By Faith Jarrell
Student Life Editor
In honor of International Holocaust Remembrance Day on Saturday, Jan. 27, Associate Professor of Biology Dr. Aaron Krochmal gave a talk in Litrenta Lecture Hall on Wednesday, Jan. 31. The talk was entitled “Bringing the Human Back Into Human Rights: Three Stories of Holocaust Remembrance” and began at 7 p.m. in the John S. Toll Science Center.
Before the talk, the Department Chair of the Political Science Department and Louis L. Goldstein Professor of Public Affairs Dr. Christine Wade introduced Dr. Krochmal, referring to him as someone who needs “no introduction” at WC.
During the talk, Dr. Krochmal shared personal stories of his own family’s passage out of Austria in the midst of the Second World War.
“Anyone who knows him knows that he has a gift for storytelling. I started to ask him how he felt about sharing these stories more widely, as I felt that others would benefit from hearing them. I was really moved when he agreed to share them in honor of International Holocaust Remembrance Day,” Dr. Wade said.
Dr. Krochmal shared stories of his paternal grandfather, his great-uncle, and other family members. The stories included discussions of those relatives who were hate-crimed while in Austria for their religion, as well as making their way to the United States afterwards. The crimes and other disturbing acts against these relatives did not stop, however, when they got to the United States. When referring to how his relatives were treated, Dr. Krochmal asked, “And [the Americans] are supposed to be the good guys?”
“Human rights violations are more nuanced than [good and evil],” Dr. Krochmal said. “While plainly the presentation was about stories of the Holocaust, for me, it was to help motivate people to think about the way we have conversations about human rights violations and… the way in which we have conversations about human rights violations biases or constrains our way to discuss, promote, protect, and prevent future violations.”
After each story, Dr. Krochmal took the time to discuss with audience members and answer questions from the crowd. One student in the audience, sophomore Anyssya Komaroff-Fayrchyld, had particular comments on the lecture.
“The quantifiable casualties… do not sell the true impact of it. You have the unquantifiable… we are an ocean away and 30 years later and people are still fearing the fallout of that,” Fayrchyld said.
At the beginning of his talk, Dr. Krochmal showed pictures of Anne Frank and Elie Wiesel, who are two well-known victims of the Holocaust. Referring to these photos, Dr. Krochmal made it clear that “Rather than focusing on the typical narrative” he wanted to “take it down to the personal level,” believing it showed the true generational trauma of genocide.
“There are fates, people, worse than death,” Dr. Krochmal said. “We mourn the murder, but we celebrate the survivors. We should mourn the murder, celebrate survival, but mourn the survivors. Not all of them died in the Holocaust back in Europe.”
Photo by Faith Jarrell
Photo Caption: Dr. Krochmal displayed photos of records left behind after his relatives fled Austria during the Second World War.