A Tribute to Sugihara Chiune
Sunday, March 2nd, 2025 from 2-5:30 pm EST
Wasserman Cinematheque, Brandeis University
Co-sponsored by: Department of Fine Arts, Japanese Students Association, East Asian
Studies, and Near Eastern and Judaic Studies.
About the Event
Join us for “Persona Non Grata,” a film on how a Japanese diplomat saved thousands of Jews during World War II. Special pre-screening presentation by Dr. Sheva Zucker.
Synopsis
Chiune Sugihara is a Japanese diplomat posted in Lithuania. He is also a world-class spy. In Lithuania, he and his partner, Pesh, gather intelligence on European affairs. As WWII began and Germany invaded Poland, hordes of Jewish refugees fled to Lithuania. In search of transit visas, they turn to Sugihara who is torn between his loyalty to his country and his loyalty to mankind.
About the Speaker
Dr. Sheva Zucker’s father, Meyer Zucker, received a transit visa to Japan from Chiune Sugihara and lived in Kobe, Japan as a refugee for around seven months followed by seven years in Shanghai. She herself is a Yiddish educator and scholar. She is the author of the textbooks Yiddish: An Introduction to the Language, Literature & Culture, Vols. I & II, and is currently working on a third textbook. She taught Yiddish for many years in the Uriel Weinreich Program in Yiddish Language, Literature and Culture, currently under the auspices of Bard College and the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research in New York City. She currently teaches for the YIVO and the Workers Circle. From 2005 until 2020 she served as the executive director of the League for Yiddish as well as the editor-in-chief of its magazine Afn Shvel. She has taught and lectured on Yiddish language, literature and culture on five continents. Her research and translation work focus mostly on women in Yiddish literature.