Elmhurst University to present noted guest speaker on Holocaust

Stephen Smith will give a Holocaust lecture at Elmhurst University.

ELMHURST – Stephen D. Smith on April 24 will present “Holocaust XR: How New Media is Enabling Memory and Education,” this year’s Holocaust lecture at Elmhurst University.

Smith is an international speaker and oral historian who specializes in immersive media, according to a news release. Smith also is executive director emeritus of the USC Shoah Foundation, the archive founded by Steven Spielberg to document the Holocaust and genocide and to develop empathy, understanding and respect through testimony.

Smith is executive chairman and co-founder of StoryFile, the world’s first AI conversational video platform that brings video alive. A theologian by training, he is the USC visiting professor of religion, where he researches genocide-related testimony. The UNESCO chair on genocide education, Smith founded the UK Holocaust Centre in England and co-founded the Aegis Trust for the prevention of crimes against humanity and genocide.

He has served as a producer on a number of film and new media projects, including Dimensions in Testimony and the VR project “The Last Goodbye,” an award-winning, virtual-reality film that transports viewers inside the Nazi death camp Majdanek.

The Holocaust Service of Remembrance and Lecture will begin at 7 p.m. April 24 in the Frick Center’s Founders Lounge, 190 Prospect Ave., Elmhurst. The lecture is part of the Religious Literacy Project at Elmhurst University, which is celebrating its 150th anniversary this year.

Admission is free, but reservations are encouraged at elmhurst.edu/cultural. For information, email marketing@elmhurst.edu.

Shaw Local News Network

Shaw Local News Network

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