USC Shoah Foundation and ProQuest are bringing the 53,000 testimonies in the Visual History Archive to thousands of students and researchers at colleges and universities around the world.

1. Visual History Archive (VHA)
2018

2. Agenda
• Genesis of the Visual History Archive (VHA)
• VHA description, key statistics, & value proposition
• USC Shoah Foundation and ProQuest partnership
• VHA collections, languages, and experience groups
• VHA demonstration screenshots
• VHA transcripts
• Filming the VHA
• VHA in teaching & research
• Bundle themes
• Etc.

3. Genesis of the VHA

4. https://sfi.usc.edu/pressroom/kit

5. VHA:
description, key statistics,
& value proposition

6. What is the Visual History Archive?
• The Visual History Archive is a streaming, 24/7, collection of over ~55,000
video testimonies of survivors and witnesses of genocide, including:
– The European Holocaust (1939-1945)
– Armenian Genocide (1915-1923)
– Nanjing Massacre (1937)
– Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda (1994)
– Guatemalan Genocide (1978-1996)
– Cambodian Genocide (1975-1979)
– Central African Republic Conflict (2012-Present)
– Contemporary Antisemitism
– South Sudan Civil War (2013-Present)
• An intuitive platform on which one may filter/view/save testimonies for
research

7. Key statistics

9. VHA value proposition
• New streaming, 24/7, of all ~55,000
testimonies
• No more infrastructure requirements like
an Internet2 line or dedicated cache
server
• Links to related ProQuest primary source
content at the testimony segment-level,
with ability to sort results
• 984 Holocaust-related English transcripts
and 900 Holocaust-related German
transcripts now available, with more
transcription to follow in coming years
• New one-time purchase acquisition model
(Perpetual Access License, or “PAL”) with
a modest annual “New Data Fee”
No download delays!
Puts testimonies in historical context
A more granular level of research
Purchase with funds readily available

10. USC Shoah Foundation and
ProQuest partnership

11. USC Shoah Foundation and ProQuest partnership
USC Shoah Foundation goal = Expand VHA access to thousands of
researchers and institutions
To help realize this goal, ProQuest committed to the following:
1. Serve as the exclusive VHA distributor to the markets:
higher education
government
museums
2. Provide related ProQuest content for the VHA interviews, at both the
one-minute-segment and entire testimony-level
3. Create transcripts for VHA video testimonies

12. VHA
facts, figures, and updates

13. Testimonies by organization
European Holocaust, 1939-1945
• USC Shoah Foundation—51,456
• Jewish Family and Children's Services (JFCS), San
Francisco, the Peninsula, Marin and Sonoma
Counties—912
• Florida Holocaust Museum—25
• Holocaust Memorial Center Zekelman Family Campus—
25
• Holocaust Museum Houston—277
• Canadian Collections—1,234
– Alex Dworkin Canadian Jewish Archives--64
– Calgary Jewish Federation--10
– Concordia University Centre for Oral History &
Digital Storytelling--30
– Freeman Family Foundation Holocaust Education
Centre--52
– Jewish Archives & Historical Society of Edmonton
& Northern Alberta--15
– Living Testimonies, McGill University—104
– Montreal Holocaust Museum—550
– Sarah and Chaim Neuberger Holocaust Education
Centre--406
– Ottawa Jewish Archives—3
TOTAL: 54,449
Armenian Genocide, 1915-1923
• Armenian Film Foundation—333
• Richard G. Hovannisian Armenian Genocide Oral History
Collection—10
• USC Shoah Foundation—1
Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda, 1994
• Kigali Genocide Memorial--70
• USC Shoah Foundation—15
• Holocaust Museum Houston—1
Guatemalan Genocide, 1978-1996
• Fundación de Antropologia Forense de Guatemala (FAFG)—31
• USC Shoah Foundation--1
Nanjing Massacre, 1937
• USC Shoah Foundation—30
Contemporary Antisemitism
• USC Shoah Foundation--15
Cambodian Genocide, 1975-1979
• USC Shoah Foundation—5
Central African Republic Conflict, 2012-Present
• USC Shoah Foundation--4
South Sudan Civil War, 2013-Present
• USC Shoah Foundation--4

14. Experience Groups
European Holocaust/World War II era, 1939-1945
Jewish Survivors 51,332
Rescuer and Aid Providers 1,159
Liberators and Liberation Witnesses 429
Sinti and Roma Survivors 406
Political Prisoners 268
Miscellaneous (World War II) 156
Jehovah’s Witness Survivors 84
War Crimes Trial Participants 62
Non-Jewish Forced Laborers 14
Eugenics Policies Survivors 13
Homosexual Survivors 6
TOTAL: 54,449
Armenian Genocide, 1915-1923
Armenian Survivor 246
Miscellaneous 37
Descendant 20
Scholar 18
Rescuer and Aid Provider 7
Foreign Witness 7
Yezidi Survivor 6
Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda, 1994
Tutsi Survivor 67
Rescuer 13
Elder 4
Hutu Power Opponent 1
Victim’s Spouse 1
Nanjing Massacre, 1937
Nanjing Massacre Survivor 30
Cambodian Genocide, 1975-1979
Cambodian Genocide Survivor 5
Central African Republic Conflict, 2012-Present
Central African Republican Conflict Witness 4
Contemporary Antisemitism
Interviewee 15
Guatemalan Genocide, 1978-1996
Guatemalan Genocide Survivor 32
South Sudan Civil War, 2013-Present
South Sudan Conflict Witness 4

15. Testimony languages
Arabic 15
Armenian 161
Bulgarian 623
Croatian 393
Czech 560
Danish 69
Dutch 1,076
English 27,250
Flemish 5
French 1,918
German 924
Greek 318
Hebrew 6,28
Hungarian 1,348
Italian 433
Japanese 1
Khmer 2
K’iche’ 5
Kinyarwanda 75
Kurdish 3
Ladino 9
Latvian 1
Lithuanian 46
Macedonian 9
Mandarin
Chinese 30
Norwegian 34
Polish 1,515
Portuguese 560
Romani 24
Romanian 130
Russian 7,136
Serbian 384
Sign 5
Slovak 561
Slovenian 6
Spanish 1,379
Swedish 264
Turkish 14
Ukrainian 304
Yiddish 575
TOTAL 54,449

16. Testimony countries (where filmed)
Argentina 731
Armenia 14
Australia 2,495
Austria 189
Belarus 246
Belgium 205
Bolivia 23
Bosnia & Herzegovina 55
Brazil 564
Bulgaria 627
Canada 4,083
Chile 65
Colombia 15
Costa Rica 19
Croatia 327
Czech Republic 563
Denmark 104
Ecuador 9
Estonia 9
Finland 1
France 1,662
Georgia 6
Germany 672
Greece 324
Guatemala 31
Hungary 790
Ireland 4
Israel 8,460
Italy 418
Japan 1
Kazakhstan 6
Latvia 79
Lebanon 4
Lithuania 137
Macedonia 9
Mexico 111
Moldova 284
The Netherlands 1,046
New Zealand 53
Norway 34
People’s Republic of China 30
Peru 2
Poland 1,381
Portugal 2
Romania 147
Russia 675
Rwanda 77
Slovakia 657
Slovenia 11
South Africa 250
South Sudan 4
Spain 7
Sweden 325
Switzerland 69
Syria 30
Ukraine 3,428
United Kingdom 872
United States 21,276
Uruguay 124
Uzbekistan 25
Venezuela 227
Yugoslavia 346
Zimbabwe 8

17. Breadth of coverage
Pre-WWII Period 1933–1938
20% of VHA
• Dictatorship under Hitler
• Pre-war life in home country
and country of immigration
• Geographical locations
• Early stages of persecution
& antisemitism
• The first concentration
camps
Intra-War Period 1939–1945
60% of VHA
• World War II in Europe
• Murder of the disabled
• The Holocaust
• Ghettos
• Mobile killing squads
• Victims of Nazi persecution
• Jewish resistance
• Non-Jewish resistance
• Rescue
• United States
• Forced marches
• Liberation
Post-WWII 1945-Present
20% of VHA
• Rescue and aid efforts
• War crime trials
• Displaced persons camps
• Emigration/Immigration

18. VHA
demonstration screenshots

19. Users login as a “guest” or with a UN/PW

21. Quick Search results list

22. ProQuest Search in Segment

23. ProQuest primary source results

24. ProQuest content search filters

25. Full text search result for article or page

26. VHA transcripts

27. Transcript in English

28. Transcript in German

30. More about transcripts and subtitles/closed captioning
• There are 984 English Holocaust-related transcripts and
~900 German Holocaust-related transcripts available
now, with more transcription to follow yearly
• Transcripts will be in the language of the interview, and
will not be translated
• There are subtitles/closed captioning for 74 Rwandan,
30 Nanjing, 77 Armenian, and two Cambodian
testimonies (more to come soon)

31. Filming the VHA:
professional, worldwide volunteers

32. Professionally-trained videographers and
interviewers
Since 1999, the following basic equipment requirements have
been necessary to tape the USC Shoah Foundation
interviews:
• Professional Broadcast Camera w/ Betacam SP deck
• Zoom Lens
• Tripod w/Head
• Monitor
• Lowell Light Kit or equivalent
• Soft Box or ability to create
look of soft box
• Batteries
• Lavaliere (lapel microphone)
• Boom Mic

33. Visual History Archive
Teaching and Research

34. Appropriate for these course disciplines

35. • 540+ Courses Taught Using
VHA in 25+ Disciplines
• 90+ Published Articles
Citing the VHA
• 70+ Published Books Citing
the VHA
• 60+ Dissertations Citing the
VHA
Source: USC Shoah Foundation
Academic use of the Visual History Archive

36. Scholarly publication example
The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos, 1933-1945: Ghettos
in German-Occupied Eastern Europe (Volume II)
• comprehensive account of how the Nazis conducted the
Holocaust in scattered towns and villages of Poland and the
Soviet Union
• covers 1,150+ sites, including both open and closed ghettos
• regional essays outline the patterns of ghettoization in 19
German administrative regions.
• key events in the history of the ghetto tell: living and working
conditions; activities of the Jewish Councils; Jewish responses
to persecution; demographic changes; and details of the
ghetto's liquidation
• personal testimonies convey the character of each ghetto
• source citations provide a guide to additional information
• shows hundreds of smaller sites―previously unknown or
overlooked in the historiography of the Holocaust
• An indispensable reference work on the destroyed Jewish
communities of Eastern Europe.

37. Bundle themes

38. VHA bundle opportunities
• Historic Newspapers: Jerusalem Post; The
American Hebrew & Jewish Messenger (1857-
1922); The American Israelite (1854-2000); The
Jewish Advocate (1905-1990); Jewish Exponent
(1887-1990)
• History Vault: New Deal; WWII; Immigration
Records; Vietnam
• Digital National Security Advisor (DNSA):
Berlin; Soviet Era; China; El Salvador; Peru;
Guatemala; U.S. Intelligence
• Alexander Street Press: Human Rights Studies
Online; Border and Migration Studies Online;
Oral History Online; Disability in the Modern
World; Twentieth Century Religious Thought:
Volume I, Christianity & Volume III: Judaism
• Executive Branch Documents, Part IV 1946-
1948: Nuremburg trial transcripts and evidence
from the US Army

39. Customers, Etc.

40. VHA Customers 2016-Present
• Michigan State University
• University of Melbourne
• Victoria University Wellington
• Chapman University
• University of Denver
• Georgetown University
• Australian Catholic University
• Princeton University
• New York University
• Keene State College
• Ferris State University
• American University of Paris
• Stockton University
• Frankfurt University
• Columbia University
• La Trobe University
• Universitaet Salzburg
• Clark University
• Centennial College
• Nova Southeastern University
• University of Alberta
• University of Kent
• Appalachian State University
• University of Tennessee
• Wake Forest University
• Central European University
• Brown University
• Texas A&M University
• Troy University
• United States Military Academy
• University of North Carolina
Greensboro
• Brandeis University
• Institute of Contemporary History
in Munich
• Duke University
• Loyola Marymount University
• The University of North Carolina at
Chapel Hill
• University of South Florida
• Universidad Iberoamericana,
Mexico
• Bielefeld University
• Carmel Catholic High School
• Claremont University Consortia
• Cornell University
• Emory University
• Los Angeles Museum of the
Holocaust
• McMaster University
• Northwestern University
• Ohio State University
• Syracuse University
• Universität Wien
• Universitätsbibliothek Gießen
• University of Michigan
• University of Minnesota
• University of Nebraska-Omaha
• University of Ottawa
• University of Pennsylvania
• University of Toronto
• Dartmouth College
• Drexel University
• Eötvös Loránd University - ELTE
• Royal Holloway UCL
• University of Texas, Dallas
• Indiana University
• Stanford University
• University of Bristol
• Museum of the History of Polish
Jews
• Harvard University
• Rutgers University
• York University
• Vanderbilt University
• American University

41. Customer testimonials
• “Oral testimonies provide essential historical and emotional truths about the
Holocaust.”
• “Faculty from a range of disciplines are interested in furthering their research through
this archive.”
• “All of us hope to complement our printed sources with these oral testimonies as we
write about history, language, economics, trauma studies, literature, and
more. Many of us have also begun using these testimonies in the classroom,
encouraging our students to delve into them in their own research.”
• “Seeing and hearing an individual who had actually witnessed the concentration
camps had a powerful emotional impact on students and brought them closer to
understanding the absolute monstrosity of the Holocaust.”
• “The Visual History Archive is a truly unique and extraordinary resource for education
and research…The Archive is an unparalleled resource to students and faculty in
many fields, but particularly to undergraduates studying the Holocaust and to
graduate students in our new M.A. program in War and Society in the Department of
History. The purchase of the perpetual license is yet another demonstration of
Chapman University’s commitment to research.”

42. Supplementary VHA license terms
Authorized Users may create derivative materials
for teaching purposes as part of courses offered by
their subscribing institution and may post such
materials to a virtual learning environment on the
internet solely for the duration of the course.
Notwithstanding 6(c ) of the Permitted Uses, only
transcripts of the videos will be available for file
delivery and local loading where a PAL has been
purchased.

43. Thank you and learn more!
• Check out the ProQuest VHA LibGuide:
http://proquest.libguides.com/visualhistoryarchive
• View the “VHA Story” video or download brochures at:
https://sfi.usc.edu/pressroom/kit
• For additional information: globalmarketingqueries@proquest.com
• Contact your ProQuest Sales Specialist
or Account Manager for pricing or to set
up a free, 30-day trial today!