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Amy Simon

Amy Simon
  • Associate Professor
  • Faculty

BIOGRAPHY

Ph.D. Indiana University; History and Jewish Studies, Associate Professor.

Professor Simon is the William and Audrey Farber Family Chair in Holocaust Studies and European Jewish History. She holds a joint appointment with James Madison College and the Department of History in the College of Social Science and is a core faculty member of the Serling Institute for Jewish Studies and Modern Israel in the College of Arts and Letters.

Dr. Simon is a former fellow and researcher at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. Her research foregrounds empathy as a historical method. Her work investigates victim/perpetrator relationships during the Holocaust, the so called “grey zones” of behavior that characterized that time, the world of Holocaust victim perceptions and emotions, and issues of representation and language within Holocaust studies.

More recently, she has become involved in researching and speaking about Holocaust pedagogy. She also regularly gives public lectures and educational workshops and trainings on historical and contemporary antisemitism.

JMC Field Affiliation: 

  • Social Relations & Policy 

Courses Taught: 

  • MC-202: Introduction to Public Affairs (Research Seminar): Narratives of Memory and Trauma, Case Study: The Holocaust
  • MC-387: Jews and Antisemitism 
  • MC-498: Senior Seminar in Social Relations & Policy: The Holocaust in American Memory
  • HST-392: History of the Holocaust
  • HST-411: European Jewish History
  • UGS-200H: Honors College Seminar: History and Testimony in the Digital Age: Study in the Holocaust

RECENT SCHOLARLY PUBLICATIONS

Book: Emotions in Yiddish Ghetto Diaries: Encountering Persecutors and Questioning Humanity (London and New York: Routledge, 2023).

“Written Remnants of Catastrophe: Holocaust Diaries as Historical Sources” in Sources for Studying the Holocaust: A Guide for Students, edited by Paul Bartrop, 33-44. London and New York: Routledge, 2023.

“Imperfect Humans and Perfect Beasts:  Changing Perceptions of German and Jewish Persecutors in Holocaust Ghetto Diaries.” Journal of Jewish Identities 13, no. 1 (2020): 85-106.

“Teaching with Holocaust Diaries:  Voices from the Chasm” in Understanding and Teaching the Holocaust, edited by Avinoam Patt and Laura Hilton, 199-212.  Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, Harvey Goldberg Series for Understanding and Teaching History, 2020.

“The Keeper of Words:  Herman Kruk as Diarist, Archivist, and Librarian of the Vilna Ghetto" in Holocaust Resistance in Europe and America:  New Aspects and Dilemmas, edited by Victoria Khiterer with Abigail Gruber, 50-61. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2017.

MSU AWARDS

2024: MSU Honors College Award for Distinguished Contributions to Honors Students (with collaborators Deborah Margolis, Lynn Wolff, Steven Weiland)

2024:  MSU History Department award for DEI contributions in teaching and service

2022:  MSU Teacher-Scholar Award

2021:  MSU HARP (The Humanities and Arts Research Program) Development Grant