Where They Settled: Holocaust Survivors in Mexico

This talk by Dr. Yael Siman explores the early and later efforts of Holocaust survivors to remember and recount their experiences, and how the transmission of these stories to their families gave rise to the construction of Holocaust memory in Mexico—one that is both similar to and distinct from other Latin American memories. While this memory includes stories of persecution and forced migration, it also reveals multiple forms of adaptation and healing within a Mexican context that was hospitable, though not necessarily democratic.

Yael Siman earned her Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Chicago. In 2024-2025 Siman was a fellow of the Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture (MFJC). She is Research Professor in the Department of Social and Political Sciences at Iberoamericana University in Mexico City. Siman is co-author of the book Victim Activists in Mexico: Social and Political Mobilization amid Extreme Violence and Disappearances, published by Lexington Books in 2024, co-author of the article “From Europe to Mexico: The Unexpected Journey of Thirty Jewish Families Escaping Nazism,” Holocaust and Genocide Studies, also published in 2024, and co-editor of the volume Holocaust and Latin America: Migration, Settlement and Memory, published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2025. She is currently conducting a research project on the migration trajectories and the memories of Holocaust survivors in Mexico.

This program is free, but RSVP required.