Testimony and Technology: The Holocaust in the Age of AI

Catalog description

The generative age of AI has arrived—and with it a profound question: what happens when machines begin to write the humanities? This seminar takes the most extreme case of modern violence, the Holocaust, to test the limits of memory, language, and empathy in the digital age. Each student works closely with one survivor testimony while engaging hands-on with digital tools, including text analysis, AI models, and media platforms. Through history, psychology, memory studies, and media theory, we will examine what AI can and cannot capture about human suffering, narrative, and truth. Drawing on history, psychology, memory studies, and media theory, the course confronts a core question of existence for the humanities: how to preserve the fractured, human voice that no machine can replicate. (HIST-HEU)