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Award-winning filmmaker Pierre Sauvage to give human rights, democracy lecture

April 14, 2008

Pierre Sauvage, award-winning filmmaker, producer and screenwriter, will deliver the Mildred Fish-Harnack Human Rights and Democracy Lecture at the University of Wisconsin–Madison.

Sauvage will give a lecture titled “Did Americans Fight the Holocaust” on Tuesday, April 15 at 4 pm in the Wisconsin Historical Society Auditorium (816 State St., Madison).

An Emmy Award-winning documentary filmmaker, Pierre Sauvage is best known for his 1989 documentary "Weapons of the Spirit," which won numerous awards and remains one of the most widely used documentary teaching tools on the Holocaust. An expert on rescuers of Jews during the Holocaust, Sauvage is currently focusing on the American experience of the Holocaust.

"Weapons of the Spirit" will screen on Monday, April 14 at 6 pm in the Browsing Library at Memorial Union (800 Langdon St., Madison).
These events are sponsored by the Global Legal Studies Center and the Division of International Studies and are co-sponsored by the Mosse/Weinstein Center for Jewish Studies, the Department of Communication Arts, and the Center for Interdisciplinary French Studies. Both events are free and open to the public.

The Mildred Fish-Harnack Human Rights and Democracy Lecture is named after a Milwaukee native who was a vibrant and active student at UW–Madison in the 1920s. While living in Germany, Fish-Harnack assisted in the escape of German Jews and political dissidents. She is the only American civilian executed under the personal instruction of Adolf Hitler, for her resistance to the Nazi regime.

The Mildred Fish-Harnack Human Rights and Democracy Lecture is designed to promote greater understanding of human rights and democracy, and enrich international studies at UW–Madison.