Join our community partners for two upcoming film events exploring Jewish history.

The Balkan Sephardim: Stories from a World Destroyed

This screening of multimedia films includes a conversation with Edward Serotta, director of Centropa, a Jewish historical institute based in Vienna.

Part of a teachers’ seminar in Columbia, this public event is a partnership with the University of South Carolina College of Education, the SC Council for the Social Studies and the South Carolina Council on the Holocaust. The program is a 1 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 18 at The Nickelodeon Theater, 1607 Main St.

Edward Serotta is a Savannah-born, Vienna-based writer, photographer and filmmaker. He is the author of three books on Jews in central Europe, including “Survival in Sarajevo: Jews, Bosnia, and the Lessons of the Past.” During the Bosnian war in the 1990s, he filed reports for National Public Radio, TIME, and Süddeutsche Zeitung. In 2000, Serotta founded Centropa to preserve European Jewish memory through family pictures and stories. Centropa now works with more than 500 schools in 20 countries.

Boys of Birkenau Documentary

Check out this free screening of a documentary telling the remarkable story of how 89 Jewish boys survived the horrors of the Holocaust in the Birkenau death camp. The free public event features a question and answer session with director Rich Newburg and writer Sarah Spoto.

There are two opportunities for this screening:

• 7 p.m., Sunday, Feb. 25 at the Katie & Irwin Kahn JCC, 306 Flora Drive, Columbia
• 7 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 27 at Harbison Theater, 7300 College St., Irmo

Both are free and open to the public. For more info call Cheryl Nail at 803-787-2023, ext. 211.