Dr Dominic Williams

Assistant Professor

School: Humanities and Social Sciences

I gained a PhD in Jewish Studies from the University of Leeds, and since then have worked teaching English Literature, Art History and Jewish History and Culture at Leeds, Reading, York St John and Southampton universities. I was Montague Burton Fellow in Jewish Studies at Leeds from 2016 until my appointment at Northumbria in Sept 2019. Like my teaching, my work is deeply interdisciplinary, and is often collaborative. Many of my recent projects have been carried out with Nicholas Chare (University of Montreal), with whom I have co-edited two and co-authored four books. In Matters of Testimony (2015), we engaged with the ‘Scrolls of Auschwitz’, the manuscripts written by the prisoners forced to work in the gas chambers of Birkenau, the Sonderkommando (SK). Following on from that work, The Auschwitz Sonderkommando (2019) considered post-war witness borne by survivors of SK in trials, memoirs, video interviews and films. I have also published articles and chapters on cultural representations of the SK. My research therefore addresses general questions of Holocaust testimony, memory and representation.

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Key Publications

Please visit the Pure Research Information Portal for further information
The Faces of Auschwitz: Digital Colourisation, Ethics and the Archive, Williams, D., Watkins, L. 17 Feb 2025, In: Visual Studies
The Routledge Handbook to Auschwitz-Birkenau, Cushman, S., Pettitt, J., Williams, D. 12 Aug 2025
The Clinical Witness: Conflict, Catastrophe and Medical Testimony, Chare, N., Barnett, N., Williams, D. 4 Sep 2025
Testimonies of Resistance: Representations of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Sonderkommando, Chare, N., Williams, D. 18 Sep 2019
Matters of Testimony: Interpreting the Scrolls of Auschwitz, Chare, N., Williams, D. Dec 2015

Professional Activity

Please visit the Pure Research Information Portal for further information
Publication Peer-review: Holocaust and Genocide Studies (Journal) 2023

PGR Supervision

Hannah Buckley What challenges did Holocaust survivors face in integrating into post-war UK and how did they overcome them? Start Date: 01/10/2024
Diane Asensio Adapting the Holocaust: Representation in Fact and Fiction from Page to Screen Start Date: 01/10/2024

PGR Supervision

Hannah Buckley A New Home: Holocaust Survivors, Community and Postwar Yorkshire Start Date: 01/10/2024
Hannah Buckley A New Home: Holocaust Survivors, Community and Postwar Yorkshire Start Date: 01/10/2024 End Date: 17/10/2025
Diane Asensio Adapting Auschwitz:representation of Auschwitz-Birkenau in film adaptations of memoirs and novelised memoirs Start Date: 01/10/2024
Diane Asensio Adapting Auschwitz:representation of Auschwitz-Birkenau in film adaptations of memoirs and novelised memoirs Start Date: 01/10/2024 End Date: 17/10/2025