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The University of Southampton
HistoryPart of Humanities

PhD Studentship in Music and the Holocaust

Published: 11 March 2015

Applications are invited for a fully-funded interdisciplinary PhD studentship as part of the Music and the Holocaust website project.

The Music and the Holocaust website is a widely-used educational resource created under the auspices of the international organisation World ORT, and was featured at a United Nations presentation in 2014. The website includes hundreds of articles describing the wide range of musical activities that took place in camps and ghettos across Nazi-occupied Europe, focusing on the work of professional musicians and composers as well as music created and performed by millions of ‘ordinary’ people in response to their experiences of internment. It also contains dozens of recordings as well as resources for teachers, students, commemoration organisers, and members of the general public interested in the subject. One of the key goals of the project is to bring the material to a wide audience and encourage its use in teaching and commemorative activity.

The PhD student’s research will focus on any aspect of musical activity in Germany or its occupied territories during the period of Nazi rule between 1933 and 1945.

The student will also spend three hours per week overseeing the website, including soliciting new articles and music recordings, writing short articles for the site based on their own research, and working with the Parkes Institute’s Outreach Programme to integrate use of the website in secondary teaching.

The student's principal supervisor will be Dr Shirli Gilbert, with a co-supervisor selected to suit the candidate's particular research interests. Students will be registered at the University of Southampton.

You are strongly recommended to contact Dr Shirli Gilbert (s.gilbert@soton.ac.uk) to discuss your proposal in advance of submission.

The PhD studentship requires at least a high 2:1 honours degree (or equivalent) and a Masters in either History, Music, or a related discipline.

The PhD scholarship is tenable for a maximum of three years, commencing September 2015, at an annual stipend of circa £15,000. Tuition fees will also be paid directly to the University at the appropriate UKEU fee rate.

Application for this studentship is by CV; a sample of written work (4,000 words, max); an 800 word personal statement; and a 1500 word research proposal. The research proposal should be in line with the topic outlined above. Please also arrange for two academic references to be sent independently by the deadline. All material should be sent to pgafh@soton.ac.uk.

Deadline for applications: Friday 24 April 2015

We may invite you for interview over telephone or Skype (date tbc).

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