"The Holocaust as Regional and Comparative History: Yugoslavia, 1941-1945"
Professional Background
Emil Kerenji received a Ph.D. in history at the University of Michigan, an M.A. in history at the Central European University, Budapest and a B.A. in history and political science at American University in Bulgaria. In fall 2008 he began a tenure-track assistant professorship of modern Eastern European history at the University of South Carolina. For his Raul Hilberg Fellowship, Dr. Kerenji conducted research on “The Holocaust as Regional and Comparative History: Yugoslavia, 1941-1945.”
Dr. Kerenji is the recipient of several academic honors including the Marshall Weinberg Prize for Outstanding Graduate Work in Judaic Studies and the Rackham Predoctoral Fellowship at the University of Michigan. His publications include “Vojvodina Since 1988” in Serbia since 1989: Politics and Society under Milošević and After, Sabrina Ramet and and Vjeran Pavlaković, eds. (University of Washington Press, 2005) and “Dimitrije Ljotić” in Anti-Semitism: A Historical Encyclopedia of Prejudice and Persecution, Richard Levy, ed. (ABC Clio, 2005). In addition to English, Dr. Kerenji is fluent in Serbian, Croatian, and Bosnian, and has reading knowledge of Hebrew, Yiddish, German, Bulgarian and Macedonian.
Fellowship Research
During his fellowship at the Center, Dr. Kerenji researched the Holocaust in Yugoslavia. In particular, he contextualized the complexity of everyday life in the different parts of Yugoslavia during the Holocaust as a means for better understanding of the collaboration, resistance, and accommodation, which has remained relatively understudied.
Dr. Kerenji was in residence at the Mandel Center from January 1 to August 30, 2008.