“'Double Memory' in Slovakia: War and Genocide in Testimony”
Professional Background
Mr. J. Luke Ryder is a PhD candidate in history at McGill University in Montreal, (Canada). He received an MA in history from Northeastern University and a BS in journalism from Boston University. A native English speaker, he possesses language skills in Slovak, Czech, German, and French. While in residence at the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies, Mr. Ryder conducted research on his project, “'Double Memory' in Slovakia: War and Genocide in Testimony”.
Mr. Ryder has published articles in two edited volumes: “Občianska vojna na Slovensku? Načrtnutie teoretického prístupu k Slovenskému národnému povstaniu” [Civil War in Slovakia? Outlining a Theoretical Approach to the Slovak National Uprising] in Slovenské národné povstanie: Slovensko a Európa v roku 1944 [Slovak National Uprising: Slovakia and Europe in 1944] (Dolis, 2014) and the forthcoming “Slovenské Národné Povstanie a 1968: Historiografia a politika v predvečer normalizácie [The Slovak National Uprising and 1968: Historiography and Politics on the Eve of Normalization]” (Slovenská akadémia vied, 2016). He has given presentations on his research at various conferences and institutions in Europe and North America, including the Slovak Institute for Sociology, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, and the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. Mr. Ryder's research has been supported by grants from the Fulbright Foundation, the American Council of Learned Societies, the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), the Center for German and European Studies at the University of Montreal, and McGill University.
Fellowship Research
For his Gunzenberger-Reichman Family Fellowship at the Mandel Center, Mr. Ryder utilized the Museum's extensive collection of narrative testimonies and archival documents to examine the interplay between ethnic Slovak and Jewish communities during the Nazi occupation of Slovakia in 1944 and the nation-wide uprising that followed. Beyond broadening our limited knowledge of the experience of Slovak Jews during this period, he aimed to illuminate contemporary perceptions of the Holocaust and a shared Slovak-Jewish past in Slovakia, as well as to describe their implications for ethnic politics in the Slovak Republic and the wider region.
Mr. J. Luke Ryder was in residence at the Mandel Center from April 1 to August 12, 2016.