Dr. Barbara Engelking

Professional Background

Professor Barbara Engelking is founder and Director of the Polish Center of Holocaust Research at the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology at the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw (Poland). She received her PhD in sociology from the Polish Academy of Science and her MA in psychology from Warsaw University. While in residence at the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies, Professor Engelking conducted research on her project, “Hiding on the Aryan Side in Warsaw, 1940-1944.”

Professor Engelking has published a number of works in multiple languages, including: “Jest taki piękny słoneczny dzień…” Losy Żydów szukających ratunku na wsi polskiej 1942-1945 ["_It is Such a Beautiful and Sunny Day:" The Fate of Jews seeking Refuge in Polish Villages, 1942-194_5]  (Polish Center for Holocaust Research, 2011), The Warsaw Ghetto: The Guide to the Perished City, co-authored with Jacek Leociak (Yale University Press, 2009) and others. Along with her role as professor at the Polish Academy of Sciences, Professor Engelking also serves as the President of the International Auschwitz Council.

Fellowship Research

As the Ina Levine Invitational Scholar at the Mandel Center, Professor Engelking analyzed the survival strategies of Jews who lived in or around the Warsaw Ghetto after 1940 and those who were in hiding after 1942. She used diverse sources, archival documents and personal communications to collect information about the people in hiding in Warsaw, and those individuals who helped, refused to help, or took a stand against those in hiding. This project allowed the creation of an extensive map of hiding on the Aryan side, which represents not only the geography of hiding in Warsaw, but also the process and psychological dimension of living in secret.

Professor Barbara Engelking was in residence at the Mandel Center from November 1, 2015 to April 30, 2016.