Objects of Atrocity: Material Culture and the Challenges of Difficult Histories

The vast majority of people throughout history have left few written traces. That is especially the case for those who were brutally forced from their homes, stripped of their possessions, and swiftly imprisoned, enslaved, or murdered. Objects of Atrocity: Material Culture and the Challenges of Difficult Histories addresses how we return humanity to these people in order to avoid their erasure from history. Academics and practitioners from a variety of disciplines and cross-disciplinary approaches grapple with the challenges and possibilities relating to the collection, conservation, storage, and display of objects in the aftermath of mass atrocities. This collection confronts a range of difficult histories including the Holocaust; the genocides in Cambodia, Rwanda, former Yugoslavia, Iraq, and Kurdistan; the incarceration of Japanese Americans; and a diverse range of crimes committed against Native Americans, African Americans, Roma, and Sinti people. The goal of this volume is to restore the dignity of these people and communities through the examination of the material culture left behind.

Robert M. Ehrenreich is director of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum’s Academic Research and Dissemination Division. He is the author or editor of four books, an international journal, and over thirty articles and reviews on the Holocaust, Holocaust studies, and European history and prehistory. His research focuses on Holocaust material culture and digital humanities. Ehrenreich has also worked on Holocaust representation and the perpetrator-victim-bystander constellation. He was previously a postdoctoral fellow at the Smithsonian; a research associate at the University of Illinois, Urbana; a senior staff scientist at The National Academies; and an associate research professor at George Washington University.

Jane E. Klinger is an independent researcher and preservation consultant and chair of ICOM International Committee for Memorial and Human Rights Museums. She is known for her work in developing the theory and conservation methodologies of the material culture of trauma. She has published articles and presented papers to various professional groups and universities in the United States and abroad. Her most recent publication is the chapter “Photography, Genocide, and Crimes Against Humanity” in Conservation of Photographs: Significance, Use, and Care. She was a 2022 Woman of Science in the Arts honoree by the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts, National Gallery. In 2023, she received the American Institute for Conservation Rutherford J. Gettens Award.

Gabriel H. Pizzorno is a senior lecturer on history, director of the Digital History Program, and faculty chair of the Digital Scholarship Group at Harvard University. His research leverages material culture, cutting-edge computing methodologies, and data-centric approaches to overcome the limitations of traditional primary sources and extend the range and depth of historical enquiry. Pizzorno’s major ongoing project is the Documentary Archaeology of Late Medieval Europe (DALME). He was the recipient of the Digital Humanities and Multimedia Prize of the Medieval Academy of America in 2022.

Caroline Sturdy Colls is a professor of Holocaust archaeology and genocide investigation and director of the Centre of Archaeology at the University of Huddersfield. Her research has led to new material and spatial understandings of the Holocaust and other genocides, and contributed to missing persons cases in and beyond conflict. She is the author of several monographs, including Holocaust Archaeologies: Approaches and Future Directions, “Adolf Island”: The Nazi Occupation of Alderney, and the forthcoming Finding Treblinka: Forensic and Archaeological Perspectives. She was the recipient of the European Archaeological Heritage Prize in 2016, the Distinguished Medal of Honor from the Treblinka Museum in 2021, and the Dan David Prize in 2025.