Huddersfield's Holocaust Centre North looking for writer and translator in residence

Earlier this year, for the first time, the centre also appointed a translator and a writer in residence to join four artists as part of the project. They too were invited to respond to and translate the centre’s memories, artefacts and accounts which cover themes of discrimination, displacement, trauma, migration, loss, memory and hope.

The centre is now seeking to appoint a new translator and writer in residence for its 24/25 programme – paid positions and open to established or less experienced candidates based in the UK.

For the translator-in-residence, Holocaust Centre North is keen to hear from those working with languages spoken by minority communities with a presence in the North of England who have experiences of migration, building a new life in England, and preserving difficult histories. It is particularly interested in working with translators with experience working in languages such as Arabic, Gujarati, Romanian, Panjabi, Polish, Slovak, Ukrainian, Urdu, as well as languages which are particularly relevant to Holocaust history and the centre’s collections, such as Czech, French, German, Hebrew and Hungarian.

The writer-in-residence will be supported to produce a new literary work engaging with material and themes in the museum, while the translator will be encouraged to produce work reflecting on the experience of living across multiple languages in the context of traumatic histories.

Both the newly appointed members will be part of a group learning programme alongside visual artists and will be given the opportunity to spend time in Holocaust Centre North’s Archive, exploring its growing collection of documentary evidence of the genocide and lives of survivors who rebuilt their lives in the North of England.

Andrew Key, head of creative development at Holocaust Centre North, said: “We want to provide a space for writers to find new ways into this difficult past, by exploring new forms or techniques, and by being supported to take steps into an area of research which may appear daunting. Our hope is that the translator-in-residence will have an opportunity to work closely with other communities in the region to find new ways of telling the shared stories of migration in the North, to help foster a celebration of the North’s diversity and history of multiculturalism. Through the programme, we hope to invite people who may have felt excluded from Holocaust history into our Archive, so that we can build a deeper understanding of the ongoing impact of our shared history across the communities in our region today.”

More details of the residency, including an open call, are available on the Holocaust Centre North website (hcn.org.uk).