maria.ferenc[at]uwr.edu.pl
Dr. Maria Ferenc is a researcher of the history of Jews during the Holocaust, and is the leader of the “Mordechaj Anielewicz – Biography and Memory” grant financed by the National Science Center and affiliated with the Taube Department of Jewish Studies.
Ferenc completed her master’s degree at the University of Warsaw at the College of Interdisciplinary Individual Studies in the Humanities and Social Sciences (MISH). Her doctoral dissertation, written under the supervision of prof. dr hab. Barbara Engelking at the Faculty of Sociology of the University of Warsaw, focused on the circulation of news in the Warsaw Ghetto. She is currently preparing a book entitled “Każdy pyta, co z nami będzie” Mieszkańcy getta warszawskiego wobec wiadomości o wojnie i Zagładzie (Everyone Asks What Will Happen to Us. Residents of the Warsaw Ghetto in the Face of News about the War and the Holocaust), which is based on her dissertation, which in turn won numerous awards and distinctions, including the “Polityka” Historical Award and an honorary mention in the Yad Vashem International Book Prize for Holocaust Research 2022 competition.
Ference has received scholarships from, among others, Yad Vashem, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Fondation Memoire de la Shoah, finalist of the “Polityka” Scientific Award (2023). Coordinator of the project of the English edition of the Ringelblum Archive and the research project “Encyclopedia of the Warsaw Ghetto”. She is co-editor of 3 volumes of documents from the Ringelblum Archive.
Ference worked as one of the curators of the Main Exhibition at the POLIN Museum (2010-2014), and since 2017 is associated with the Research Department of the Emanuel Ringelblum Jewish Historical Institute.
Her research interests include the Warsaw Ghetto, as well as the history of Jewish conspiracy and resistance during the Holocaust.