About

Welcome to my personal website!

My name is Emily Julia Roche.

I currently hold the position of Lecturer on History & Literature at Harvard University in Cambridge, MA. I was previously a Government of Ireland Postdoctoral Fellow at Maynooth University in County Kildare, Ireland. My current research explores how architects and other building technicians employed spacial strategies of survival at Auschwitz. I am a historian of modern Eastern Europe with interdisciplinary research focuses in the fields of Holocaust and genocide studies, the history of modern architecture, and urban studies. As a teacher, I focus on the classroom acquisition of skills (including source analysis, critical thinking, argument construction, and digital humanities tools) and the active practice of historical empathy in order to train students as versatile problem-solvers. I am a service-minded member of my profession and have experience as an editor, conference co-organiser, reading group convenor, and peer reviewer. I am fully fluent in Polish and English and also conduct research in German, Russian, and Czech.   

Outside of my academic life, I enjoy urban exploration (I'm currently based near Boston), watching movies, feeding the local corvids, and running (I completed my first marathon in Warsaw in 2025). 

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(Photo: Warsaw, Poland, 2017)