Rachel Pistol

Rachel Pistol is a Research Fellow at King's College London and Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Exeter, specializing in 20th-century British and American history with a focus on WWII internment, refugee history, and historical memory. She is the EHRI-UK National Coordinator and teaches at the University of Cambridge. Her work examines parallels between historical and contemporary xenophobic policies, particularly in contexts of war and migration.

• Education: BA, MA, PhD from Royal Holloway, University of London (supervised by Prof. David Cesarani)
• Previous roles: Lecturer in History at Royal Holloway, Lecturer in Business at Kingston University

Research interests include:

• Second World War internment policies in the UK and USA
• Refugee trajectories and memorialisation
• Comparative studies of xenophobia
• Digital humanities methodologies

Publications highlight:

• Edited volumes on Holocaust legacies and internment camps
• Analysis of historical parallels to current refugee crises
• Studies on British media's treatment of refugees

Awards include the College Postgraduate Teaching Prize (2016) and fellowship in the Royal Historical Society.