Norah Karrouche

Dr. Norah Karrouche is an Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, specializing in historical culture and memory in Morocco, Algeria, and North African communities in Europe. Her research focuses on Berber cultural activism, oral history, and the reception of antiquity in colonial contexts. She actively contributes to digital humanities initiatives through CLARIAH, integrating oral history into research infrastructures.

Education:

• PhD in History of Society, Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam (2013)
• MA in Classics and Ancient Civilizations, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (2008)
• Licentiaat/MA in Ancient History, KU Leuven (2006)

Research Interests: She investigates Berber museums, Moroccan history textbooks, French colonial ethnology, and digital humanities applications. Her work bridges academic research with community archives, emphasizing data reuse in large-scale infrastructures like CLARIAH-PLUS.

Awards: Recipient of the 2010 Emile Zola Award for her essay on cultural-political issues. Nominated three times for the Faculty of Humanities Teaching Award (2018–2020).

Grants & Projects:

• Principal Investigator for the StoRe project (2024–2026) focusing on oral history preservation
• CLARIAH-PLUS integration of oral history collections
• NWO-funded research on Moroccan Rif migration history

Teaching: Teaches global history courses including 'International Relations from Below' and developed the Huizinga Summer School in Digital Humanities. Active in curriculum development emphasizing decolonial perspectives.

Labs/Teams: Collaborates with CLARIAH on digital humanities tools like the Dexter web application for cross-disciplinary referencing. Engages with institutions such as the Max Planck Institute and Centre Jacques Berque.