Leah Niederhausen conducts PhD research into the restitution of colonial archives, focusing on historical memories, narratives, and justice.
DIALOGICS OF JUSTICE
Leah Niederhausen is a historian and PhD Candidate in the chair group of Historical Memory and Transformative Justice. Prior, Leah has worked as a researcher at the Expert Centre Restitution within the NIOD Institute for War, Holocaust, and Genocide Studies Amsterdam. She holds a B.A. from Münster University (2020, cum laude) and a M.A. in Global History from Free University Amsterdam (2023, cum laude). Her master thesis, titled Restitution and Memory. The Past Made Present in Nazi and Colonial Restitution in Germany 1945-2023 has been awarded the Jan Brouwer Thesis Award 2024 by the Dutch Royal Society of Science (KHMW).
Leah conducts PhD research into the restitution of colonial archives, focussing on historical memories, narratives, and justice. Funded by the Dutch Research Council (NWO), her research project has been awarded the PhD in the Humanities 2024 Grant. She is being supervised by Prof. Nicole Immler (UvH) and Prof. Wouter Veraart (VU Amsterdam).
Specifically, Leah explores the restitution of colonial archives as the restoration, production, and transformation of knowledge. Similar to the museological restitution field (e.g. Sarr/Savoy 2018), archival return is increasingly characterized by efforts to move beyond the archive walls to address colonialism, colonial archives, and archival displacement as epistemic injustices (e.g. Melanson 2020; Landström 2021). Following calls to challenge these epistemic injustices (e.g. Rassool 2022; Basu 2024), the aim is to identify the epistemic frameworks that have shaped archival restitution so far by studying cultural memory and historical narratives in archival restitution contexts. Specifically, this project applies a relational approach that interconnects physical archival restitutions to Namibia (1996, 2005, 2019) and Suriname (2010-2017). The overarching aim is to enhance a more relational understanding of archival restitution that can contribute to epistemic transformation.
Contact: l.niederhausen@uvh.nl
PUBLICATIONS
Museum object here, archival record there: Museological-archival dis:connections in the 2019 restitution of the Witbooi family bible
Leah Niederhausen
May 12, 2026 | Editorial: cultural infrastructures in Africa
In this special issue on Cultural Infrastructures in Africa, Leah Niederhausen reflects on archival-museological shifts during the restitution process of the Witbooi Bible and their implication on institutional frontiers of restitution narratives at large.
Read more“What is the restitution that you are calling for?”: Hoe Namibische belongings uit Duitse collecties terugkeren
Leah Niederhausen
Dec 16, 2025 | Tweedewereldoorlog.nl
“Restitution is a social process in itself, which reflects and reproduces existing power structures.”
Read moreRestitution as Restoration and Transformation
Leah Niederhausen
April 9, 2025 | The Palgrave Encyclopedia of Cultural Heritage and Conflict
Leah Niederhausen wrote an entry on restitution as both a restorative and transformative concept for The Palgrave Encyclopedia of Cultural Heritage and Conflict.
Read moreMEDIA
BLOG
EVENTS
15-17/4/2026 – Dialogics of Justice Final Conference
April 15th-17th 2026 Dialogics of Justice (NWO-VICI) – Final Conference About the conference The last decade has witnessed an increase in civil proceedings brought before Dutch district courts by people adversely affected by colonial violence, military missions, sexual abuse, and environmental harm. Does legal action against institutions such as the Dutch state, the military, the church, and…
Read more23/1/2026 – Meeting RNW Oral History – The Multivoiced Archive: (How) Can We Make Oral History Archives Reparatory?
On Friday 23 January, the Oral History Network of the Huizinga Institute hosted an inspiring gathering at University Utrecht that brought together practices and reflections from Oral History, Transitional Justice, and Memory Studies around our project: The Multivoiced Archive. During the session we – Nicole Immler, Siri Driessen, Leah Niederhausen and Rosa Mul – presented our Multivoiced Archive project,…
Read more6/2/2026 – Guest Lecture ‘Emotions and Fieldwork’
Leah was invited to give a guest lecture in the MA Genocide Studies at the University of Amsterdam. In a source analysis workshop, Leah discussed emotions she encountered on a fieldwork trip to Namibia, and about the practical and emotional challenges working within academic structures poses when doing collaborative and decolonial work.
Read more1/9/2025 – European Network in Universal and Global History – Archival Restitution to Challenge Epistemic Injustice?
Presentation held by Leah Niederhausen at the European Network in Universal and Global History on “Archival Restitution to Challenge Epistemic Injustice? Coba’s Death and the Archives of the Court of Civil and Criminal Justice of Suriname, 1849”.
Read more24-25/4/2025 – Archiving Dis:connected Cultural Heritages in Africa: Prospects, Processes and Challenges
Leah Niederhausen “How can we archive restitution?” This was one of the questions I had the privilege of discussing during the truly inspiring workshop “Archiving Dis:connected Cultural Heritages in Africa: Prospects, Processes and Challenges”, hosted by the Käte Hamburger Research Centre global dis:connect at LMU Munich. Archival Silences and Pan-African Legacies Throughout our conversations on…
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