Born in 1964, Grzegorz Berendt is Associate Professor at the University of Gdansk. He has been associated with the Institute of History at Gdansk University since 1985, and currently works at the Department of History of Culture of Political Thought. As a historian, he conducts research on the history of Polish Jews and other ethnic groups in the Gdansk Pomerania region in the 20th century. He is the author of around a hundred scientific and over thirty popular science publications. His academic achievements include four monographs and co-authorship of seven books. He has researched the history of Gdansk, Lebork, Puck, Pruszcz Gdanski, and Kashubian rural communities. His current research projects focus on the extermination of Jews in Poland as well as on Polish-Jewish relations during the Holocaust. Outside of Poland, he has conducted archival and library research in Belarus, Ukraine, Denmark, Finland, Israel, Germany, and the United States. He is a member of the Polish Historical Society, the Gdansk Scientific Society, and the Kashubian Institute. He is a member of the Stutthof Museum Council and a member of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Museum Council, and Chairman of the Scientific Council of the Jewish Historical Institute. He is a member of the editorial board of "Studia Historica Gedanensia" - a scientific journal from the Faculty of History at the University of Gdansk.
Between the years 2002 - 2007, Grzegorz Berendt was Head of Postgraduate History Studies at the Faculty of Philology and History at the University of Gdansk. In October 2006, he took up a second job at the Gdansk branch of the Institute of National Remembrance (KŚZpNP). From 2007 - 2008, he coordinated research by several dozen people as part of the INDEX research project devoted to the subject of Polish citizens persecuted by the German-Nazi occupiers for helping Jews. He was the supporting coordinator under this project until March 2017. In October 2008, the President of the Institute of National Remembrance entrusted him with the position of Head of the Branch Office of Public Education of the Institute of National Remembrance (KŚZpNP in Gdansk), which he held until December 31, 2013. In this capacity, he coordinated the work of twenty five scientists and educators in the Tri-City and in Bydgoszcz who worked with several million inhabitants of the Pomeranian, Kuyavian-Pomeranian and part of Warmian-Masurian districts. During his term of office as Head of OBEP, the Institute of National Remembrance launched a series of branch publications. During his tenure, more than fifty volumes have been published, mostly devoted to the history of Gdansk Pomerania and Kuyavia between the years 1939 - 1990. At the beginning of 2014, while still working at the Scientific Research Department of OBEP of the Institute of National Remembrance in Gdansk, he researched the extermination of Jews within the borders of the Second Polish Republic. From beginning of January until end of April 2017, he was Head of the Departmental Historical Research Office of the Institute of National Remembrance in Gdansk.
From May 6, 2017 to July 23rd, 2021 Grzegorz Berendt held the position of Deputy Director for Research of Museum of the Second World War in Gdansk.
From July 24th, 2021 to July 20nd 2022, Grzegorz Berendt is Acting Director of Museum of the Second World War in Gdansk.
From July 21st 2022 is Director of Museum of the Second World War in Gdansk.
Awards and decorations:
- In Warsaw, March 21st, 1991 he gained a distinction in a national competition organised by the Israeli Embassy and the Polish-Israeli Friendship Society for the best Polish-Jewish and Israeli MA thesis, for his thesis ‘Jews in the Free City of Gdańsk 1933-1939’.
- In 1995 he won the annual award from the Gdańsk Scientific Society for outstanding achievements in the field of social sciences and humanities for his doctoral dissertation entitled ‘Jews in the Free City of Gdańsk between 1920-1945’. Various political, cultural and social activities, Gdańsk 1996.
- Warsaw 2003, he gained a team award from the Rector of the University of Gdańsk for his book ‘Between emigration and duration. Jewish Zionists and Communists in Poland after the Holocaust’.
- He was given an individual award from the Rector of the University of Gdańsk, for his habilitation thesis entitled ‘Jewish life in Poland in 1950-1956. A history of the social and cultural life of Jews in Poland’.
- Team award from the Rector of the University of Gdansk for the collective work ‘Home - meeting of private and public spaces in the context of civilization changes in the 19th and 20th centuries’.
- Team Award from the Rector of the University of Gdansk, for his book ‘The History of Lebork’.
Medals, Decorations and Orders:
- The Gold Cross Order of Merit
- The Medal of the National Education Commission
- Medal dedicated to the anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising
- The Khan Jelal Ed Din Medal
- The Pro Memoria Medal
- The Knight's Cross of the Order of Polish Restitution Medal
His most important works:
- Jews in the Free City of Gdańsk in the years 1920-1945 (Cultural, political and social activities), published by the Gdańsk Scientific Society, Gdańsk 1997, pp. 327;
- Jews at the Gdańsk crossroads (1945-1950), Publishing House 44, Gdańsk 2000, pp. 211;
- Jewish life in Poland in 1950-1956. A history of the social and cultural life of Jews in Poland, Publishing House of the University of Gdańsk, Gdańsk 2006, pp. 402;
- The Union of Zionist Democrats "Ichud", [in:] A. Grabski, G. Berendt, Between emigration and duration. Jewish Zionists and Communists in Poland after the Holocaust, edited by the Jewish Historical Institute, Warsaw 2003, pp. 101-223;
- Chapters V-VII, 1918-1989 History of Puck, ed. A. Groth, Marpress Publishing House, Gdańsk 1998, pp. 242-310;
- In the Weimar Republic and the Third Reich, a history of Lebork, "Bernardinum" Publishing House, Lębork-Gdańsk 2009, pp. 425-554;
- In the shadow of the Polish United Workers' Party. Activities of the Social and Cultural Society of Jews in Poland under communist rule (1950-1989): Associations of national, ethnic and postulated minorities in Poland after World War II, Zakład Publishers "Nomos", Kraków 2013, pp. 171-209.
