Kathryn Agnes Huether, PhD
**While I was honored to be featured on Tablet Magazine's Unorthodox podcast as the 'Gentile of the Week,' it was not without reservations. Identities are complex, and nothing is ever a simple 'either/or.' At the time, I had not yet undergone my conversion to Judaism—a process that, like all aspects of identity, resists easy categorization. To truly understand someone as an individual and their reasoning, it’s important to avoid assumptions and not read too much into labels.
assessing the world through sonic interactions
Kathryn Agnes Huether received her PhD in Musicology/Ethnomusicology from the University of Minnesota in 2021. She is currently a Postdoctoral Research Associate jointly appointed at UCLA’s Alan D. Leve Center for Jewish Studies and the Initiative to Study Hate, where her research focuses on antisemitism, Holocaust memory, and the role of sound in shaping historical narratives.
Her work examines how sonic mediation influences collective memory, identity politics, and representations of trauma—particularly in relation to the Holocaust, contemporary antisemitism, and racial violence. Drawing on both institutional and social media narratives, she explores how sound operates as a powerful tool in constructing and contesting historical meaning.
Her first book project, Sounding Trauma, Mediating Memory: Holocaust Economy and the Politics of Sound, traces the political economy of Holocaust memory through the lens of sound from the 1950s to the present, analyzing how music, voice, and sonic environments shape public remembrance in museums, film, and testimony. Her second book, Sounding the Holocaust in Film (forthcoming), is a pedagogical guide to analyzing sound and music in Holocaust cinema.
Huether has forthcoming articles in Sound Studies, and has been an invited speaker at HEFNU’s regional institutes and on Tablet’s Unorthodox podcast. Previously, she held positions at Vanderbilt University and Bowdoin College, and was a 2021–2022 Postdoctoral Fellow at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum’s Mandel Center for Advanced Holocaust Research in partnership with American University.