Following retirement, Sohail Husain (Geography 1972, PhD 1976) began researching his unusual family history. His mother's family was German and Jewish, and she escaped Nazi Germany a few days before Britain declared war, leaving behind her parents who were murdered in Auschwitz. His father's family were Indian and Muslim. He made his way to the UK before Partition, but his family experienced the accompanying horrific violence and fled to Pakistan.

Starting with very little knowledge, Sohail put the research skills honed during his time at Nottingham to compile a detailed memoir that traces the lives of his parents and grandparents, which were hugely impacted by some of the most momentous events of the 20th century. The extraordinary story and resultant publication, 'Beyond Beliefs' has been widely acclaimed and received outstanding reviews. Sohail shares with us this incredible story.

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Did you have a career plan when you graduated?

"I didn’t have a career plan during my undergraduate years, but I had aspirations instilled by my parents. My mother, who was German and Jewish, came to the UK as a teenage refugee from the Holocaust. My father was Indian and Muslim and came to the UK as a migrant, also in the 1930s. Both arrived penniless and earned a low income working London’s street markets. They made sacrifices for me to get educated and build a career that would enable me to avoid the hardships they had endured. I didn’t want to disappoint them!

"During my final undergraduate year, I got a taste for research while undertaking my dissertation. When the opportunity to apply for a research studentship arose, I took it and was successful. I guess the idea of an academic career was beginning to form in my mind, but that didn’t firm up until later.

"When I began my studies in the Geography department at Nottingham in October 1969, gaining qualifications for a specific career was not the priority. In fact, in his ‘welcome’ lecture to ‘freshers’ the head of department, Prof K C Edwards, stressed that our time at university should be seen as a time for personal development, enjoyment and mental enrichment. I don’t think there was any mention of jobs or employment or a career. It was only much later in the course, as the recruitment ‘milk round’ approached, did most students begin to think seriously about their future career path."

Below: Sohail measuring stones on a Geography field trip in Denmark.   

What inspired to research your family history and also turn your hand to writing? How did you navigate that journey?

"In my younger years I knew very little about my parents’ early lives or the lives of their parents, and showed little interest in finding out more. It was only later that I began to see my unusual heritage as both interesting and advantageous, and curious to know more. But by both my parents when I was young, so I couldn’t ask them any questions. Then I saw history repeating itself. My daughters never had the opportunity to meet their paternal grandparents, had no real awareness of them, and showed no curiosity about them. So, my research was undertaken partly to fill gaps in my own knowledge, but also to bring alive to my children the grandparents they never knew.

"Retirement gave me the time to investigate and, once again, I was able to deploy the same research skills that I gained in Nottingham and had been using throughout my working life. And to begin with I approached the task as just another research project, with objectivity and without becoming personally involved. But it soon became apparent that this was a crazy unrealistic notion. It was impossible to research one’s own family history, which includes horrific violence during the Partition of India on my father’s side and the murder of my maternal grandparents in the Auschwitz gas chambers, without becoming emotionally involved. The research also uncovered many other extraordinary chapters to the family story.

"It was never my intention to publish the research. But when I shared the initial findings with family and a few friends, their reaction was that this incredible tale deserved a wider audience, which is how the book, Beyond Beliefs, came about. And what started as a compact six-week project was still ongoing six years later! Two years on, it is still keeping me busy. I have accepted more than 65 invitations to give talks based on the story and it is now being considered for a TV series. That would take me into a completely different world, and I might need some new skills to navigate through that!"

Below: The Geography postgraduate/staff football team. Sohail front row, second from left.

You had three specific ‘careers’ - how did you find transitioning between them and did the skills you learnt at Nottingham help?

"The transition out of academia, after working in a large university for more than a decade, into a newly created not-for-profit organisation with six staff was a shock to the system! But it was also exciting and rewarding. It was a charity dedicated to creating safer communities by addressing the underlying causes of crime. Within 10 years we had grown to over 500 people. I was working alongside colleagues from many different professions, each with their own specialism, own outlook on the world and own ‘language’. That was incredibly challenging and at the same time stimulating, and I had absolutely no regrets.

"The skills learnt at Nottingham, both as an undergraduate and postgraduate were crucial in making that leap. They included soft skills, such as effective teamwork with people from diverse backgrounds, good communication, problem-solving under pressure, time management and leadership. But I was also able to use technical skills acquired through my degrees, especially social research skills (problem analysis, information gathering, data analysis, project evaluation, report writing, etc).

"Leaving the charity after 17 years to start my own consultancy was also a journey into the unknown. Not only was it scary to be responsible for ‘everything’, but I had also decided to work internationally, rather than in the UK. Initially, rather fortuitously, I became an adviser on UN programmes to prevent violence against women and girls, work that continued for more than a decade and took me all over the world. But the competences needed for that work were no different. It required the same personal, interpersonal and technical skills as my previous roles, skills initially acquired during my years in Nottingham, and then applied in very different contexts.

Below: Sohail presenting his book to Davd Baddiel during the World Cup. David's mother escaped from Nazi Germany in August 1939, exactly the same time as Sohail's mother.

For the many alumni who may read this who are approaching retirement or have just entered it, do you have any advice?

"Retirement might mark the end of one’s paid employment, but it need not mean one has to stop using skills and experience acquired during a lifetime working. On the contrary, making use of them in a different context, and perhaps for personal interest, can not only be rewarding, but can also provide the mental stimulation that staves off cognitive decline, maintains a strong sense of purpose and boosts life satisfaction."

Find out more about Sohail's memoir and feel free to contact him directly by email.