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THE CROWN FAMILY CENTER FOR JEWISH AND STUDIES

2018-2019 Clockwise from top: Global Engineering Trek (page 6); Jess Schwalb (Weinberg College ’19) at Harris Day of Jewish Study (page 2); The Klutznick Lecture in Jewish Civilization (page 4); German-Jewish Hermeneutics Workshop (page 2). ii THE CROWN FAMILY CENTER FOR JEWISH AND ISRAEL STUDIES 2018-19 FROM THE THE DIRECTOR CROWN FAMILY Dear Friends, When the academic field of Jewish Studies CENTER first developed in the nineteenth century, its earliest advocates sought FOR to place the Jewish tradition on equal footing with the established JEWISH disciplines of History, Philosophy, and the Classics. Some of these scholars envisioned the nascent “Science of Judaism” as a kind of AND Jewish antiquarianism that might, through disciplined study and critical objectivity, at ISRAEL long last “give Judaism a decent burial.” The Hebrew Bible, , medieval , and so on might no longer be of practical relevance to emancipated, STUDIES enlightened modern , but the fossilized remains of the Jewish tradition could at least be catalogued and analyzed from a modern, critical vantage point.

David Shyovitz Needless to say, the intervening years have belied the notion that Jewishness is nothing but Director a relic to be pored over and then shelved in a museum case. Far from grinding to a halt with Claire Sufrin the arrival of modernity, the Jewish tradition has continued to develop and transform, its Assistant Director, Jewish Studies creativity, complexity, and contentiousness undiminished. The field of Jewish Studies has Elie Rekhess been revived in turn, as an increasingly diverse array of scholars expand the canon of Jewish Associate Director, Israel Studies literature, apply innovative methodologies to familiar sources, and bring to light neglected Nancy Gelman historical figures and events. The State of Israel in particular has served as the setting, and Program Coordinator impetus, for animated political, cultural, and religious debate and experimentation—and the Katie Jenio sub-discipline of Israel Studies has emerged as one of the most vibrant fields of inquiry in Program Assistant today’s scholarly landscape. Krystle Felcaro Heaps Program Assistant To be sure, study of the Jewish past and present for their own sake continues to be a vital component of the fields of Jewish and Israel Studies. But the relevance of these fields for Judd A. and Marjorie Weinberg understanding today’s world has become increasingly self-evident. From the controversies College of Arts and Sciences Northwestern University over Israel’s “nation-state law” to those over anti-BDS legislation; from the exclusion of Crowe Hall 5-179 Jewish Zionists at the Women’s March to “Jexodus” and “Jews for Trump”; from the attacks 1860 Campus Drive in Pittsburgh and Poway to the chants of marchers in Charlottesville; from the halls of Evanston, Illinois 60208 Congress to the House of Commons to the chambers of the Knesset—more than ever, making 847-491-2612 sense of our fraught modern era requires sophisticated, informed, critical perspectives on Visit us on the web at Jewish and Israeli history, society, thought, and culture. www.jewish-studies.northwestern.edu The Crown Family Center for Jewish and Israel Studies seeks to provide students, faculty members, and the broader public with these vitally important intellectual tools. The Center serves as a hub for teaching, research, and public engagement, and encompasses scholars For more information who specialize in the broad scope of , literature, philosophy, and languages. or to be added to our Our strengths in Jewish Studies are augmented by specialists in the field of Israel Studies, mailing list, contact us who have bolstered the study of Israeli history and politics by including perspectives drawn from science and technology, economics, and environmental studies. The students who at jewish-studies@ take our courses, the faculty whose research we support, and the community members who northwestern.edu. attend our many public events emerge with the knowledge and skills necessary to not only understand the past, but also to help shape the future.

In the pages that follow, you can learn about the courses, public events, and academic scholarship supported by the Crown Center over the course of the 2018-19 year. We are proud to serve as a resource to students and faculty, and work hard to build bridges beyond the ivory tower to the greater Chicagoland community. I warmly invite you to involved in the coming academic year in whatever way you choose—by attending our events, engaging with our faculty, or helping to support our collective efforts with a donation.

ON THE COVER Detail from Summer Wind in Upper Galilee Genesis Portfolio, Northwestern University Library David Shyovitz © Domy Reiter-Soffer, www.domyrs.com Director 1 2018-2019 EVENTS The Manfred H. Vogel ,” the talk illustrated how German Lecture in Judaic Studies Jews explored the meaning of Judaism by examining the central heroes of “Between Jesus and Paul: early Christianity. The talk was also German-Jewish From Apologetics to Jewish attentive to what was happening at that Theological Affirmations” Hermeneutics Workshop time in the work of Christian theologians Paul Mendes-Flohr, such as Adolf von Harnack, whose The German-Jewish Hermeneutics University of Chicago Essence of Christianity portrayed Judaism Workshop, held on Monday, October 29 and in a negative light and elicited harsh Tuesday October 30, brought together more responses from, among others, Leo Baeck than a dozen scholars of German Studies, and Franz Rosenzweig. History, Literature, and Religion from around the United States and Germany Allan and Norma Harris to Northwestern for two days of sharing Day of Jewish Study research on the interaction of Jewish and Christian artists, theologians, and “What is ? Historical, philosophers in the 19th and 20th centuries. Political and Personal Perspectives” Papers addressed topics as varied as the A panel discussion with faculty influence of Christian biblical scholars on and students the work of Jewish biblical scholars and vice Paul Mendes-Flohr with Claire Sufrin and David Shyovitz On Sunday, March 3, a panel of versa; philosopher Hans Jonas’ notion of professors and students addressed “reading” the world; and the use of parable This year’s Manfred H. Vogel Memorial aspects of antisemitism at the 2019 (mashal) as a literary form in sources Lecture in Judaic Studies, held on Allan and Norma Harris Day of Jewish ranging from the Talmud to the notebooks Monday, October 29, in conjunction Study. The engaged audience of more of . Organized by Claire Sufrin with the German-Jewish Hermeneutics than 150 Northwestern students and and Nitzan Lebovic (Lehigh University), Workshop, featured historian Paul community members considered, the meeting was sponsored by the Crown Mendes-Flohr, whose work on German among other things, pre-modern roots Family Center for Jewish and Israel Studies Jewish intellectuals including Martin of antisemitism, the role of antisemitism with additional support from the German Buber and Franz Rosenzweig has made in the white power movement, and the Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), the an indelible mark on the study of modern relationship between antisemitism Berman Center for Jewish Studies at Lehigh Jewish history. In his talk, “Between and anti-. The panel featured University, the Weinberg College of Arts Jesus and Paul: from Apologetics to Professors David Shyovitz and Sara and Sciences, and the Chabraja Center for Jewish Theological Affirmations in 20th Hirschhorn of Northwestern University Historical Studies at Northwestern. Century Germany,” Professor Mendes- and Professor Kathleen Belew of the Flohr addressed the fascination of many University of Chicago in conversation German-Jewish intellectuals with the key with Northwestern students Jess figures of early Christianity, Jesus and Schwalb, Ariel Sheffey, and Charlie Paul. Animated by captivating details such Valdes Yelin. Professor Claire Sufrin as Jacob Taubes’ claim that Paul was so served as moderator. deeply rooted in Judaism that he “spoke

German-Jewish Hermeneutics Workshop participants

Allan and Norma Harris Day of Jewish Study

2 THE CROWN FAMILY CENTER FOR JEWISH AND ISRAEL STUDIES 2018-19 Undergraduates attending “Israel at a Crossroads? Electoral Politics in a Divided Nation”

Author Nicole Krauss with Claire Sufrin

“Israel at a Crossroads? Renée and Lester Crown “Deborah Lipstadt Electoral Politics in a Divided Nation” Speaker Series on Antisemitism” A panel discussion on the April 2019 Knesset election “A Literary Conversation In cooperation with the Chicago with author Nicole Krauss” Humanities Festival On Wednesday, March 13, in the run-up to the (first) 2019 Israeli Knesset elections, In an onstage conversation with On Thursday, May 2, the award-winning panelists Yael Aronoff (Michigan State Professor Claire Sufrin on Monday, historian and author of The Eichmann University), Anshel Pfeffer (), Elie April 8, author Nicole Krauss was Trial and Denial: Holocaust History on Trial Rekhess (Northwestern University) and thoughtful and reflective about delivered a penetrating and provocative Yedidia Stern (Israel Democracy Institute) the process of writing and the analysis of antisemitism, focusing on its shared perspectives on the Israeli political responsibilities of an author to her current, virulent incarnations on both landscape gleaned from their areas of readers as she discussed themes the political right that are central to her work. Nicole and left: from Krauss is one of the most important white supremacist Jewish American novelists writing demonstrators today. Her 2006 book, History of Love, in Charlottesville, is an enthralling tale of loneliness Virginia, to and the power of literature to create mainstream enablers bonds across time and space. Her Deborah Lipstadt such as Donald 2011 book, Great House, which won a Trump and Jeremy Corbyn, to a gay pride National Book Award (among other march in Chicago that expelled a group prizes), explores memory, loss, and of women for carrying a Star of David storytelling. Her most recent novel, banner. Lipstadt painstakingly elucidated “Israel at a Crossroads” panel Forest Dark, takes place in Tel Aviv, with history’s ongoing manifestations of “the two protagonists on spiritual quests to hate that will not die,” and contextualized academic, journalistic, and public policy free themselves from their respective contemporary antisemitism through a expertise. Over the course of a lively obsessions. Like writers of an earlier long historical lens. discussion, the speakers disagreed in their generation such as Philip Roth, predictions, but reached a unanimous Bellow, or Cynthia Ozick, Krauss’ work consensus that the electoral season had is written in a Jewish key yet resonates exposed the deep divisions in Israeli society widely with a universal audience: in an unprecedented fashion. her books have been translated into more than 30 languages and sold well around the world.

33 2018-2019 EVENTS

Symposium on Water in Israel and the Middle East Co-sponsored by the Northwestern Center for Water Research “Drought, Insecurity, and Conflict in Israel, the Middle East, and Beyond” was the topic of this year’s symposium on Water in Israel and the Middle East, the fourth in an annual series, held on Monday, May 6. The panel of experts discussed issues affecting water insecurity including climate change, drought, and contamination, as well as challenges in regulating limited resources in an area of political tension. Guest speakers included Symposium on Water in Israel and the Middle East participants Yaakov Garb of Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Yochanan Kushnir of , Jim Yoon of the Pacific Northwest Philip M. and Ethel National Laboratory, and Giora Shaham of Klutznick Lecture in the Government Authority for Water and Sewage in Israel. Jewish Civilization Co-sponsored by the Jewish United The symposium was co-chaired by Aaron Fund of Metropolitan Chicago Packman, Director of the Center for Water Research, Elie Rekhess, Associate Director for “Double Amnesia: Jews and Human Israel Studies at the Crown Family Center for Rights in the Twentieth Century: Jewish and Israel Studies, and Sera Young, The Unknown Story of how Zionism Assistant Professor of Anthropology and Invented International Human Rights” Global Health. This interdisciplinary sym- James Loeffler, University of Virginia posium is part of an ongoing collaboration The 2019 Klutznick Lecture on Tuesday, between the Northwestern Center for Water May 21 featured Professor James Loeffler, Research and the Crown Family Center for whose recent book Rooted Cosmopolitans Jewish and Israel Studies. This year’s sympo- (Yale, 2018) uncovers the Jewish political sium was co-sponsored by the McCormick roots of the international human rights School of Engineering and the Weinberg movement. In his lecture, Loeffler focused College of Arts and Sciences. particularly on Her­sch Zvi Lauter­pacht, Professor James Loeffler the “father of international human rights law,” who helped to draft both the Israeli Declaration of Independence and the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Loeffler illuminated the ways in which Lauterpacht and other intellectuals and activists saw their commitments to universal human rights and to political Zionism as compatible, and mutually reinforcing.

Professor James Loeffler; Paula Harris, Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago; Dean Adrian Professor Yochanan Kushnir Randolph, Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences; Professor David Shyovitz; Professor Claire Sufrin

4 THE CROWN FAMILY CENTER FOR JEWISH AND ISRAEL STUDIES 2018-19 2018-2019 COURSES

Jewish History 750-1492

History of Faculty and graduate Co-sponsored events Holocaust Trials student colloquia Wednesday, November 14 Economic History of Israel Thursday, November 1 “Thinking about Poetic Redundancy Arabs in a Jewish State “From Jackson to Johannesburg with Vergil and the Hebrew Bible” Andrea Rotstein, Tel Aviv University to Jerusalem: How the 1967 War Hamas and Palestinian Sponsored by the Department of Classics Turned Diaspora Jewish Zionists Political Islam into White People” Monday, February 25 Sara Hirschhorn, Visiting Assistant Gender, Race and the Holocaust “Sovereignty as Self-Elimination: Professor in Israel Studies, The Israeli Case” Jewish Life in Medieval Europe Northwestern University Joyce Dalsheim, University of Shattered Worlds: Representation Thursday, February 14 North Carolina after the Shoah “My Fingers for War: A Prayer for Jewish Sponsored by the Middle East and ’s Tears: Jewish Response Militiamen in Colonial Suriname” North African Studies Program to Suffering Eli Rosenblatt, Affiliated Scholar, Monday, March 4 Northwestern University A and a Priest Walk Into “Institution, Community, Politics: a Bar To Talk About God Wedesday, April 3 On Book Three of Franz Rosenzweig’s “Protecting the Faith: Censoring Star of Redemption” Introduction to Yiddish Culture: Benjamin of Tudela’s Book of Travels” Petar Bojanic, University of Belgrade, Literary Images of the Shtetl Marci Freedman, Sava Ranisavljevic University of Rijeka Tales of Love and Darkness: Postdoctoral Fellow in Judeo-Spanish Sponsored by the Department of German Eros and Isolation in Modern Studies, Northwestern University Wednesday, April 24 “Writing History, Writing Biography: Wednesday, May 1 Modern Israel: History, Politics Capturing H.G. Adler’s Many Worlds” “Israel’s Digital Policy: Biometrics, and Society, 1882-present Social Media Regulation and ‘Sdarot’” Peter Filkins, Bard College Efrat Daskal, Postdoctoral Fellow in Israel Sponsored by the Department of German Zionism and its Critics Studies, Northwestern University From Globalization to Nationalism: Should We Blame the Media? Monday, May 13 “ the Mālikī” Media and Minorities in Israel Marc Herman, Institute Fellow at the Frankel Center for Advanced Judaic Reporting the Arab-Israeli Conflict Studies at the University of Michigan Yiddish Culture and the Holocaust Co-sponsored by the Middle East and North African Studies Program Water in Israel and the Middle East: Reliance, Sustainability and Security

Introduction to Hebrew Bible

Introduction to Judaism

Kabbalah

Gender and Sexuality in Judaism

Global Engineering Trek Religion and Literature

The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

Hebrew I, II, III

5 UNDERGRADUATE NEWS

2018 JEWISH STUDIES MINORS DANIELLA (DANI) LEWITTES “I grew up attending Jewish day school for most of my life, and Jewish learning was not always something that I appreciated throughout my childhood. I did not under- stand the impact studying Jewish topics had on me until I GLOBAL ENGINEERING TREK IN ISRAEL Shortly before the school year arrived at Northwest- officially began last September, a dozen undergraduates from across the ern, finding myself university participated in the first-ever Global Engineering Trek (GET) in Israel desperately missing with Professors Elie Rekhess and Aaron Packman. Students examined Israel’s the comfort of a critical water infrastructure, experienced its culture of innovation, and toured classroom in which diverse historical and archaeological sites. One student commented, “Having I could… deepen my history and engineering so intertwined made the experience twice as interesting. Daniella Lewittes understanding of Being able to switch between the two kept things fresh and helped with digesting Judaism’s rich history and mind-blowing all of the information.” The GET was sponsored by the Crown Family Center concepts. I missed the feeling of challeng- for Jewish and Israel Studies and the NU Center for Water Research with the ing myself and always questioning my support of The Institute for Sustainability and Energy at Northwestern (ISEN). classmates through animated discussions both in and out of the classroom. When I began taking Jewish Studies classes for my NU distribution requirements, I knew that I had finally gotten what I had so JILL STACEY HARRIS PRIZE DINNER AT TA’IM PO, badly craved. While my career interests IN JEWISH STUDIES MOCK ISRAELI RESTAURANT (and therefore my major) lie elsewhere, it The 2019 Jill Stacey Harris Prize Northwestern Hebrew students of all levels quickly became obvious to me that I needed in Jewish studies was awarded to experienced Israeli culture first-hand as to pursue a Jewish Studies minor and make Weinberg College senior ALEXANDER professor of Hebrew Hanna Tzuker Seltzer Jewish Studies a part of my life forever. OLTARSH. Alexander’s paper “How created the mock restaurant “Ta’im Po” Northwestern has helped me do just that, Changing Standards in Denaturalization (It’s Tasty Here) in a campus lounge. Stu- and I am eternally grateful.” Cases Changed the Government’s Use dents were able to practice their language of Evidence in Prosecuting Them,” skills by ordering Israeli dishes from a AARON STRAUSS “When I arrived at was written for Hebrew menu and conversing with native Northwestern freshman year, I was certain Professor Benjamin speakers who acted as servers. of very few things. Which classes to enroll Frommer’s course, This event was co-sponsored by the Middle in, which clubs to sign up for… it all seemed “Holocaust Trials.” East and North African Studies Program and like the decisions I was making were those The essay examines supported by a Course Enhancement Grant of life-altering proportions. There was one the case of John from the Weinberg College Dean’s Office. decision though, that was something of a Demjanjuk and Alexander Oltarsh no-brainer. And that was Hebrew study. uses it to identify I’d been flirting with fluency since I’d key patterns in the pursuit of Holocaust learned how to spell perpetrators within the American court my Hebrew name in system. Through comparison with Kindergarten, and several other cases, Oltarsh outlines how the Hebrew studies judges established the standard of proof minor gave me the necessary for the denaturalization of Nazi final push I needed. war criminals and how these standards It was nice to know came to shape Demjanjuk’s situation. Aaron Strauss that no matter how my other choices panned out, my decision The Jill Stacey Harris Prize has been to study Hebrew would be a challenge that awarded annually since 1991 for the best I understood and loved.” undergraduate essay in Jewish Studies. Ta’im Po

6 THE CROWN FAMILY CENTER FOR JEWISH AND ISRAEL STUDIES 2018-19 ALUMNI SPOTLIGHT

I benefited enormously from an amazing level of “support from my advisors, who guided WHAT SORTS OF COURSES discuss the parameters of how to and challenged me ARE YOU TEACHING? legally determine what humiliation entails every step of the way.” WHO ARE YOUR STUDENTS? and how much it is worth. I’m also looking I teach a wide range of students: at the category of despair (legally relevant Sarah Wolf undergraduates in the dual-degree program when someone loses an object and despairs between JTS and Columbia/Barnard; MA of getting it back, thus relinquishing and PhD students in the graduate school; claims to ownership) and possibly also students in the school of education, some jealousy and regret. of whom are studying online while working full-time; and rabbinical students, who are WHAT’S YOUR FAVORITE PART all ages and backgrounds. Most of my OF YOUR NEW POSITION? courses are seminars with 15 or so students. I am lucky to have landed in an institution This year I’ll be teaching a freshman seminar that has felt like a good fit for me in many exploring the concept of canon; a cross- ways, but the best part of my position is listed elective related to my research on probably the teaching. I have a fair amount emotions in rabbinic literature (see below); of flexibility about what I teach, and my and a class on sex and family in the Talmud students tend to be smart, motivated, for first-year rabbinical students. respectful, curious, and often able to read primary texts in the original. As a young WHAT WAS YOUR DISSERTATION professor in a small Jewish world, I do ABOUT? sometimes wind up teaching my friends, My dissertation explored the development which is definitely a bit weird, but is also of literary elements—plot, characterization, a pretty good problem to have. Sarah Wolf and narration—in legal literature towards the end of the classical rabbinic period. HOW DID NORTHWESTERN’S arah Wolf I showed that this development took place JEWISH STUDIES COMMUNITY received her at a time when rabbinic culture became PREPARE YOU FOR THESE NEXT increasingly scholastic, meaning that STAGES IN YOUR CAREER? PhD in Religious it began to center around text study in I benefited enormously from an amazing Studies from formalized academies. I argued that as level of support from my advisors, Mira study became the most important ritual Balberg and Barry Wimpfheimer, who SNorthwestern University guided and challenged me every step of activity for the rabbis, their engagement in 2018. She is currently with law became less about solving practical the way. They also worked with me to craft a training program, and ultimately an an Assistant Professor of or textual problems, and more about creating compelling imaginary worlds in approach to the job search, that would fit Talmud and Rabbinics at which to explore legal concepts. my specific interests and career goals. the Jewish Theological WHAT RESEARCH ARE YOU Seminary in City. DOING NOW? I’m currently researching the portrayal of emotions in rabbinic literature, and I’m particularly interested in the use of emotions as legal categories. For example, humiliation is considered to be a civil crime that carries a financial penalty, which means that the

7 JEWISH STUDIES GRADUATE CLUSTER FELLOW NEWS

STEPHANIE BRENZEL defended her Studies Conference, and the Association for Postdoctoral Fellow in Jewish Studies at dissertation “As Strong as Death: Franz Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies Duke University before beginning a tenure- Rosenzweig’s Philosophy of Love in The Star Summer Convention, and she participated track job as Assistant Professor of Theatre of Redemption” this past spring. She will in the year-long Doctoral Seminar at the at Columbia College Chicago in August 2020. begin work as the Igor Kaplan Postdoctoral Polin Museum for the History of Polish Jews She is currently working on an article for a Fellow in Jewish-Christian Relations at the in . She also represented Fulbright special volume of : An Interdisciplinary University of Toronto in August and will Poland at the EU-US Young Leaders Seminar Journal of Jewish Studies and developing her spend the next year turning her dissertation in Brussels in April. In early July, Rachel dissertation into a book proposal. into a book. participated in the 2019 Leonid Nevzlin International Forum for Young Scholars BOGDAN PAVLISH is a third-year PhD LEV DASCHKO is currently in the process on East European Jewry in New York. student in history working on the Armenian of publishing an article on Jewish postcard In November, Rachel will be co-convening diaspora in seventeenth-century Poland- makers in nineteenth-century Czernowitz. a working session at the 2019 American Lithuania. His research on the economic He is also working on his dissertation Society for Theatre Research Conference, and religious connections of Armenian on interethnic relations in the Austrian entitled “Performing a People’s Public: merchants and clerics has also brought borderland of Bukovina before the First Theatre’s New Publics in Central southeast Europe and the Near East into World War. This year he was awarded the and East Europe and Russia.” the scope of his project. In summer 2019, Neporany Doctoral Fellowship from the he worked in the libraries and archives Canadian Institute for Ukrainian Studies MAHMURE İDIL ÖZKAN is a doctoral of the Vatican, studying materials from for 2019-20. student in linguistic anthropology. Her Catholic missionaries to the Armenians of dissertation project investigates the 2015 Poland-Lithuania and other parts of early TOVA MARKENSON completed the body offer of Spanish citizenship to Sephardic modern Eurasia. His research trip to Rome chapters of her dissertation on Yiddish Jews, exploring language ideologies, was organized and funded by the University theatre and Jewish women’s migration in citizenship, transnational migration, of Notre Dame. early-twentieth century with the and understandings of homeland and support of research fellowships from the belonging among Turkish Sephardic Jews. BENJAMIN RICCIARDI completed his Memorial Foundation for In June 2018, she presented a paper on PhD in Religious Studies in 2019 with a and the Sexualities Project at Northwestern. Turkish Jews’ configurations of time and dissertation entitled The Weekday Amidah She also published a performance review of identity through a focus on metalinguistic as a Performative Anti-Theodicy. Over Argentinean director Sebastián Kirszner’s narratives on Judeo-Spanish at the the past year he submitted an article on new play La Shikse in Theatre Journal, “Turkish-Jewish Entanglements: Resilience, Hermann Cohen and another on Steven S. completed an article on Yiddish theatre’s Migration, and New Diasporas” conference Schwarzschild. His current research focuses contributions to the Argentine avant-garde, at the University of Graz. In summer 2018, on the intersection of Jewish philosophy presented at the Association for Theatre she conducted exploratory research in and video games. in Higher Education’s national conference, Barcelona and Istanbul with funding ANASTASIIA SIMFEROVSKA worked and took part in a Digital Yiddish Theatre from the Buffet Institute Keyman Modern on her Jewish Studies subfield at libraries Project workshop. Over the summer, she Turkish Studies Program, TGS, and the and archives in Poland, Israel, and . participated in a summer research institute Fan Foster Foundation. on migration at Harvard University’s In September 2018, she gave a public lecture Mellon School for Theatre and Performance GRACE KESSLER OVERBEKE “The Art and the Catastrophe: the Role of Research. She is delighted to be the presented at the Association for Jewish the Holocaust in the Making of the Jewish incoming Crown Graduate Fellow. Studies annual conference, received the Artist,” at the TKUMA Institute for Holocaust Mark and Ruth Luckens International Studies, in Dnipro (Dnipropetrovsk), Ukraine; RACHEL MERRILL MOSS had a fruitful Prize in Jewish Thought and Culture, and in November 2018, she presented “The Jewish dissertation research year in Poland successfully defended her dissertation Face of : Portraiture in the Multi-Ethnic supported by a 2018-2019 Fulbright research “The Forgotten Pioneer: Jean Carroll City 1890’s-1930’s,” at Wroclaw University, grant. During the academic year, Rachel and the Jewish Female Origins of Stand- Poland; and in July, 2019, she presented presented work at the American Society for Up Comedy.” After graduating from “A Jewish Artist in the Nazi-occupied Lviv: Theatre Research Conference, the British Northwestern in the Spring of 2019, she Jonasz Stern, William Ochs, Henryk Beck,” Association for Slavonic and East-European will serve as the 2019-2020 Perilman

8 THE CROWN FAMILY CENTER FOR JEWISH AND ISRAEL STUDIES 2018-19 CROWN GRADUATE at the International Conference “Art and FELLOWSHIP the Holocaust: Reflections for the Common Future,” held in Riga, Latvia. She received a Crown Family Center Israel Studies Research Grant to work on her chapter- length project “A Jewish Artist Between the Galut and the Land of Israel: Wilhelm Wachtel, Zeev Porath, Mikhail Steinberg.”

AMANDA RUPPENTHAL STEIN was he recipient of the 2018-19 Crown Graduate Fellow. Her dis- the 2019-20 sertation (working title: “Sounding Judentum: Assimilation, Art Music, and Being Jewish Crown Graduate Musically in 19th Century Germany”) ex- Fellowship is plores how art music served as an avenue of assimilation for 19th century German-speak- TTova Markenson, a doctoral ing Jews and challenges existing scholarly candidate in the School narratives on musical expressions of Judaism of Communication’s and Jewishness by musicians during this pe- riod. Amanda also traveled twice to Uganda Interdisciplinary PhD in 2019, participating in a Cantors Assembly Program in Theater and solidarity mission and recording project and conducting fieldwork at the Centennial Cele- Drama, and a Jewish Tova Markenson bration of the Abayudaya Jewish community. Studies Graduate Cluster

is a PhD student in fellow. Tova is currently ARIEL WEINER Aires were funded by a notorious Jewish Comparative Literary Studies (CLS) and at work on a dissertation prostitution ring that trafficked Jewish German. In 2018-19, Ariel received a women from to Argentina Doctoral Fellowship from the Canadian titled “Entrance Forbidden during this period. As she argues, these Social Sciences and Humanities Research to the Yiddish Theatre: assumptions were in fact rumors based Council (SSHRC). She also passed her CLS Performance, Prostitution, in antitheatrical prejudice. To revise the Theory Exams, and completed her second history of Argentine Yiddish theatre, year of coursework. In June she attended and Protest in Buenos Tova uses these early-twentieth-century the second annual Summer Institute Aires (1900-1939),” and perceptions about Yiddish theatre and for Psychoanalysis at Northwestern and prostitution to understand the performance participated in the Center for Global Culture the Crown Fellowship will of women’s sexual and religious identities— and Communication (CGCC)’s Summer help to fund her studies both on the Argentine Yiddish stage, where Institute on Media Aesthetics in July. as she completes the Yiddish “brothel dramas” explicitly tackled She also received funding from the Jewish the question of Jewish prostitution, and in Studies Cluster to pursue German language project over the course the auditorium, where outraged activists acquisition over the summer. of the coming year. mobilized Yiddish theatregoers towards anti-prostitution reform. Tova’s fascinating project reveals the strategies by which Jewish women Tova’s research opens up a fascinating, “performed” femininity in early- and unknown (perhaps even suppressed) twentieth-century Argentina, where chapter in American Jewish culture, Jewish women were disproportionately and promises to make a path-breaking associated with prostitution. Tova contribution to Theater Studies and to challenges historical assumptions that Latin American Jewish history. the thriving Yiddish theatres in Buenos

9 FACULTY NEWS

DANNY M. COHEN, Associate Professor Hidden Jews in the Nazi Protectorate of of Instruction in the School of Education Bohemia and Moravia,” in Ari Kohen and and Social Policy, received the Charles Gerald J. Steinacher, ed., Unlikely Heroes: The Deering McCormick Distinguished Place of Holocaust Rescuers in Research and Professor of Instruction university teaching Teaching (Nebraska University Press, 2019), award in Spring 2019. He and Phyllis and “Privileged Victims: Intermarriage Lassner co-authored a new introduction between Jews, Czechs and Germans in the for the reprint of the memoir I Was Nazi Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia,” A Doctor in Auschwitz by Gisella Perl, which will be published next year as part of published by Lexington Books. a volume that he co-edited with Adrienne Edgar, Intermarriage from Central Europe SARAH CUSHMAN, Director of the to Central Asia: Mixed Families in the Age Holocaust Educational Foundation of of Extremes, (Nebraska University Press, Northwestern University, and Lecturer in forthcoming 2020). the Department of History, taught “Gender, İpek Kocaomer Yosmaoğlu Race, and the Holocaust” in Spring 2019. EDNA GRAD is Distinguished Senior She completed several articles including Lecturer Emerita of in “The Auschwitz Women’s Camp: An with Press on the the Jewish Studies Program. Overview and Reconsideration,” for the hundredth anniversary of its appearance Palgrave Handbook on Holocaust Literature in 1921. The volume will include hitherto PETER HAYES, Theodore Zev Weiss and Culture, edited by Victoria Aarons and untranslated and even unpublished texts Holocaust Educational Foundation Phyllis Lassner, and “How Deep the Gray as well as the first English-language Professor of Holocaust Studies Emeritus in — ‘Privileged’ Jewish Women Prisoners translations of contemporaneous writings the Departments of History and German, in Auschwitz-Birkenau,” to be published by several outstanding German-Jewish received a National Leadership Award in Proceedings from the 2018 Ethel LeFrak writers and thinkers, including Hermann from the United States Holocaust Memorial Holocaust Education Conference: Women, Cohen, Erich Unger, and Kurt Hiller. Museum at its 25th Anniversary Luncheon The Holocaust, and Genocide. In 2018, in Chicago. In addition, his book Why? Professor Cushman received the Professor MARCI FREEDMAN, Sava Ranisavljevic Explaining the Holocaust appeared in Shulamit Reinharz Research Award Postdoctoral Fellow in Judeo-Spanish Spanish and Polish translations and is being from the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute Studies, presented her ongoing research developed into a multi-part documentary for research on the geography of the into the censorship of Benjamin of Tudela’s for television. He also published his newest Auschwitz women’s camp. Book of Travels at a Crown Family Center book, co-authored with Christopher colloquium, and at the annual meeting Browning and the late Raul Hilberg, EFRAT DASKAL, Postdoctoral Fellow of the Canadian Society for Renaissance German Trains, Jewish Souls. After 20 in Israel Studies, taught three courses Studies. Her current research focuses on an years of service, including the last five as exploring the intersection between Israel unknown Italian manuscript which argues chair, he stepped down from the Academic studies and communication studies. She against the censorship of Hebrew books Committee of the USHMM in May 2019. He continued her research in digital rights using an array of Jewish and non-Jewish remains hard at work, in partnership with advocacy, ethical regulation of social media, sources. The project received a grant from Stephan Lindner of Munich, on finishing a and cyber-security awareness, the latter the Undergraduate Research Assistant book called Profits and Persecution: German in cooperation with the Federman Cyber Program, which allowed Freedman to Big Business, the Nazi Economy, and the Security Center Law Program at the Hebrew hire an undergraduate research assistant Holocaust. University of Jerusalem. She presented her to support the project in Summer 2019. work at six international conferences and Freedman taught “Jewish History, SARA HIRSCHHORN, Visiting Assistant prepared five papers for publication. 750-1492” in Spring Quarter. Professor in Israel Studies, prepared a proposal for her second book, tentatively PETER FENVES, Joan and Sarepta BENJAMIN FROMMER, Associate entitled From Jackson to Johannesburg to Harrison Professor of Literature, Professor in the Department of History, Jerusalem and Back: How the 1967 War Department of German and Program offered courses on the history of the Transformed Diaspora Zionists into White in Comparative Literary Studies, will be Holocaust and about trials of Holocaust People, research for which was supported publishing along with Julia Ng a new perpetrators and deniers. In addition, over by a Crown Family Center Israel Studies translation of Walter Benjamin’s seminal this past year he completed several articles, Research Grant over summer 2019. She essay “Toward the Critique of Violence” including: “The Saved and the Betrayed: presented her work at the Hebrew University,

10 THE CROWN FAMILY CENTER FOR JEWISH AND ISRAEL STUDIES 2018-19 Stanford University, and University of PHYLLIS LASSNER, Professor of He taught courses at the Universities of Toronto (amongst many others) and Instruction Emerita in the Cook Family Wroclaw, Chernivtsi, Kyiv, and Kharkiv. appeared at the U.S. Department of State, Writing Program and the Gender and Presently he is editing a historical guide AIPAC, AJC, and various other communal Sexuality Studies, and Jewish Studies to Uman focusing on the Ukrainian, platforms. She also completed a journal Programs, published her essay, “The Polish, and Jewish legacy of this shtetl and article entitled “From Goldineh Medinah to American Voices of Hidden Child Survivors: working with Arthur Green on a manuscript City of Gold: and Jerusalem Coming of Age Out of Time and Place” in tentatively entitled Defender of the Faithful: after the 1967 War.” She taught the courses New Directions in Jewish American and the Life and Thought of Rabbi Levi Itshak of “Zionism and its Critics” and “Modern Israel: Holocaust Literatures edited by Victoria Berdichev. History, Politics, and Society, 1882-Present.” Arons and Holli Levitsky (SUNY Press, 2019). She and Danny M. Cohen wrote the ELIE REKHESS, Crown Visiting Professor LUCILLE KERR, Professor in the introduction to a new edition of Gisella in Israel Studies, Visiting Professor in Department of Spanish and Portuguese, Perl’s memoir, I Was a Doctor in Auschwitz, the Department of History, and Associate used her Spring 2019 research leave to published by Lexington Books in 2019. Director of Israel Studies, spoke on work on two chapters of her book project “The Impact of the 1967 War on the Arab Readings in Latin American Jewish MARCUS MOSELEY is Associate Minority in Israel” for the “Six Day War— Literature and Culture. One, a reading Professor of Yiddish Language in the Five Decades Later” conference held at the of Jacobo Timerman’s Preso sin nombre Jewish Studies Program. Y&S Nazarian Center for Israel Studies at celda sin número (1980), is situated at the UCLA. He also gave papers at the Academic intersection of testimonial studies and ANNA PARKINSON, Associate Professor Jewish studies. Her reading is a literary in the Department of German, is a co- interrogation of previous testimonial and convener of the “Critical Theory in the Jewish readings of this text that have seen Global South” Mellon project (2017-2020), it primarily as a transparent source of housed in the Critical Theory Program at historical and biographical information, Northwestern. As part of this project, she bypassing its literariness and the complex is researching and designing a new course figures of its testimonial subject. The titled “Trauma, Politics, and the Uses of other considers verbal and visual works Memory.” She participated in a workshop revolving around Jewish immigration to titled “The Reception of the Jews in China Latin America, framing the discussion in during WWII” at NYU’s Shanghai campus. the legal history of passports and Jewish She also presented papers drawn from cultural production in the region. Her current research at the Sixth Biennial undergraduate and graduate teaching German Jewish Studies Workshop; at the continued to focus on 20th-21st century Lessons and Legacies conference XV: “The Latin American narrative more broadly. Holocaust: Global Perspectives and National Narratives;” and at the German Studies Elie Rekhess JACOB LASSNER, Philip M. and Association conference. Ethel Klutznick Professor Emeritus of Engagement Network National Conference; YOHANAN PETROVSKY-SHTERN, Jewish Civilization in the Departments of at the Association of Israel Studies Annual Crown Family Professor of Jewish Studies History and Religious Studies, completed Conference; and at a conference on “Israel in and Professor in the Department of History, the manuscript for his book Middle East the Netanyahu Era,” at the Smokler Center was on sabbatical in 2018-2019. During that Politics and Historical Memory, which is for Jewish Life at Johns Hopkins University. time, he gave multiple presentations of his in production and will appear early in He also spoke at the Center of Hebrew book Jews and Ukrainians: a Millenium of 2020. He presented four conference papers Studies, Faculty of Letters, University of Co-Existence (University of Toronto Press, including “Strategies of Resistance to , , and delivered a talk 2nd edition 2018) in Poland, Israel, and Unwanted Authority: The Arab Response on “Israel’s Arab Christian Community,” at Ukraine. He supervised Ukrainian editions to British Rule in Palestine” at the annual Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles. meeting of the Space Between Society and of his books The Anti-Imperial Choice “Islamist Responses to Unwanted Authority: and The Golden Age Shtetl, published in The Concept and Practice of Revolution in 2018 and 2019 respectively by KRYTYKA/ Traditional Arab Societies, Past and Present” Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute, and at the annual conference of the Association presented these books in Ostroh, Rivne, for the Study of the Middle East and Africa. Lviv, Chernivtsi, Kyiv, Kharkiv, and .

11 Professor Barry Wimpfheimer’s book The Talmud: A Biography wins a 2018 HANNA TZUKER SELTZER, Assistant National Jewish Book Award Professor of Instruction in the Jewish Studies and Middle East and North African FOR NEARLY TWO Studies Programs, presented “But Both MILLENNIA, the Talmud has Their Hands Reach Out: Ideology and the been at the center of Jewish Father-Son Relationship in Preliminaries spiritual, cultural, and social by S. Yizhar” at the Association for Jewish life. In his award-winning Studies Annual Conference. She also 2018 book The Talmud: presented “What Are We Talking About A Biography, Professor Barry When We Talk About Israeli Culture: Wimpfheimer explores the On Cultural Gaps, The Challenge and origins, development, and The Opportunity” at the 2019 National reception of the Talmud in Association of Professors of Hebrew International Conference. Additionally, and beyond Jewish culture. she developed and taught two new classes His introduction to this for third-year Hebrew students based unlikely best-seller sheds on the themes: “Parents and Children light upon the Talmud’s overlapping roles as a source of traditional teachings, in Israeli Culture” and “Between Two a touchstone of cultural authority, and a powerful symbol of Jewishness Writers: Sayed Kashua and Etgar Keret.” for both supporters and critics. BARRY SCOTT WIMPFHEIMER, Associate Professor in the Department of Religious Studies and the Pritzker School of Law, participated in the Jewish Book KEN SEESKIN, Philip M. and Ethel University, the University of Illinois, Council’s Author Network and spoke Klutznick Professor of Jewish Civilization, Chicago, the University of Tennessee, and at venues across the country about his and Professor in the Departments of the Hebrew University, Jerusalem, and led book The Talmud: A Biography, which Philosophy and Religious Studies, will retire a study tour for the Jewish United Fund of was awarded the National Jewish Book at the end of next academic year after 47 Metropolitan Chicago to Madrid, Cordoba, Award in the category “Education & Jewish years at Northwestern. When he entered Seville, and Toledo, Spain. He also began Identity” in March 2019. Wimpfheimer also Northwestern as an Assistant Professor in a term as chair of the Medieval and Early published “Codes,” a comparative analysis 1972, there was no Jewish Studies Program Modern Jewish History, Literature, and of ancient Mesopotamian, Jewish, Greek, and no full-time faculty member teaching Culture division at the Association for and Roman law codes in Bloomsbury’s the history or culture of the Jewish people. Jewish Studies. A Cultural History of Law, Volume I. Ken is currently putting the finishing touches on a sequel to his book Thinking about the CLAIRE SUFRIN, Associate Professor of İPEK KOCAOMER YOSMAOĞLU, Torah entitled Thinking about the Prophets. Instruction in the Jewish Studies Program Associate Professor in the Department of A conference honoring his contribution to and Assistant Director of Jewish Studies, History, delivered talks on violence and the University will be held in May of 2020. co-chaired the German-Jewish Hermeneutics the Ottoman Empire at Leiden University Workshop held at Northwestern in October and New York University in Fall 2018. DAVID SHYOVITZ, Associate Professor 2018, where she also presented a paper on She drafted a book proposal for an edited in the Department of History, and Director Martin Buber’s theories of revelation. In volume based on the papers delivered of the Crown Family Center for Jewish and addition, she presented her work on religion at the symposium “Turkish-Jewish Israel Studies, spent the 2018-19 academic and literature at Illinois Wesleyan University Entanglements” that took place at the year at work on his book project O Beastly and at the Association for Jewish Studies University of Graz in June 2018. She also ! Jews, Animals, and Jewish Animals in annual meeting. She taught undergraduate taught an undergraduate seminar on the , and published an article on courses on interfaith dialogue; gender “Nations and Nationalism in the Middle aberrant human bodies in medieval thought and sexuality in Judaism; and religion and East” in Spring 2018 and continued work in the volume Monsters and Monstrosity literature, in addition to a course on Martin on her research project about Ottoman in Jewish History (Bloomsbury, 2019). Buber for the Northwestern University and Turkish Jews in the interwar years. He delivered invited lectures at Harvard Alumnae Continuing Education Program.

12 THE CROWN FAMILY CENTER FOR JEWISH AND ISRAEL STUDIES 2018-19 With Gratitude SUPPORT JEWISH to Our Supporters AND ISRAEL STUDIES The Crown Family Center for Jewish and Israel Studies gratefully AT NORTHWESTERN acknowledges the support of the following individuals and families whose support over the last two years ur success is dependent upon the support of enhanced all aspects of our work. our alumni, community partners, and generous donors, who help us fulfill our mission of providing O Leslie Sachs Aiello ’83 rich, rigorous, and relevant education in the fields of Jeffrey C. Bloom ’82 Jewish and Israel Studies. A gift of any size can help us Rabbi Karen N. Bodney-Halasz ’97 to maintain and expand our undergraduate and graduate Miles Jared Bronstein ’16 teaching, faculty and student research, and extensive Katelin Anne Coronado ’17 Ludmilla Coven public programming. Thank you for considering a gift to The Crown Family support this work. To give, you can do one of the following: Lynn Galfond Delaney ’80 Robert J. Delaney ’79 • Go to www.giving.northwestern.edu/nu/wcas, click on “View additional gift Samuel Fuchs Feldstein ‘19 designations,” and select “Jewish Studies Program” from the drop-down menu. Dr. Alan J. Freint ’72 • Phone 800-222-5603 and tell them you would like your gift allocated to the Caroline Mara Frisch ’15 Crown Family Center for Jewish and Israel Studies. Alan W. Galishoff ’85 • Send your check, payable to Northwestern University, to Kim Milstein Buckley, Alexander Charles Gedalin ’16 Alumni Relations and Development, Northwestern University, 1201 Davis Street, J. Gelfand ’79 Evanston, Illinois 60208. Be sure to indicate that your donation is for the Jane Yanovsky Ginns ’01 Crown Family Center for Jewish and Israel Studies. Charles H. Goodman (’89 P) Kelsey Dawn Kamp ’10 MS Gary P. Kulwin ’88 Michael Lee Lehrer ’06 Aaron Michael Levine ’14 Hazel Louise Levine ’13 Dr. John Lewinson ’57 Wendy Laskow Lipsman William S. Lipsman ’71 (’12 P) Eve H. Pinkert Stuart L. Pinkert ’58 Howard H. Prager ’78 Paula M. Romberg ’82 Ilana Alison Rosen ’08 Steven E. Rosen ’85 MS Rachel Reinhold Sacks ’06 Yael Ratner Silverman ’97 Adam Gregory Stewart ’15 Meredith Goodman Stewart ’15 Aaron Strauss ’19 Steve Sussman ’93 Howard J. Tilman ’06 Alyse S. Vishnick ’99 Student and faculty participants at the Allan and Norma Harris Day of Jewish Study Valerie Anne Zuckerman ’14

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14 THE CROWN FAMILY CENTER FOR JEWISH AND ISRAEL STUDIES 2018-19