The Department of Judaic and Near Eastern Studies
University of Massachusetts Amherst
is pleased to present the following events:
Guest Lecturers, Fall 2009
David Biale - Wednesday, October 21st, 4:00PM
Herter Hall, Room 301
Daniel Boyarin - Monday, November 2nd, 3:30PM
Herter Hall, Room 301
Donald Weber - Wednesday, November 12th, 4:00PM
Herter Hall, Room 601
Udi Aloni - Wednesday, November 18th, 7:00PM
Herter Hall, Room 601
Willi Goetschel - Thursday, November 19th, 11:30AM
Brown-Bag luncheon with Judaic/German students
Herter Hall, Room 601
Willi Goetschel - Thursday, November 19th, 4:00PM
Herter Hall, Room 601
Jacquelyn Southern - Wednesday, December 2nd, 4:30PM
Herter Hall, Room 601
Previous events:
Fall 2007
Olga Gershenson
The Marriage of Inconvenience:
Transforming the Jewish Wedding on the Soviet Screen
The wedding appears to be the most often represented ritual celebration in pre-war Yiddish film. In European or American film, the wedding is always markedly Jewish, featuring an idealized and detailed recreation of the ritual. In contrast, in Soviet-Jewish films of the 1920s-30s, representation of the wedding both signals and shapes the transformation of Soviet Jewish identity. This talk will trace how this transformation is captured in Jewish Luck (1925), Benya Krik (1927), Border (1935) and Seekers of Happiness (1936).
Dr. Olga Gershenson is an Assistant Professor of the Judaic and Near Eastern Studies Department at UMass. She is the author of Gesher: Russian Theatre in Israel; A Study of Cultural Colonization (Peter Lang, 2005). Her research on Israel and Jewish cultural studies has appeared in Multilingua, Western Journal of Communication, Journal of International Communication, Journal of Modern Jewish Studies and several anthologies.
Thursday, October 11, 2007, 5:00PM
Alanna Cooper
Culture, Diaspora, Gender:
Whither Jewish Studies
Over the past few decades a "new Jewish Studies" has arisen out of a dynamic engagement with the fields of gender studies, diaspora studies and cultural studies. One outcome of this inquiry has been an unprecedented challenge to the long-held notions that there is a single Judaism, Jewish People and Jewish History. While the un-doing of these stable objects of inquiry potentially spells the end of Jewish Studies, this paper suggests that the future of the field lies in marshalling the tools of cultural studies, diaspora studies and gender studies not only to address the ways in which Jews interact with their non-Jewish neighbors, but also the ways in which Jews interact with each other in their global setting.
Alanna Cooper is a cultural anthropologist who studies Jews of Muslim lands and Jews on the margins of the Jewish world, focusing on identity, migration, diaspora and embodied religious practice. Her recent publications include Remembering Home and Exile: Memoirs by Jews of Muslim Lands (AJS Perspectives, Spring 2007) and Conceptualizing Diaspora: Tales of Jewish Travelers in Search of the Ten Lost Tribes (2006, AJS Review, 30.1).
Thursday, October 18, 2007, 4:00 PM
This event was made possible by the Felix Posen Foundation Fellowship in Secular Judaism.
Jonathan Skolnik
Mimesis, Racism, and Anti-Semitism:
German-Jewish Exiles and African-Americans in Hollywood, 1933-1965
German-Jewish refugees from the Nazified German film industry found a positive reception in Hollywood after 1933. But these exiles from Nazi racism were also keenly aware of the contradictions of life in the United States in the era of segregation and the Hays Code, as well as the anti-Jewish undertones of the 1943 Harlem riot. Professor Skolnik's talk -- from a book-in-progress -- examines the work of major studio directors such as Fritz Lang and Billy Wilder as well as lesser-knowns like Edgar Ulmer who made all-Black-cast films for segregated audiences. The philosopher Theodor Adorno's critical perspectives on mimesis, racism, and mass-culture (written while he, too, was a German-Jewish exile in LA) will provide a basis for an interpretation of the films.
Jonathan Skolnik, Assistant Professor of German, joined the UMass Amherst faculty in Fall 2007. He co-edited special issues of New German Critique on “German-Jewish Religious Thought” and “Secularization and Disenchantment” and is the author of articles on Paul Celan, Heinrich Heine, Arnold Zweig and the image of the Wandering Jew.
Thursday, November 1, 2007, 5:00PM
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