Join 2017-2018 Stroum Center Graduate Fellows Molly FitzMorris, Vivian Mills and Sarah Riskind as they share their research on the topics of Ladino language, Sephardic music, and the early-modern literature of Spain.

Professor Devin Naar of the Stroum Center’s Sephardic Studies Program will offer commentary on the Fellows’ work as the faculty respondent for this panel.

A light lunch will be served; please RSVP below to be included in the lunch order.

Molly FitzMorris, Isaac Alhadeff Sephardic Studies Fellow

Paper title: “The search for the shinedji: Using Ladinokomunita as a corpus to study Modern Ladino morphology”

Molly is a third-year PhD student in the Department of Linguistics.  She has a BA in Latin American Studies from New York University, and an MA in Hispanic Studies from the University of Washington.  Her research focuses on the documentation of Ladino in Seattle, and her two current projects explore the dialects of Ladino spoken in Seattle and the use of a common Turkish suffix in Ladino.  Molly helped organize the first three International Ladino Day celebrations in Seattle, and is an occasional student at the weekly Ladineros classes.
 

Vivian Mills, Richard M. Willner Memorial Scholar

Paper title: “Shem Tov of Carrión: Jewish Poetry and Moneylending in Fourteenth Century Castile”

Vivian is a second-year PhD student in Spanish and Portuguese Studies at the University of Washington. She was born in Ecuador and moved to the United States with her family at the age of sixteen. She received a BA in Business Economics and an MA in Spanish from the University of South Florida. Her research focuses on identity and the building of textual authority in the literary works of Jewish, Converso and Morisco writers of late medieval and early-modern Iberia. Her latest research focuses on the works of Shem Tov of Carrion, a medieval poet and rabbi. When not reading poetry, you can find Vivian at work in her garden or spending time with her family.
 

Sarah Riskind, Robinovitch Family Fellow

Paper title: “Sephardic Music Reimagined: Modern Arrangements for Choir”

Sarah is a doctoral student in choral conducting in the UW School of Music. Originally from Boston, MA, she holds degrees from Williams College and the University of Wisconsin-Madison. In addition to conducting, singing, and teaching, she has composed choral and instrumental works that have been performed in Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire, Wisconsin, and Washington, many of which use Jewish liturgical texts in Hebrew and English. She is currently pursuing research on choral arrangements of Sephardic Jewish music.