10/19 TALK | Arabian Judaism and Early Islam
2022-10-19 16:00 - 17:30 (America/Los_Angeles) | Zoom

10/26 TALK | The Jews of Medieval Baghdad in the Abbasid Era
2022-10-26 16:00 - 17:30 | Zoom

11/2 TALK | Jews and Muslims in Colonial Algeria: Between Intimacy and Resentment
2022-11-02 15:00 - 16:30 | Zoom

11/10 TALK | Coffeehouses, Parks, and Neighborhoods: Jews and Muslims in 20th-Century Cairo
2022-11-10 15:00 - 16:30 | Zoom

11/15 EVENT | Territories of Ladino in its Postvernacular Mode: The Case of Poetry and Literary Translation
2022-11-15 15:30 - 17:00 | Denny Hall 213

2/15 TALK | Masua Sagiv on Religious Feminism and Social Change in Israel
2023-02-15 10:30 - 12:20 | HUB 214, UW Seattle Campus, 4001 E Stevens Way NE, Seattle, WA, 98195, United States
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In this talk, scholar Masua Sagiv will dive into the past two decades in Israel to focus on how the Jewish religious (orthodox) society is undergoing a philosophical and theological revolution promoting gender equality, in society and Halacha (religious law) alike. This revolution has a decisive impact on the Jewish religious society, and in light of the Israeli constitutional arrangements that weave religious norms across the public sphere, it influences the general Jewish public in Israel as well. The talk will introduce religious halachic feminism in Israel and some of its main struggles (in matters of marriage and divorce, body and sexuality, and spiritual leadership), focusing on the strategies the activists apply and their impact on Israeli society.

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About the speaker

Masua Sagiv is the Koret Visiting Assistant Professor of Jewish and Israel Studies at UC Berkeley and a Scholar in Residence of the Shalom Hartman Institute based in the San Francisco Bay Area. Masua’s scholarly work focuses on the development of contemporary Judaism in Israel, as a culture, religion, nationality, and as part of Israel’s identity as a Jewish and democratic state. Her research explores the role of law, state actors and civil society organizations in promoting social change across diverse issues: shared society, religion and gender, religion and state, and Jewish peoplehood. Prior to moving to the Bay Area, Masua was the Academic Director of the Menomadin Center for Jewish and Democratic Law at Bar-Ilan University. In addition, Masua earned her doctorate in law from Tel-Aviv University, where she wrote her dissertation on the topic of law and social change in the Halachic Feminist struggle in Israel.

2/23 RESEARCH COLLOQUIUM | "Suppose the Mother were Jewish", a Happy Hour with Susan Glenn
2023-02-23 16:30 - 18:00 | Smith Room, Suzzallo Library, UW, 4000 15th Ave NE, Seattle, WA, 98195, United States
Leo Pfeffer speaking at the National Convention of the American Jewish Congress (1966). Seated is Shad Polier. Image credit: American Jewish Historical Society, Center for Jewish History, New York City.
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The Stroum Center for Jewish Studies is thrilled to invite you to the first in a new series of workshops, a happy-hour research colloquium led by Susan Glenn. Please join us to celebrate Susan’s three years as the Samuel and Althea Stroum Professor in Jewish Studies! Plus, you can enjoy alcohol and light charcuterie.
In this colloquium, Susan Glenn will share some of her research from her work-in-progress, “Suppose the Mother Were Jewish”: Leo Pfeffer, the American Jewish Congress, and the Problem of Religious Protection Law, to which a Ph.D. candidate Joana Bürger will pose some initial questions before the floor opens for discussion. Read on for a brief synopsis of her forthcoming paper:

A towering figure in the history of twentieth-century First Amendment litigation, Leo Pfeffer (1909-1993), intervened in more church-state cases than any other twentieth century lawyer. Pfeffer is best remembered for challenging the constitutionality of religious activities in the public schools, state aid to parochial schools, tax exemptions for religious institutions, and discriminatory Sunday closing laws. This paper focuses on an important arena of Pfeffer’s church-state jurisprudence that has been ignored by historians and legal scholars: his daring and controversial forays into the religious minefield of child adoption and custody. A deeply religious Jew for whom the strict separation of church and state was also an article of faith, Pfeffer not only challenged the constitutionality of “religious protection” laws and judicial practices that made it difficult, if not impossible, for couples to adopt children born to mothers whose religion differed from theirs, he also argued for the First Amendment rights of mothers, including Jewish mothers, to have their children raised in a religion that differed from their own.
The paper argues that Pfeffer’s views on religion, the constitution, and child adoption–and the controversies they provoked — constitute an important, but yet to be written, chapter in the history of postwar American Jewish debates about religion, the family, and Jewish “continuity.”
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About the speaker

Susan Glenn is a University of Washington History Professor who holds a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley (1983). She previously served as the Howard and Frances Keller Endowed Professor in the University of Washington’s Department of History, and now serves as the Samuel and Althea Stroum Professor in Jewish Studies. Her published work includes two books and a co-edited volume of cross-disciplinary essays, Boundaries of Jewish Identity (University of Washington Press, 2010), Susan’s book Daughters of the Shtetl: Life and Labor in the Immigrant Generation (Cornell University Press, 1990), won the American Historical Association’s Joan Kelly Memorial Prize for the best book in gender and women’s history. Her second book, Female Spectacle: The Theatrical Roots of Modern Feminism (Harvard University Press, 2000), analyzed the significance of late nineteenth and early twentieth century popular theater as a critical site of women’s enlarging cultural and social authority. Currently, she is working on a study of religious conflicts over child adoption in the aftermath of World War II.
Moreover, Susan has twice been appointed as Distinguished Lecturer by the Organization of Historians, and has also served on both the Academic Council of the American Jewish Historical Society and the Advisory Council of the Jewish Women’s Archive.
Cosponsored by the Department of History.

The University of Washington is committed to providing access and accommodation in its services, programs, and activities. To make a request connected to a disability or health condition contact Grace Dy at (206) 543-0138 or jewishst@uw.edu at least 10 days before the event.

3/31 EVENT | A Workshop with Rachel Brown
2023-03-31 09:30 - 10:30 | Thomson 317, UW Campus, 2023 Skagit Lane, Seattle, WA, 98195, United States
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The Stroum Center for Jewish Studies is hosting Rachel Brown for a morning workshop, in which she’ll discuss chapter 1 of her forthcoming paper, titled “Land, Reproductive Labor and Accumulation: Situating Migrant Carework in Israel/Palestine”. Jewish Studies grad fellow Jake Beckert will serve as respondent.

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About the speaker

Rachel Brown‘s research and teaching interests include feminist and queer political theory, settler colonialism, Marxist feminism and questions of labor migration, transnational feminisms, and the politics of debt.
She earned her doctorate from The Graduate Center, City University of New York in 2017. Her book manuscript, Unsettled Labors: Migrant Caregivers in Palestine/Israel, is under contract at Duke University Press. Her work has appeared in Feminist Theory, Political Theory, International Feminist Journal of Politics, Theory & Event, and Global Networks. Her most recent article is forthcoming in Race & Class.

The University of Washington is committed to providing access and accommodation in its services, programs, and activities. To make a request connected to a disability or health condition contact Grace Dy at (206) 543-0138 or jewishst@uw.edu at least 10 days before the event.

4/3 TALK | Sarah Zaides Rosen on "Tevye's Ottoman Daughter"
2023-04-03 16:00 - 17:00 | Zoom
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In this talk, historian and Stroum Center for Jewish Studies’ Associate Director Sarah Zaides Rosen will trace the story of 19th- and 20th-century Russian Jews who left the Pale of Settlement, crossed the Black Sea and arrived in Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul), all in the twilight years of the Russian and Ottoman Empires.
This talk will introduce listeners not only to a fascinating Jewish community where Sephardic Jews were the majority (and Ashkenazi Jews the minority), but also to the ways in which Sephardic Jews responded to a refugee crisis, and in turn how they contended with contemporary political ideas, including Zionism.
The audience will also learn about hopeful Jews who created agricultural colonies in the western Aegean region of Turkey (such as Or Yehuda), funded by philanthropist Baron Maurice de Hirsch and aided by the nascent agricultural school Mikveh Israel. There, in these early “kibbutz”-like colonies, Russian and Ashkenazi Jews would either await Ottoman citizenship, which would allow them to move on to the Land of Israel, or slip through the borders between what is now Turkey, Syria, and Israel.
Centered on the book “Tevye’s Ottoman Daughter: Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews at the End of Empire“, Sarah will discuss Jewish identity in the late Ottoman world, and the ways in which Zionism was being debated and interpreted in the late Ottoman context.
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Presented by the Stroum Center for Jewish Studies.
Cosponsored by the Departments of History and Middle Eastern Languages and Cultures, the Ellison Center for Russian, East European, and Central Asian Studies, and the Middle East Center.
About the speaker

Sarah Zaides Rosen received her Ph.D. from the Department of History at the University of Washington in 2017 and her B.A. from the University of California San Diego. She was a fellow at the Woodrow Wilson Foundation and has held the Titus Ellison Fellowship and multiple Joff Hanauer Fellowships at the University of Washington. Her research has been supported by the Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture, Brandeis University, and the Vidal Sassoon Center for the Study of Antisemitism. Zaides Rosen is currently Associate Director of the Stroum Center for Jewish Studies at the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies at the University of Washington.
In conversation with Professors Canan Bolel (MELC) and Devin E. Naar (History and Jewish Studies).

The University of Washington is committed to providing access and accommodation in its services, programs, and activities. To make a request connected to a disability or health condition contact Grace Dy at (206) 543-0138 or jewishst@uw.edu at least 10 days before the event.

5/2 STROUM LECTURE | "Melodeklamatsiye": A Yiddish Performance Genre ?
2023-05-02 19:00 - 20:30 | Kane Hall 220, 4069 Spokane Ln, Seattle, WA, 98195, US

5/4 STROUM LECTURE | "Between Me and the Other World", an Immersive Music Experience
2023-05-04 19:00 - 20:30 | Walker-Ames room in Kane Hall

5/15 BOOK TALK | Wordplay in Ancient Near Eastern Texts with Professor Scott Noegel
2023-05-15 17:00 - 18:30 | Zoom
As part of the UW Department of Middle Eastern Languages and Cultures‘ “Conversations With Scholars” lecture series, this will be an all-access book talk that will be completely open for questions from attendees after a few brief introductory remarks from the author himself, Professor Scott Noegel.
BOOK TALK

The monograph offers a comparative study of the various functions that wordplay serves in ancient Near Eastern texts and provides a comprehensive classification for the phenomenon.
Languages covered include Sumerian, Akkadian, Egyptian, Ugaritic, biblical Hebrew, and Aramaic. The monograph also examines definitions of “wordplay” by exploring ancient conceptions of words and the generative role of scripts (consonantal, syllabic, and pictographic). Also discussed are issues of terminology, genre, audience, grammaticality, interpretation, and methodology.
The book further considers the distribution and preferences of these devices among the languages and discusses a number of principles and strategies that inform their creation, such as ambiguity, repetition and variation, delayed comprehension, metaphor and metonymy, clustering, and the use of rare words. The book concludes by suggesting potential avenues for future research.

Download a free copy of the book at: https://www.sbl-site.org/…/pdfs/pubs/9780884144762_OA.pdf and click on the button below to join the Zoom event on Monday, May 15, 2023 at 5:00 pm.
BOOK TALK

5/21 - 5/22 UW Symposium | Jews Amidst the Embers of the Ottoman Empire
2023-05-21 - 2023-05-23 | Madrona 313 + Communications 202
Research in the fields of Jewish, Ottoman, and Middle East history is often focused either on the late Ottoman period (variously defined), or on successor regimes (e.g. Republican Turkey, Arab and Balkan nation-states, British mandate Palestine or French mandate Syria). Moreover, scholars often divide the worlds of Ottoman Jewry into two discrete zones defined by geography, culture, or language: the Ladino-speaking Jews of the Balkans and Anatolia, and the Arabic-speaking Jews of the Eastern Mediterranean and parts of North Africa. Yet due to the parameters imposed by multiple (sub)fields, language limitations, and other factors, these various Jewish groups–who also intersect with Greek-speaking Jews, Neo-Aramaic-speaking Jews, Yiddish-speaking Jews and others–are often not conceptualized within an integrated framework.
Working across these temporal and geographic divides reveals the legacies and afterlives of the Ottoman Empire after its demise, continuity as well as change across space and across moments of historical rupture, and the mechanisms by which the Ottoman Empire took on meaning as an object of memory within and in light of later political, cultural, and social developments.
Conference Overview

5/25 WORKSHOP | 'Anglo-Saxons of the East': Armenian Self-Definition... with Ara Daglian
2023-05-25 17:00 - 18:30 | Thomson 317, UW Campus, 2023 Skagit Lane, Seattle, WA, 98195, United States
‘Anglo-Saxons of the East’:
Armenian Self-Definition in Early 20th Century America
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The Stroum Center for Jewish Studies is thrilled to invite you to the second in a new series of workshops, a lecture led by Jewish Studies Graduate Fellow Ara Daglian. Please join us to celebrate his imminent graduation and learn something new from him, all while enjoying wine and Dingfelder’s Deli delights. Yes, you read that right!
In this lecture, Ara Daglian will share some of his research from his work-in-progress, “Anglo-Saxons of the East”: Armenian Self-Definition in Early 20th Century America, to which Professor Devin E. Naar of the Sephardic Studies Program will pose some initial questions before the floor opens for discussion. Read on for a brief synopsis of his forthcoming paper:

This paper focuses on an important work of Armenian-American identity — The Armenians in America by M. Vartan Malcom. While previously known as a source of statistical and quantitative information on early Armenian-American history, the text also provided a voice to Armenian-Americans in an era where the American public knew them only through paternalistic aid campaigns and fundraiser slogans.

To analyze The Armenians in America as a work to redefine the Armenian-American identity, this paper turn towards Jewish studies for inspiration. Jewish studies historiography boasts a highly developed framework for understanding how Jewish Americans redefined themselves in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, offering a useful tool for studying Armenian-Americans as well.

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Co-sponsored by UW’s Middle East Center and UW’s Armenian Student Association.
About the speakers

Ara Daglian is a master’s student in the Middle East Studies program at the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies. Originally from Connecticut, he received his B.A. in history from Eastern Connecticut State University before coming to the University of Washington. As a Stroum Center graduate fellow, Ara plans to examine the complex inter-communal relations between Jews, Arabs and Armenians residing in Jerusalem during the British Mandate era. He is a Robinovitch Family Fellow.

Devin E. Naar is the Isaac Alhadeff Professor in Sephardic Studies, Chair of the Sephardic Studies Program, Associate Professor of History, and faculty at the Stroum Center for Jewish Studies in the Jackson School of International Studies at the University of Washington. As chair, Naar has spearheaded a project to collect, preserve and disseminate the rich Sephardic and Ladino historical, literary and cultural heritage. After serving as a Fulbright fellow to Greece, his first book, Jewish Salonica: Between the Ottoman Empire and Modern Greece, was published by Stanford University Press in 2016. The book won the 2016 National Jewish Book Award in the category of Research Based on Archival Material and was named a finalist in Sephardic Culture. It also won the 2017 Edmund Keeley Prize for best book in Modern Greek Studies awarded by the Modern Greek Studies Association. As a fellow in the Society of Scholars at the Simpson Center for the Humanities at the University of Washington in 2013-2014, Dr. Naar began his second book project, Reimagining the Sephardic Diaspora. He conducts research in Judeo-Spanish, Greek, Hebrew and French.

9/12 LUNCH & LEARN | Antisemitism and the Politics of "Tolerance"
2023-09-12 12:00 - 13:00 | Zoom
Russell Shorto has called Amsterdam “the world’s most liberal city,” and indeed, the Netherlands is well known for its tolerant approaches to drug enforcement, legalized sex work, and gay rights. However, recent events have brought this self-congratulatory attitude into question, especially in debates over immigration and multiculturalism.
Is tolerance as positive of an ideal as it seems on the surface? Or might a focus on tolerance reinforce the very conflicts it is intended to manage? This conversation will explore the legacies of the Holocaust for how antisemitism is approached in the Netherlands today and its complex relation to anti-Muslim racism.
LUNCH & LEARN

About the speaker

Nicolaas P. Barr, Ph.D., teaches in Comparative History of Ideas and Jewish Studies at the University of Washington, Seattle. He leads a UW study abroad program to Amsterdam and is the Dutch-to-English translator of Tofik Dibi’s coming-out memoir Djinn. Nicolaas has appeared on The Stranger’s podcast “Blabbermouth” to discuss such terms as anarchy, progressive, and neoliberal, and written on Dutch racism in The Nation and Jewish Currents. He’s an editor for H-Low Countries and a trombonist in the Mexican band Banda Vagos.

PANEL - POSTPONED | Jewish History and Jewish Memory Revisited: Yerushalmi’s 'Zakhor' at 40
2023-10-12 19:00 - 20:30 | HUB 214, UW Seattle Campus, 4001 E Stevens Way NE, Seattle, WA, 98195, United States
The Stroum Center is turning 50 years old and author Yosef Hayim Yerushalmi’s Zakhor isn’t far behind! Please join us for the first SCJS 50th Anniversary event of the year.
Note: This event has been postponed to a TBD date later in autumn quarter. Check back soon for more information.
A tribute to Zakhor
Rachel B. Gross, an expert on Judaism and American Jewish history, will open the conversation by addressing Yerushalmi’s influence on the field of Jewish Studies. Then she will give an overview of how and why she uses the term “nostalgia” to bridge what Yerushalmi sees as a division between Jewish history and memory.
Across all editions, just under 20,000 copies of Zakhor have been sold to date! This panel on Jewish history and Jewish memory will be moderated by faculty member Nicolaas P. Barr (Comparative History of Ideas), who specializes in antisemitism, intellectual history and modern Europe. Faculty member Jason Groves (German Studies), who specializes in memory studies in the context of ecology, will share his perspective as well.
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Note: This event has been postponed to a TBD date later in autumn quarter. Check back soon for more information.
About the speakers

Rachel B. Gross is Associate Professor and John and Marcia Goldman Chair in American Jewish Studies in the Department of Jewish Studies at San Francisco State University. She is a religious studies scholar who studies twentieth- and twenty-first-century American Jews. Her book, Beyond the Synagogue: Jewish Nostalgia as Religious Practice, is a 2021 National Jewish Book Award finalist in American Jewish Studies and received an Honorable Mention for the 2021 Saul Viener Book Prize, given by the American Jewish Historical Society. She is currently working on a religious biography of the twentieth-century immigration writer Mary Antin.
Nicolaas P. Barr, Ph.D., teaches in Comparative History of Ideas and Jewish Studies at the University of Washington, Seattle. He leads a UW study abroad program to Amsterdam and is the Dutch-to-English translator of Tofik Dibi’s coming-out memoir Djinn. Nicolaas has appeared on The Stranger’s podcast “Blabbermouth” to discuss such terms as anarchy, progressive, and neoliberal, and written on Dutch racism in The Nation and Jewish Currents. He’s an editor for H-Low Countries and a trombonist in the Mexican band Banda Vagos.
Jason Groves is an associate professor of German Studies at the University of Washington, where he is also a core faculty member in the Environmental Cultures and Values minor. His research interests encompass literature and art in German romanticism and realism, Jewish German literature, especially post-Holocaust poetry, literary theory, cultural criticism, memory studies, and trauma studies, particularly in the context of historical and ongoing ecological crises.
Since 2019 he has co-organized the Colloquium on Transcultural Approaches to Europe and from 2016-2019 he co-organized the Cross-disciplinary Research Cluster on the Anthropocene, both funded by the Simpson Center for the Humanities.

The University of Washington is committed to providing access and accommodation in its services, programs, and activities. To make a request connected to a disability or health condition contact Grace Dy at (206) 543-0138 or jewishst@uw.edu at least 10 days before the event.

POSTPONED | "Luminous": Book Talk and Art Showcase with Canadian Jewish Author and Artist Linda Dayan Frimer
2023-10-26 18:30 - 20:00 | Walker-Ames room in Kane Hall
In partnership with the Canadian Studies Center (Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies), we are hosting Linda Dayan Frimer, a Jewish artist with Eastern European roots from Vancouver, Canada whose art focuses on the dignity and preservation of both culture and nature.
This event will start with a happy hour and art exhibit, followed by a lecture. As part of our Stroum Center 50th Anniversary events, Frimer will present on her new book, Luminous: An artist’s story as a guide to radical creativity. She maintains that “radical creativity in this sense reaches the foundational core of self where real change occurs, through the sharing of story, art, nature and culture in a global, Canadian and Jewish context.”
In conversation with faculty member Galya Diment.
Note: This event has been postponed to a TBD date later in the 2023-24 academic year. Check back soon for more information.

Co-sponsored by the Canadian Studies Center, Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies.
About the author and artist
Linda Dayan Frimer is an internationally recognized artist and celebrated facilitator, whose esthetically powerful works of art address memory, trauma, culture, and the environment. Born in the wilderness town of Wells, British Columbia, Frimer was immersed in the wonder of the surrounding landscape. At a young age, she overheard stories of the Holocaust and became determined to champion and protect the sanctity of all life forms. She turned to art as her natural medium. Her work with the Gesher Intergenerational Holocaust project made an astonishing contribution to healing trauma through creativity while her work with Cree artist George Littlechild resulted in a book entitled “In Honor of our Grandmothers”, sharing reverence and championing dignity of those who have suffered. Frimer’s artworks have supported the work of environmental organizations such as the Trans Canada Trail, Raincoast Conservation Foundation, and the Western Canada Wilderness Committee. “Some paintings beg comparison with Emily Carr’s famous forests, but Frimer’s light-filled spaces and Post-Impressionist/Fauvist palette will hit a stronger emotional chord with many people” – in British Columbia Reviews by Michael Kluckner. Her new book, nominated for many awards, “Luminous: An artist’s story as a guide to radical creativity,” reaches the foundational core where real change occurs.
About the moderator
Galya Diment is the Byron W. and Alice L. Lockwood Professor in the Humanities and Professor in the Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures at the University of Washington. Her teaching specialties include Russian literary and cultural history, the works of Vladimir Nabokov, and Russian Jewish film.
Prof. Diment received her Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from the University of California, Berkeley, and is on the editorial boards of Nabokov Studies, Russian Studies in Literature, and Studies in Russian and European Literature. She has authored and edited eight books, among them “Pniniad: Vladimir Nabokov and Marc Szeftel” (1997; Paperback 2013), and “A Russian Jew of Bloomsbury: The Life and Times of Samuel Koteliansky” (2011; Paperback 2013).
Her essay about her grandfather, who was a rabbi near Vitebsk, and his family was featured in a Vitebsk publication, “Mishpoka,” in 2013. Her articles have also appeared in the Times Literary Supplement, New York Magazine, and London Magazine.
She is currently working on a book about Jewish painters from Vitebsk at the turn of the twentieth century — “Vitebsk and Beyond: Yehuda Pen, Marc Chagall, and Leon Gaspard.”
The University of Washington is committed to providing access and accommodation in its services, programs, and activities. To make a request connected to a disability or health condition contact Grace Dy at (206) 543-0138 or jewishst@uw.edu at least 10 days before the event.

11/16 LECTURE | What Can Jewish Mothers Teach Us About Jewish Origins and Ethnicities?
2023-11-16 19:00 - 20:30 | Thomson Hall 101, 2023 King Lane, Seattle, WA, 98195, United States
From ancient biblical narratives to cutting-edge genomic research, putting mothers at the center of our questions, definitions, and research into Jewish history can provide unexpected insights and startlingly unfamiliar perspectives. As part of our Stroum Center 50th Anniversary events, author Cynthia Baker will discuss how this is especially true in relation to issues of race/ethnicity and its entanglements with gender, religion, and nationality.
In conversation with faculty member and SCJS Director Mika Ahuvia.
This event is free and open to the public. Click the button below to register:
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About the speaker

Cynthia M. Baker is the author of “Jew” in the Key Words in Jewish Studies series, published by Rutgers University Press. The book offers a wide-ranging exploration of this key term that lies not only at the heart of Jewish experience but also at the core of Western civilizational projects. Baker is Chair of the Religious Studies Department at Bates College in Lewiston, Maine, USA, where her teaching and research engage broadly with Jewish history and historiography, early Christianity, gender, violence, and religio-ethnic nationalisms.
About the moderator
Mika Ahuvia was born in Kibbutz Beit Hashita in northern Israel. She researches the formative history of Jewish and Christian communities in the ancient Mediterranean world. Specializing in Late Antique Jewish history, she works with rabbinic sources, liturgical poetry, magical texts, early mystical literature, and archaeological evidence.
Her book “On My Right Michael, On My Left Gabriel: Angels in Ancient Jewish Culture” investigates conceptions of angels in foundational Jewish texts and ritual sources. In the book, Ahuvia uncovers how angels made their way into the practices and worldview of ancient Jews and makes sense of why angels continue to play such an important role within and outside of institutional religious settings.
Ahuvia teaches courses in Jewish Studies, comparative religion, and global studies in the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies and is also the Stroum Center’s Undergraduate Program Coordinator.

12/3 EVENT | Ladino Day 2023: 'Kantika', a Sephardic Novel by Author Elizabeth Graver
2023-12-03 10:00 - 11:00 | Zoom
Join author Elizabeth Graver in conversation with Isaac Alhadeff Professor of Sephardic Studies Devin E. Naar for a discussion of “Kantika,” a moving, multi-generational saga inspired by Graver’s grandmother. Rebecca Baruch Levy (née Cohen) was born into a Sephardic Jewish family from Istanbul in the early 20th century, and her kaleidoscopic journey takes her to Barcelona, Havana, and ultimately New York, exploring themes of displacement, endurance, and family as home.
“Kantika” — meaning “song” in Ladino — is a lush, lyrical novel which celebrates the legacy of language, and the insistence on seizing beauty and grabbing hold of one’s one and only life.
“Far from being a Pollyannaish tale of New World success, ‘Kantika’ is a meticulous endeavor to preserve the memories of a family, an elegy and a celebration both.” — Ayten Tartici, New York Times, April 2023

About the speakers
Elizabeth Graver’s fifth novel, “Kantika” (Metropolitan Books/Holt, 2023), was inspired by her grandmother, Rebecca Baruch Levy (née Cohen), who was born into a Sephardic Jewish family in Istanbul, and whose tumultuous and shape-shifting life journey took her to Spain, Cuba and New York. German and Turkish editions are forthcoming. Elizabeth’s fourth novel, The End of the Point, was long-listed for the 2013 National Book Award in Fiction and selected as a New York Times Notable Book of the Year. Her other novels are “Awake,” “The Honey Thief,” and “Unravelling.” Her story collection, “Have You Seen Me?,” won the 1991 Drue Heinz Literature Prize. Her work has been anthologized in Best American Short Stories, Prize Stories: The O. Henry Awards, The Pushcart Prize Anthology, and Best American Essays. The mother of two daughters, she teaches at Boston College.
Devin E. Naar is the Isaac Alhadeff Professor in Sephardic Studies, Associate Professor of History, and faculty at the Stroum Center for Jewish Studies in the Jackson School of International Studies at the University of Washington. Born and raised in New Jersey, Dr. Naar graduated summa cum laude from Washington University in St. Louis and received his Ph.D. in History at Stanford University. He has also served as a Fulbright fellow to Greece. His first book, Jewish Salonica: Between the Ottoman Empire and Modern Greece, was published by Stanford University Press in 2016. The book won the 2016 National Jewish Book Award in the category of Research Based on Archival Material and was named a finalist in Sephardic Culture. It also won the 2017 Edmund Keeley Prize for best book in Modern Greek Studies awarded by the Modern Greek Studies Association.

Ladino Day 2023 is supported by the Lucie Benveniste Kavesh Endowed Fund in Sephardic Studies and presented in partnership with the Sephardic Brotherhood of America.
Ladino Day 2023 is also cosponsored by the Departments of History, Linguistics, Middle Eastern Languages & Cultures, and Spanish & Portuguese Studies at the University of Washington, as well as by Congregation Ezra Bessaroth, the Seattle Sephardic Network, the Sephardic Bikur Holim Congregation, Sephardic Heritage International (SHIN) DC, and the Turkish American Cultural Association of Washington (TACAWA).

1/24 WEBINAR | A New Day in Babylon and Jerusalem: Zionism, Power, Politics, and Identity
2024-01-24 12:00 - 13:30 | RSVP for Zoom link
In this lecture, based upon her forthcoming second book project, historian and author Sara Hirschhorn will consider the modern histories of Zionism and the Left, the rise of transnational “power” movements, and the unraveling of American Jewish unanimity around Israel between 1967 and 1975. The talk will historically inform pressing and politicized questions in the face of resurgent contemporary antisemitism.
The event will be held in Zoom webinar format.
Click the button below to register and receive a link to the event:
Register Now >

About the speaker
Sara Hirschhorn is currently a visiting professor at the University of Haifa Ruderman Program for American Jewish Studies and Senior Research Fellow at the University of Haifa Comper Center for the Interdisciplinary Study of Antisemitism and Racism. She is also a research fellow at the Center for Antisemitism Research at the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and a fellow of the Jewish People Policy Institute. She received her Ph.D. in history from the University of Chicago in 2012.
Her research, teaching, and public engagement activities are focused on the Israeli settler movement, the Arab-Israeli conflict, and Diaspora-Israel relations. These interests culminated in her first book City on a Hilltop: American Jews and the Israeli Settler Movement (Harvard University Press, 2017), which won the 2018 Sami Rohr Prize in Jewish Literature Choice Award and was a finalist for the 2018 National Jewish Book Award.

The University of Washington is committed to providing access and accommodation in its services, programs, and activities. To make a request connected to a disability or health condition contact Grace Elizabeth Dy at (206) 543-0138 or jewishst@uw.edu at least 10 days before the event.

1/31 LECTURE | The Israel-Palestine Conflict: Finding a Path Forward - Lecture with Alon Tal
2024-01-31 19:00 - 20:30 | Kane Hall 110, 4069 Spokane Lane, Seattle, WA, 98195, United States
After a century of conflict, it is often said that in the Middle East the past is the enemy of the future. Nonetheless, it is unwise to consider alternatives for resolving the Israeli/Palestinian conflict without understanding the antecedents to the present Gaza War, the concerns of the sides and the key reasons behind the failed past efforts for reconciliation.
Alon Tal, a leading Israeli environmentalist and former member of the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, has been working to promote cooperation in sustainability between Israel and its neighbors for almost thirty years.
This talk will briefly consider the basic history of the military conflicts in the region, how the present war in Gaza is changing perceptions, the shift in the geopolitical dynamics of the Middle East, and the prospects for transforming the present tragedy in order to open a new page in the relations between these historic adversaries.
Register to attend the event:
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This event will also have a livestream option. View the livestream on YouTube:
Livestream: The Israel-Palestine Conflict: Finding a Path Forward

About the speaker
Alon Tal is a visiting professor in sustainability at Stanford University and a professor of public policy at Tel Aviv University. In 2021 and 2022, he was a member of Israel’s Knesset, where he chaired the country’s first parliamentary sub-committee on climate change and the environment.

This lecture is cosponsored by the Near and Middle Eastern Studies Ph.D. Program and by the Middle East Center of the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies.
The University of Washington is committed to providing access and accommodation in its services, programs, and activities. To make a request connected to a disability or health condition contact Grace Elizabeth Dy at (206) 543-0138 or jewishst@uw.edu at least 10 days before the event.

POSTPONED | Time's Echo: The Second World War, the Holocaust, and the Music of Remembrance
2024-02-08 19:00 - 20:30 | Thomson Hall 101, 2023 King Lane, Seattle, WA, 98195, United States
Writer, music critic, and cultural historian Jeremy Eichler will present on the relationship between music, war, and memory, as presented in his recent book Time’s Echo: The Second World War, the Holocaust, and the Music of Remembrance.
Note: This event has been postponed. Check back soon for more information.

About the speaker

An award-winning writer, scholar and critic, Jeremy Eichler is the author of Time’s Echo, a new book on music, war and memory that has been named “History Book of the Year” by The Sunday Times and hailed as “the outstanding music book of this and several years” by The Times Literary Supplement. Published by Knopf in North America and Faber in the U.K., Time’s Echo was a finalist for the UK’s premier non-fiction prize, and is currently being translated into six languages.
Eichler is the recipient of an ASCAP Deems Taylor Award for writing published in The New Yorker, a fellowship from Harvard University’s Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, and a Public Scholar award from the National Endowment for the Humanities. He earned his PhD in modern European history at Columbia University and has taught at Brandeis University. His criticism has appeared in The New York Times and many other national publications, and since 2006, he has served as chief classical music critic of The Boston Globe.

The University of Washington is committed to providing access and accommodation in its services, programs, and activities. To make a request connected to a disability or health condition contact Grace Elizabeth Dy at (206) 543-0138 or jewishst@uw.edu at least 10 days before the event.

2/14 LUNCH & LEARN | Exile, Diaspora, and the Jews in the Roman and Byzantine Era with Mika Ahuvia
2024-02-14 12:00 - 13:00 | Thomson Hall 317, Thomson Hall 317, Seattle
Join us to hear Professor Mika Ahuvia present on her forthcoming paper, Exile, Diaspora, and the Jews in the Roman and Byzantine Era.
Abstract: In the centuries around the turn of the Common Era, successive empires repeatedly enslaved thousands of Jews and displaced them from their homeland. Displaced Jews joined established Jewish communities dispersed over three continents and lacked uniform, central or stable governance structures for the first one thousand years of the Common Era. Jews who witnessed the expulsions of their co-religionists drew on historical precedents and biblical models to develop new conceptions of God’s ongoing faithfulness to the Jewish people (e.g. the Shekhina). A full account of Jewish experiences of exile and forced migration in the Roman era must acknowledge divergent responses found in a variety of textual sources (e.g. rabbinic literature, piyyut, Targum, Latin and Greek witnesses) as well archaeological sources (e.g. funerary inscriptions, synagogue art, incantation bowls) from ancient Syro-Palestine and beyond.
Lunch will be provided. This event is free and open to the public, but RSVP is required. Click the button below to register:
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About the speaker

Mika Ahuvia was born in Kibbutz Beit Hashita in northern Israel. She researches the formative history of Jewish and Christian communities in the ancient Mediterranean world. Specializing in Late Antique Jewish history, she works with rabbinic sources, liturgical poetry, magical texts, early mystical literature, and archaeological evidence.
Her book “On My Right Michael, On My Left Gabriel: Angels in Ancient Jewish Culture” investigates conceptions of angels in foundational Jewish texts and ritual sources. In the book, Ahuvia uncovers how angels made their way into the practices and worldview of ancient Jews and makes sense of why angels continue to play such an important role within and outside of institutional religious settings.
Ahuvia is the Director of the Stroum Center for Jewish Studies and teaches courses in Jewish Studies, comparative religion, and global studies in the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies.
The University of Washington is committed to providing access and accommodation in its services, programs, and activities. To make a request connected to a disability or health condition contact Grace Elizabeth Dy at (206) 543-0138 or jewishst@uw.edu at least 10 days before the event.

2/22 LECTURE | Jerusalem in Rome and Galilee: Encountering the Holy City in Jewish and Christian Mosaics
2024-02-22 19:00 - 20:30 | Thomson Hall 101, 2023 King Lane, Seattle, WA, 98195, United States
The city of Jerusalem has long been of vital importance to numerous religious groups, from antiquity to the present. But where did rank-and-file believers in the ancient world actually encounter images of the “Holy City” in their daily lives? And what cultural and social work did these images perform?
Join Professors Karen Britt and Ra‘anan Boustan as they explore a wide range of depictions of Jerusalem in floor and wall mosaics produced during late antiquity (third to eighth centuries CE). During this period, which saw the emergence of both orthodox Christianity and novel forms of Judaism, visual representations of Jerusalem became increasingly prominent in the decoration of religious buildings throughout the Mediterranean, from the grand basilicas of Rome in the west to rural synagogues and churches in Palestine and Arabia in the east. They will show how images of Jerusalem bridged the great gaps in both space and time that separated the religious communities of late antiquity from Jerusalem and its glorious past. In the process, these images brought the visual presence of the Holy City into spaces of worship throughout the Roman Empire, thereby fostering memories of the past, hopes for the future, and forging networks of belonging that radiated out from this sacred center into the cities, towns, and even villages of the late Roman world.
This lecture is co-sponsored by the Middle East Center in the Jackson School of International Studies, the School of Art + Art History + Design, the Department of Middle Eastern Languages and Cultures, and the Department of Classics at the University of Washington.
This event is free and open to the public, however RSVP is required. Click the button below to register:
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About the speakers

Karen Britt is assistant professor of art history at Northwest Missouri State University. As an art historian engaged in archaeology, her research focuses on the eastern Mediterranean. She has worked on archaeological projects at various sites in the region, and is currently the mosaics specialist for the Huqoq Excavation Project in Israel. In her scholarship, Britt explores how architectural decoration, in particular mosaics, can illuminate culture and society in the late Roman, Byzantine, and early Islamic worlds. Her research has been supported by the National Endowment for the Humanities, the U.S. Department of State’s division of Educational and Cultural Affairs, the J. William Fulbright Foundation, the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, and the Council of American Overseas Research Centers. She is the co-author of The Elephant Mosaic Panel in the Synagogue at Huqoq (2017) and has authored or co-authored articles published in venues including Studies in Late Antiquity, Journal of Late Antiquity, Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research, Mediterranean Studies, Journal of Art Historiography, and Journal of Roman Archaeology. Britt has collaborated with Ra‘anan Boustan since 2014 on the publication of the synagogue mosaics in the village of Huqoq in lower eastern Galilee.
Ra‘anan Boustan has been a Research Scholar in the Program in Judaic Studies at Princeton University since 2017. Before coming to Princeton, he was an Associate Professor in the Department of History at UCLA. Boustan’s work explores the dynamic intersections between Judaism and other Mediterranean religious traditions in late antiquity, with a special focus on the impact of Christianization on Jewish culture and society. In addition to publishing numerous articles and edited volumes, Boustan is the author of From Martyr to Mystic (2005) and co-author of The Elephant Mosaic Panel in the Synagogue at Huqoq (2017). He currently serves as the Editor-in-Chief of two international journals, Jewish Studies Quarterly and Studies in Late Antiquity. Boustan is the site historian for the Huqoq Excavation Project and collaborates with Dr. Karen Britt on the publication of the mosaic floor in the site’s late fourth-century synagogue.
Britt’s and Boustan’s collaboration represents a close partnership between a specialist in late antique material culture who has worked on mosaics at archaeological sites in the eastern Mediterranean and a historian of religion with expertise in literary evidence, especially the Jewish textual tradition from the Hellenistic, Roman, and Byzantine periods. They endeavor not only to bring their respective tools and expertise to bear on their work on mosaics, but more importantly to develop as much as possible a fully integrated approach that avoids privileging one type of historical source.

The University of Washington is committed to providing access and accommodation in its services, programs, and activities. To make a request connected to a disability or health condition contact Grace Elizabeth Dy at (206) 543-0138 or jewishst@uw.edu at least 10 days before the event.

2/28 LUNCH & LEARN | The Invention of the Postcard: The Circulation of Jewish Visual Culture in Ottoman and Greek Salonica with Shalom Sabar
2024-02-28 12:00 - 13:00 | Thomson Hall 317, Thomson Hall 317, Seattle
The invention of the postcard in the late nineteenth century revolutionized how people exchanged information and images. While first introduced in the United States, the postcard quickly spread across the world. In the realm of the Ottoman Empire, where post offices had operated since the middle of the nineteenth century, the postcard added a new dimension to the emerging technologies of communication.
Join us to hear Professor Shalom Sabar discuss how his review of extensive collections of Jewish postcards from Salonica (1897-1917) helps us to understand the self-perception and the experience of the Jews living in the city.
Lunch will be provided. This event is free and open to the public, but RSVP is required. Click the button below to register:
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This event is co-sponsored by the Division of Art History at the University of Washington.

About the speaker
Shalom Sabar is a Professor Emeritus of Jewish Art and Folklore at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. He received his Ph.D. in Art History at the University of California, Los Angeles in 1987. He is the author of more than 250 publications exploring Jewish art and the material culture of Jewish communities in the Sephardi and Ashkenazi worlds in Europe and the Islamic East. His research areas include Jewish ceremonies and rituals, life cycle events, objects of daily life, ephemera, folk art, amulets, and magic, as well as the visual culture of illustrated Hebrew books and manuscripts. Shalom Sabar is also an avid collector of Israeli and Jewish ephemera and has guided numerous traveling seminars to Jewish sites in Europe, North Africa, India, and Central Asia
The University of Washington is committed to providing access and accommodation in its services, programs, and activities. To make a request connected to a disability or health condition contact Grace Elizabeth Dy at (206) 543-0138 or jewishst@uw.edu at least 10 days before the event.

3/27 EVENT | A Spark of King David: The Musical Poetry of Rabbi Israel Najara Then and Now
2024-03-27 19:00 - 20:30 | Kane Hall 220, 4069 Spokane Ln, Seattle, WA, 98195, US
Can a 16th-century religious Hebrew poet remain relevant to contemporary audiences? Rabbi Israel Najara’s poetic legacy proves that this is indeed possible. A Middle Eastern contemporary of William Shakespeare, nicknamed “A Spark of King David” by his followers, Najara’s poems continue to be used for Jewish rituals and festivities in the present day.
Join us to hear from Professor Edwin Seroussiwhy Rabbi Najara’s poetry of hope and redemption has persisted in synagogues, in Jewish homes, and on Israeli pop stages to this very day.
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Also register for Edwin Seroussi’s talk on Thursday, March 28, at 7:00 p.m.:
Sonic Ruins of Modernity: Ladino Folksongs Today

About the speaker

Edwin Seroussi is the Emanuel Alexandre Professor Emeritus of Musicology at Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Chair of the Academic Committee of the Jewish Music Research Centre, Visiting Scholar at Dartmouth College and, in 2023/4, Fellow at the Herbert G. Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. His research focuses on Jewish musical cultures of the Mediterranean and Middle East and their interactions with Islamic cultures, Judeo-Spanish song and music in Israel. He explores processes of hybridization, diaspora, nationalism and transnationalism in diverse contexts and historical periods such as the Ottoman Empire, colonial Morocco and Algeria, Germany’s Second Empire and the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Zionist settlement in Palestine and the Judeo-Spanish-speaking diaspora.

This series is cosponsored by the UW Department of Middle Eastern Languages and Cultures, the UW Middle East Center, the UW Near and Middle East Studies Ph.D. Program, ArtsUW, part of the College of Arts and Sciences, and by the Ethnomusicology Program at the University of Washington.
It was made possible with the support of the Hazzan Isaac Azose Fund for Community Engagement, which was created in partnership with the Isaac Alhadeff Foundation and the Benoliel Family Fund, with additional support provided by Congregation Ezra Bessaroth, the Seattle Sephardic Brotherhood and the Sephardic Bikur Holim Congregation, as well as Jack I. Azose, Howard Behar, Harley and Lela Franco, Jeff and Jamie Merriman Cohen, Jack Schaloum and Marlene Souriano Vinikoor.

The University of Washington is committed to providing access and accommodation in its services, programs, and activities. To make a request connected to a disability or health condition contact Grace Elizabeth Dy at (206) 543-0138 or by emailing jewishst@uw.edu at least 10 days before the event.

3/28 LECTURE | Sonic Ruins of Modernity: Ladino Folksongs Today
2024-03-28 19:00 - 20:30 | Kane Hall 220, 4069 Spokane Lane, Seattle, WA, 98103, United States
Drawing on his forthcoming book, “Sonic Ruins of Modernity: Judeo-Spanish Folksongs Today,” musicologist Edwin Seroussi will examine a repertoire of Ladino (Judeo-Spanish) folksongs transmitted by Sephardic Jews, a process made possible by a complex network of people and forces extending from the distant past to the “post-tradition era” of the present.
In addition to the lecture, Ke Guo, musician and Ph.D. candidate in the UW School of Music, will perform Sephardic folksongs.
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Also register for Edwin Seroussi’s talk on Wednesday, March 27, at 7:00 p.m.:
A Spark of King David: The Musical Poetry of Rabbi Israel Najara Then and Now

About the speaker
Edwin Seroussi is the Emanuel Alexandre Professor Emeritus of Musicology at Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Chair of the Academic Committee of the Jewish Music Research Centre, Visiting Scholar at Dartmouth College and, in 2023/4, Fellow at the Herbert G. Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. His research focuses on Jewish musical cultures of the Mediterranean and Middle East and their interactions with Islamic cultures, Judeo-Spanish song and music in Israel. He explores processes of hybridization, diaspora, nationalism and transnationalism in diverse contexts and historical periods such as the Ottoman Empire, colonial Morocco and Algeria, Germany’s Second Empire and the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Zionist settlement in Palestine and the Judeo-Spanish-speaking diaspora.

This series is cosponsored by the UW Department of Middle Eastern Languages and Cultures, the UW Middle East Center, the UW Near and Middle East Studies Ph.D. Program, ArtsUW, part of the College of Arts and Sciences, and by the Ethnomusicology Program at the University of Washington.
It is presented by the Hazzan Isaac Azose Fund for Community Engagement, created in partnership with the Isaac Alhadeff Foundation and the Benoliel Family Fund, with additional support provided by Congregation Ezra Bessaroth, the Seattle Sephardic Brotherhood and the Sephardic Bikur Holim Congregation, as well as Jack I. Azose, Howard Behar, Harley and Lela Franco, Jeff and Jamie Merriman Cohen, Jack Schaloum and Marlene Souriano Vinikoor.

The University of Washington is committed to providing access and accommodation in its services, programs, and activities. To make a request connected to a disability or health condition contact Grace Elizabeth Dy at (206) 543-0138 or by emailing jewishst@uw.edu at least 10 days before the event.

4/11 LECTURE | Contemporary Ethiopian Artists in Israel and the Question of Hyphenated Identity
2024-04-11 19:00 - 20:30 | Thomson Hall 101, 2023 King Lane, Seattle, WA, 98195, United States
Artist and researcher Efrat Yerday will draw upon the work of several contemporary visual artists, including Zauditu Yossef-Seri, Tgst Ron Yossef, Michal Mamit Worku, and Nirit Takele, as well as the works of younger artists, including Ephraim Wasse, Jenet Belai, and Rachel Aniyu, to illustrate the challenges faced by Ethiopian Jewish artists in Israel today.
Yerday will discuss how Israeli artists of Ethiopian descent often feel forced to choose one side of their identity in their lives and work, along with the diverse strategies these artists use to navigate these challenges.
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About the speaker
Efrat Yerday is an artist and researcher, poet and cultural entrepreneur. She is a Ph.D. candidate in sociology at Tel Aviv University, writing about Ethiopian Jews in Israel between 1955-1975 and the struggle for citizenship. Yerday is also the chairwoman of the Association for Ethiopian Jews and in 2020 won New Israel Fund’s Gallanter Prize for emerging Israeli social justice leaders.
Yerday is the co-editor of “The Monk and the Lion: Contemporary Ethiopian Visual Art in Israel” (Achoti Press, 2017) and wrote the epilogue for the 2018 Hebrew translation of Zora Neal Hurston’s “Their Eyes Were Watching God.” In 2018, Yerday joined film director Bazi Gete in coordinating the Atesib! African film festival, the first of its kind in Israel.
Her scholarly work has appeared in the journal Anthropology of the Middle East and she was a panelist and presenter at the Annual Israeli Sociological Society Conference in 2020 and 2021.

This event is cosponsored by the UW African Studies Program.
The University of Washington is committed to providing access and accommodation in its services, programs, and activities. To make a request connected to a disability or health condition contact Grace Elizabeth Dy at (206) 543-0138 or jewishst@uw.edu at least 10 days before the event.

5/7 STROUM LECTURE | The Complexities of Jewish Friendships: Jews and Non-Jews in Imperial Germany
2024-05-07 19:00 - 20:30 | RSVP for Zoom link
The Stroum Center for Jewish Studies proudly announces its 2024 Samuel and Althea Stroum Lecture series, featuring acclaimed Holocaust historian Marion Kaplan.
The first lecture in the series will focus on grassroots social interactions between Jewish and non-Jewish Germans and, where possible, on the feelings these evoked among Jews—both heartening and discouraging. Antisemitism set limits on Jewish success and also the boundaries against which Jews pushed relentlessly — and often successfully. Although the lecture will focus on Jews, moments of acceptance and animosity provide a vantage point from which to study the diversity of German society as well.
Learn more and register for the following lecture, happening Thursday May 9, here.
This event is free and open to the public, but RSVP is required. Click the button below to register:
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About the speaker
Marion Kaplan is the Skirball Professor of Modern Jewish History Emerita at NYU. She is a three-time National Jewish Book Award winner for The Making of the Jewish Middle Class: Women, Family and Identity in Imperial Germany (1991), Between Dignity and Despair: Jewish Life in Nazi Germany (1998), and Gender and Jewish History (with Deborah Dash Moore, 2011) as well as a finalist for Dominican Haven: The Jewish Refugee Settlement in Sosua (2008). Her other monographs include: The Jewish Feminist Movement in Germany; Jewish Daily Life in Germany, 1618-1945 (ed.); and Hitler’s Jewish Refugees: Hope and Anxiety in Portugal, 1940-45 (2020).
The Stroum Lectures in Jewish Studies are an annual series of talks given by luminaries in the field of Jewish Studies, hosted by Stroum Jewish Studies at the University of Washington. For more than thirty years, through the generosity of Samuel and Althea Stroum, Jewish Studies has been able to bolster public scholarship around Judaism. View highlights from the past thirty years below, or scroll further to learn more about the history of the lectures and view the full archive.

5/9 STROUM LECTURE | Hitler’s Jewish Refugees: Hope and Anxiety in Portugal
2024-05-09 19:00 - 20:30 | WA
The Stroum Center for Jewish Studies proudly announces its 2024 Samuel and Althea Stroum Lecture series, featuring acclaimed Holocaust historian Marion Kaplan.
In her second lecture, Kaplan will focus on the experiences of Jewish refugees as they fled Hitler’s regime and then lived in limbo in Portugal until they could reach safer havens abroad. Drawing attention not only to the social and physical upheavals these refugees experienced, she will highlight their complicated feelings as they fled their homes and histories, while having to beg strangers for kindness.
Learn more and register for the first lecture, happening Tuesday May 7, here.
This event is free and open to the public, but RSVP is required. Click the button below to register:
Register Now >

About the speaker
Marion Kaplan is the Skirball Professor of Modern Jewish History Emerita at NYU. She is a three-time National Jewish Book Award winner for The Making of the Jewish Middle Class: Women, Family and Identity in Imperial Germany (1991), Between Dignity and Despair: Jewish Life in Nazi Germany (1998), and Gender and Jewish History (with Deborah Dash Moore, 2011) as well as a finalist for Dominican Haven: The Jewish Refugee Settlement in Sosua (2008). Her other monographs include: The Jewish Feminist Movement in Germany; Jewish Daily Life in Germany, 1618-1945 (ed.); and Hitler’s Jewish Refugees: Hope and Anxiety in Portugal, 1940-45 (2020).
The Stroum Lectures in Jewish Studies are an annual series of talks given by luminaries in the field of Jewish Studies, hosted by Stroum Jewish Studies at the University of Washington. For more than thirty years, through the generosity of Samuel and Althea Stroum, Jewish Studies has been able to bolster public scholarship around Judaism. View highlights from the past thirty years below, or scroll further to learn more about the history of the lectures and view the full archive.
The University of Washington is committed to providing access and accommodation in its services, programs, and activities. To make a request connected to a disability or health condition contact Grace Elizabeth Dy at (206) 543-0138 or jewishst@uw.edu at least 10 days before the event.
