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Robert Seltzer Series The Intolerance of Monotheism: Towards a Religious History of Antisemitism Because of their minority status in Medieval Islamic and Christian societies, Jews became the persecuted other who justified Christian and Muslim belief in their own supersession or replacement theology. Even in the modern, more secular era, baked-in religious prejudices informed the dynamics […]
Robert Seltzer Series Illiberal Religious Momfluencers: The Political Language of Wellness This talk examines illiberal Jewish and Christian women Instagram influencers who focus on wellness, domesticity, and motherhood. Using digital ethnography and interviews, Fader explores where and how influencers inspire each other and interact, elaborating a political illiberal religious women’s authority that creates change, while […]
Robert Seltzer Series Anna Sokolow and the Jewish Roots of her American Modern Dance American modern dance pioneer and Jewish cultural icon Anna Sokolow (1910-2000) was a dancer and choreographer of uncompromising integrity. A very important part of American Jewish culture whose story is not well known, her choreography closely reflects her intense commitment to […]
Robert Seltzer Lecture Series For Women and Girls Only: Reshaping Jewish Orthodoxy Through the Arts in the Digital Age Mainstream portrayals of ultra-Orthodox religious women often frame their faith as oppressive: they are empowered only when they leave their community. Jessica Roda's scholarship flips this notion on its head. Drawing on years of fieldwork between […]
Robert Seltzer Lecture Series The Light of Learning: Hasidism in Poland on the Eve of the Holocaust The Light of Learning, by Glenn Dynner, tells the story of an unexpected Hasidic revival in Poland on the eve of the Holocaust. Hasidic leaders reinvented themselves through an ensuing pedagogical revolution. Hasidic yeshivas soon overshadowed courts and […]
Robert Seltzer Lecture Series The Art of the Niggun: Melody as Devotion In a duo performance, Dr. Samuel Torjman Thomas traverses the world of niggunim, drawing upon the Hasidic devotional […]
Robert Seltzer Lecture Series Mel Brooks: Disobedient Jew Presented by: Jeremy Dauber, Atran Professor of Yiddish Language, Literature, and Culture at Columbia University and director emeritus of its Institute for Israel and Jewish Studies This lecture will be held online via Zoom. Zoom link will be provided upon RSVP Please download the Zoom app before […]
Robert Seltzer Lecture Series Leaving the Hasidic Community: Reality Versus Popular Culture Presented by: Schneur Zalman Newfield, Associate Professor of Sociology and Jewish Studies at Hunter College, City University of New York This lecture will be held in person at Hunter College and online via Zoom. Zoom link will be provided upon RSVP Please download […]
Robert Seltzer Lunch Lecture Series The Jews of Summer: Summer Camp and Jewish Culture in Postwar America Presented by: Sandra Fox, Goldstein-Goren Visiting Assistant Professor of American Jewish History at New York University, and director of the Archive of the American Jewish Left in the Digital Age In this lecture, Sandra Fox explains how a […]
Robert Seltzer Lunch Lecture Series Sounds of Mediterranean Jewry: Sephardi-Mizrahi Songlines Presented by: Dr. Samuel Torjman Thomas, Founder and Artistic Director of ASEFA and the New York Andalus Ensemble and Adjunct Assistant Professor in music and Jewish studies at Hunter. This event is co-sponsored by the Department of Music at Hunter College. Due to limited […]
Robert Seltzer Lunch Lecture Series The Yiddish (Un)conscious: Psychoanalysis as a Jewish Science Presented by: Naomi Seidman, Chancellor Jackman Professor of the Arts at the University of Toronto, and a Guggenheim Fellow. This event is co-sponsored by the Department of Music at Hunter College. This lecture will also be available live on Zoom. Link sent […]
Robert Seltzer Lunch Lecture Series A Fortress in Brooklyn: Race, Real Estate, and the Making of Hasidic Williamsburg Presented by: Nathaniel Deutsch, Professor of History at the University of California, Santa Cruz. And Michael Casper, PhD., University of California. Co-hosted by Hunter's Department of Urban Policy and Planning. This event will be held online via […]
Robert Seltzer Lunch Lecture Series Performing Jewish Identity in Russian Immigrant Narratives of the Third Wave 1970-1980s) Presented by Yasha Klots, PhD, Assistant Professor, Hunter College Was the Third Wave of the Russian Emigration to the United States in fact Jewish? This talk will focus on Russophone authors from the Soviet Union immigrating to the […]
Robert Seltzer Lunch Lecture Series A Decade-Long Retrospective on US-Israel Relations Presented by Dr. Sara Yael Hirschhorn, a '22-'23 inaugural fellow at the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) Center for Antisemitism Research and an instructor in Jewish and Israel Studies, Rutgers University This program presents a decade-long retrospective of Diaspora-Israel relations, examining how American and Israeli realities […]
Robert Seltzer Lunch Lecture Series Moshiach, Moshiach! Differing Notions of Messiah in Second Temple Judaism Presented by Rachel Slutsky, Monsignor John Oesterreicher Assistant Professor of Jewish Studies and Jewish-Christian Relations in Antiquity, Seton Hall University What do we mean when we talk about the messiah? This was a question circulating throughout ancient Judaism during the […]
Robert Seltzer Lunch Lecture Series Trends in American Jewish Names Presented by Sarah Benor, Vice Provost and Professor of Contemporary Jewish Studies, Hebrew Union College Which names do Jews and non-Jews associate most with Jews? How do Jews of different ages, ancestries, and religious orientations vary in the names they select for their children and […]
Robert Seltzer Lunch Lecture Series “The Same as in the Portuguese Synagogue in New York”: Colonial New York’s Emergence as a Center of North American Jewish Commercial and Communal Activity Presented by Noah Gelfand, Doctoral Lecturer, History Department, Hunter College This talk employs an Atlantic perspective to examine the economic and religious endeavors of New […]
Robert Seltzer Lunch Lecture Series Fradl Shtok and Yiddish Women’s Cultural Modernity Presented by Allison Schachter, Associate Professor of Jewish Studies, English, and East European Studies, Vanderbilt University What role did women play in the making of Yiddish literary modernity? We know too little about the women writers, artists, and intellectuals who participated in transforming […]
Robert Seltzer Lunch Lecture Series Stanley Kubrick - New York Jewish Intellectual Presented by Nathan Abrams, professor of Film Studies at Bangor University, Wales. Legendary director Stanley Kubrick was born Jewish but has never really been considered a Jewish director - until now. In this illustrated talk, Abrams will explore Kubrick's ethics and ethnicity, based […]
Robert Seltzer Lunch Lecture Series From Kitchen Judaism to Combat Kashrut: Keeping Kosher in WWII Presented by Daniel Bronstein of Hunter College. The onset of World War Two inspired hundreds of rabbis from Reform, Conservative and Centrist Orthodox backgrounds to leave civilian life for the sake of serving over a half-million American Jews then serving […]
Robert Seltzer Lunch Lecture Series Kafka's Last Trial Benjamin Balint, author of Kafka's Last Trial, in conversation with Lisa Anderson, professor and chair of the German Department at Hunter College. Franz Kafka's last instruction to his closest friend, Max Brod: to destroy all his remaining papers upon his death. When the moment arrived in 1924, […]
Robert Seltzer 2021-2022 Lunch Lecture Series Presents: Sophie Halaby in Jerusalem: An Artist’s Life Presented by: Laura S. Schor This talk will focus on the life and art of the little-known Jerusalem artist Sophie Halaby. The discussion will consider how researching Sophie Halaby helped Professor Laura Schor reframe her understanding of Jerusalem. The talk will […]
Robert Seltzer 2021-2022 Lunch Lecture Series Presents: “I Am Now at War Again” Jewish World War I Veterans and Kristallnacht Presented by: Michael Geheran This talk examines the responses of German Jewish World War I veterans to the state-sponsored violence the Nazis unleashed against Jews on 9 November 1938. Like other victims of the Pogrom, […]
Robert Seltzer 2021-2022 Lunch Lecture Series Presents: Tehran Children: How a Decade Long Search in My Father's Footsteps Became "One of the Greatest Untold Stories of the Second World War" Presented by: Mikhal Dekel It is a largely unknown fact most Polish Jews who escaped Nazi extermination - nearly a quarter-million - survived in Uzbekistan, […]
