Israelis and Palestinians. Ashkenazim and Mizrahim. Hasidim and Zionists. All are part of the cultural diversity that will be explored by new fellows of the Frankel Institute for Advanced Judaic Studies.
The 2016-17 fellows will gather around the theme of “Israeli Histories, Societies and Cultures: Comparative Approaches.”
“This year’s theme focuses on the diversity of Israeli life,” said Jeffrey Veidlinger, director of the Jean & Samuel Frankel Center for Judaic Studies, which includes the Institute.
“In America’s obsession with Israeli political conflict, we so often forget the variety of cultures and societies that coexist within the state. Frankel fellows this year will be exploring many of these cultures, and will help us understand how we can better understand and appreciate the diversity of the human experience in Israel.”
Established through a contribution from the Jean and Samuel Frankel Jewish Heritage Foundation, the Frankel Institute provides annual fellowships for scholars and artists around the world to conduct research on a given theme.
With the goal of advancing Jewish studies globally, it remains the only program of its kind at a public university in the United States. Additionally, the institute offers lectures, symposia, art exhibitions and musical performances to the public.
“The 2016-17 Frankel fellows are scholars who represent the cutting edge of academic work on Israel,” noted Shachar Pinsker, associate professor of Hebrew literature and culture at U-M and this year’s head fellow.
“They will be thinking hard about Israel in multiple Jewish studies and Middle Eastern contexts — literary, historical, religious, political and cultural — and through the lens of different geographies. This will no doubt change the character of scholarship for many years to come, and complicate established narratives about Israel.”
The 2016–17 Frankel Institute fellows and their fields of research are:
• Naomi Brenner, Ohio State University, “Best-Sellers and the Boundaries of Hebrew Literature.”
• Liora Halperin, University of Colorado-Boulder, “Memories of Violence: The First Aliyah and its After-Images.”
• Mostafa Hussein, Brandeis University, “The Refraction of Arabo-Islamic Civilization in Hebrew and Israeli Cultures.”
• Noah Hysler-Rubin, Bezalel Academy for Arts and Design, “Planning Palestine: A Comprehensive Approach for the Study of Israel’s Urban History.”
• Lior Libman, State University of New York-Binghamton, “ʽJews in a Harness’: The Socialist-Zionist Labor Movement and Hasidism.”
• Aviad Moreno, Ben-Gurion University, “From Morocco, in Another Way: Aliyah and Other Jewish Migrations from Northern Morocco, 1860–2010.”
• Shachar Pinsker, University of Michigan, “A Silent Language? Yiddish in Israeli Literature.”
• Bryan Roby, University of Manchester, “Blackness and the Double-Consciousness of Arab Jews: A Comparative History of the Mizrahi and African-American Experience.”
• Gavin Schaffer, University of Birmingham, “Where is Home? Aliyah and British Jews Since 1967.”
• Rachel Seelig, University of Chicago, “Motherless Tongues: German-Hebrew Literary Exchange.”
• Shayna Zamkanei, University of Chicago, “The Arabized Jewish Diaspora.”
• Yael Zerubavel, Rutgers University, “Biblical Reenactments: The Performance of Antiquity in Modern Israeli Culture.”
