Jewish Studies Week 2021 returns March 23 to 25

08 February 2021

Jewish Studies Week returns to the University of Alberta — virtually — March 23 to 25. Presented by the Wirth Institute for Austrian and Central European Studies, this annual series brings together three expert speakers in a trio of virtual lectures and Q&A sessions to explore a breadth of topics across Jewish history, literature, and culture.

This year’s lineup includes renowned historian Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, Ronald S. Lauder Chief Curator, POLIN Museum Core Exhibition and University Professor Emerita and Professor Emerita of Performance Studies at New York University. Professor Kirshenblatt-Gimblett will deliver the 2021 Tova Yedlin lecture “Coming of Age: Jewish Youth in Poland between the War” on March 23 live via Zoom.

On March 24, hosted by Dr. Peter Sabo, Belzberg Lecturer of Jewish Studies at the University of Alberta, Professor Vered Weiss, Israel Institute Teaching Fellow in the Department of Jewish Studies at SF State, will present “Juda and the New Jew: Undead Jewish Israeli Identities”.

This virtual talk will explore the 2017 Israeli television series Juda as a platform for social critique, and exposes the productive use of the vampire as means to address antisemitism and reconsider social boundaries. Content warning: the presentation will discuss sex and violence and will contain spoilers for first season of Juda.

The Annual Central European Art History Lecture concludes the series on March 25. In her talk “Rethinking Jewish Space in Vienna before 1938” Professor Lisa Silverman explores how texts including newspaper articles, novels, caricatures, and maps created by both Jews and non-Jews reveal the significance of the coding of space as “Jewish” or “not Jewish,” both inside and outside Vienna, particularly after the collapse of Austria-Hungary in 1918.

Professor Silverman is associate Professor of History and Jewish Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and Contributing Editor of the Leo Baeck Institute Year Book for Central European Jewish history. This talk is co-sponsored by the Department of Art & Design at the University of Alberta.

Registration is required but all events are free to attend and open to the general public. Click here for full details.