Events

All activities arranged by the Center are open to all members of the University community as well as the public.

Faculty Forum Lecture – The Center sponsors the Judaic Studies Faculty Forum Luncheon Lecture Series in which faculty members and students make presentations about current research and writing related to Judaic Studies. Lectures usually begin around 12:00 p.m. and last 30-40 minutes.

Yiddish Tish Discussion Luncheon – The Center organizes a luncheon discussion table in the Yiddish language. This provides an opportunity for faculty and students to practice their listening and or speaking skills in an informal manner. A few of the student members of the group in the recent past were so devoted to their study of Yiddish that they spent a part of the summer studying Yiddish at Vilnius University in Lithuania, a pre-Holocaust center of Yiddish culture. All are welcome and novices are especially welcome.

The 2007 Fierberg Lecture was held on Monday, September 24 at 5:00 p.m. in the H.R. Monteith Building with special guest, Shulamit Reinharz, Jacob Potofosky Professor of Sociology and Founding Director of the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute and the Women’s Studies Research Center at Brandeis University, on “The Woman Who Created the First Kibbutz and the Women Who Followed: Some Sociological Insights.” The next Fierberg Lecture will be held during the academic year 2009-10.

The first 2008 Ivry Lecture was held on Wednesday, March 26 at 5:30 p.m. in the Babbidge Library, Class of 1947 Room, with special guest, Lawrence H. Schiffman, Ethel and Irvin A. Edelman Professor of Hebrew and Judaic Studies and Chair of Skirball Department of Hebrew and Judaic Studies, New York University, on “Second Temple Literature and Rabbinic Judaism.” A second lecture was held on Wednesday, April 16 at 5:00 p.m. in the Babbidge Library, Class of 1947 Room, with special guest Eric Meyers, Bernice and Morton Lerner Professor of Judaic Studies and Director of the Center for Jewish Studies, Department of Religion, Duke University, on "Synagogue Excavations at Nabratein in Galilee and Rabbinic Tradition.”

The 2006 Mittelman Lecture was held on Tuesday, October 17 at 4:30 p.m. in the Doris and Simon Konover Auditorium with special guest, Lawrence L. Langer, Alumnae Chair Emeritus Professor of English of Simmons College and former instructor at UConn, on “The Legacy of Holocaust Testimonies.” The next Mittelman Lecture will be held in September of 2008.