The Chicago Center for Jewish Studies

Recorded Lectures and Conferences

2012-2013

• December 3, 2012. Sander Gilman.  The third and final lecture of the series connected with the Crerar Library exhibition “Transcending Tradition: Jewish Mathematicians in German-Speaking Academic Culture”  was presented by Sander Gilman, Distinguished Professor of the Liberal Arts and Sciences and Professor of Psychiatry at Emory University, and was entitled, “Smart Jews and Science: The Science of ‘Smartiness’ and Jews.”

2011-2012

• November 13, 2011. David Grossman, “Reading and Conversation: David Grossman at the Chicago Humanities Festival.” Co-sponsored with the Chicago Humanities Festival. Located at the Northwestern University School of Law Thorne Auditorium, 375 E. Chicago Avenue.

• January 18, 2012. Matthew Suriano, University of Maryland, speaking as part of the “Matter of Israelite Religion” lecture series: “Death in the Kingdom of Judah: The social process of dying and the ritual context of the dead.”

• February 20, 2012. Alvin H. Rosenfeld, Indiana University, delivers the 2012 Gossett Lecture “Primo Levi: Is Forgiveness Possible after Auschwitz?”

Rosenfeld Lecture

Rosenfeld Q&A

• February 23, 2012. Michael Segal, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, “The Writing On the Wall: Dreams and Riddles in the Book of Daniel.”

• March 1, 2012. Nili Sacher Fox, Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in Cincinnati, Ohio, speaking as part of the “Matter of Israelite Religion” lecture series: “Fashion vs. Ideology: Biblical Laws Pertaining to Israelite Dress.”

• March 4, 2012. The State of American Jewish Belief Revisited.

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

Part Four

Part Five

• March 29, 2012. Steven Zipperstein, Stanford University, “Mythology, Historicity, and the 1903 Kishinev Pogrom:  How a Riot Changed 20th Century Jewish History.” (RECORDING TO BE POSTED IN JUNE)

• April 1, 2012. David Stern, speaking as part of the Haggadah lecture series, “The Haggadah and the Jewish Imagination.” PLEASE NOTE: The audio quality is poor in the beginning but improves quickly.

• April 22, 2012. Marc Michael Epstein, speaking as part of the Haggadah lecture series, “Birds’ Head Revisited: Identity, Politics and Polemics in the Birds’ Head Haggadah.”

• April 26, 2012. Etgar Keret and Nathan Englander at the Chicago Humanities Festival (VIDEO link to YouTube).

• May 1, 2012. Raymond Cohen delivers the June and Harold Patinkin Lecture, “A Time to Talk: Israel, the Jewish People, and the Catholic Church.”

• May 6, 2012. Vanessa Ochs, speaking as part of the Haggadah lecture series, “The Coconut on the Seder Plate: A Biography of the Contemporary Haggadah.”

• May 10, 2012. Harriet Murav, “Poetry After Kerch: Representing Jewish Mass Death in the Soviet Union.”

• May 13, 2012. Katrin Kogman-Appel, speaking as part of the Haggadah lecture series, ”Popularizing Books in a Manuscript Culture: The Visual Language of the Late Medieval Haggadah.”

2010-2011

• “A Jewish Theologian in Chicago: Themes in the Thought of Eliezer Berkovits.” A conference held on March 6, 2011.  Presented in collaboration with Spertus Institute of Jewish Studies.

• Meir Shalev (Israeli novelist and writer).  The Horvitz Memorial Lecture. “Between Antiquity and Modernity: Can the Hebrew Language Survive its Revival?”  March 3, 2011.  Made possible by the Leo and Sarah (Bunny) Horvitz Fund of the Chicago Center for Jewish Studies, with support from the University of Chicago Arts Council. This recording is divided into two parts, accessible at the links below:

Part 1

Part 2

2009-2010

• “Israelite Archaeology and Israeli Identity: Reconstructions of Antiquity in Modern Israel.” A conference held on April 30, 2010. University of Chicago.

• Josef Stern (University of Chicago). “The Unbinding of Isaac: Maimonides on Genesis 22 (The Aqedah).” University of Chicago. May 5, 2010.

• Derek Penslar (University of Toronto). “When May We Kill Our Brethren? Jews at War in the Long Nineteenth Century.” University of Chicago. May 24, 2010.