Scriptural Encounter 2024
Faith responses to difficult challenges. This series of Scriptural Encounter addresses the question, 'What might be the role of the faith traditions in encouraging measured reconciling solutions?’ We are exploring ways to deal with tensions that arise from our respective Scriptural traditions. The third webinar will be presented by Rabbi Dr. Daniel Roth, director of Mosaica, an Israeli NGO advancing community mediation and dialogue and Director Emeritus of the Pardes Center for Judaism and Conflict Resolution. Thursday 28 November, 4-5.30pm online via Zoom. Registration details here.
Call for postdoc fellowship applications
Jewish Studies. The Rothschild Foundation Europe offers a Post-Doctoral Research Fellowship in Jewish Studies for £35,000 per annum for two years (in the UK, this equates to a part-time position). The Foundation only allows one application per institution, and so there will be an internal selection process. Candidates who wish to be considered for entering the competition as Manchester’s institutional applicant, should submit (i) a one-page CV, and (ii) a proposal of no more than 2 pages, including:
1. Project title
2. 150 word abstract
3. Project description
4. Research methodology
5. Explain how your project would advance Jewish Studies in Europe and align with the University of Manchester and the Centre for Jewish Studies
6. Estimated duration of the project (usually two years)
7. Describe how the results of the research will be published (eg book, article).
8. Confirm eligibility according to the Rothschild application guidance.
The two documents named above should be sent to daniel.langton@manchester.ac.uk by the internal selection application deadline of 8 December 2024. (The deadline for the institution’s grant application is 13 January 2025.) It is important to note that the successful internal candidate will be expected to draft a full application as soon as an internal decision has been made (around 13 December 2024) and to secure agreement from two referees who know their work and can provide a reference by 20 January 2025. The internal deadline is set so as to allow time for consultation, feedback and necessary University permissions before a submission meeting the Foundation's deadline. The internal selection will be guided by criteria of the Rothschild Foundation, although these are not detailed. However, they include an emphasis on "advancing Jewish Studies in Europe" and at the relevant institution, and the future potential of the proposed research. Although all research topics in Jewish Studies are eligible in principle, the Foundation says it welcomes in particular applications from those engaged in “the study of contemporary Jewish life in Europe from a social science perspective and those whose proposals involve digital humanities research techniques”. Full eligibility criteria, additional conditions, a sample application form and guidance notes, are available from the Rothschild website: https://rothschildfoundation.eu/what-we-fund/academic-jewish-studies/post-doctoral-fellowships/
New publication
Middle Eastern studies. Former Manchester PhD student, Roman Vater, The Hebrew Falcon: Adya Horon and the Birth of the Canaanite Idea (New York: Sun Press, 2024). Further information.
New publication
Jewish and Biblical Studies. Daniel Langton, 'Paul of Tarsus: Judaism' in Encyclopedia of the Bible and Its Reception Online, edited by Constance M. Furey et al (Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter, 2024). Further information.
New Publication
Jewish history. Daniel Langton, 'Wandering Jews in England’s Green and Pleasant Land: Wissenschaft des Judentums in an Anglo-Jewish Context' in Hebrew Union College Annual 94 (2023), 235-284. Further information.
History department seminar
Holocaust studies. Simone Gigliotti will present her book, Restless Archive: The Holocaust and the Cinema of the Displaced. There will be a book discussion with response by Jean-Marc Dreyfus. Wednesday 13 November, 3pm. Roscoe 2.3. Open access available here. Further information.
Abduction of Weizmann bronze busts, University of Manchester
Jewish history. The BBC reports: "Police are investigating reports of a burglary at a university in which two busts of the first president of Israel were taken. Footage circulating online showed two masked people smashing a glass display case in the University of Manchester's chemistry building and removing two busts of Chaim Weizmann, who had been a lecturer there in the early 1900s." The University has issued an appeal for tolerance. See the CJS's online exhibition on 'Manchester and Zionism' for more information on the role of Manchester and the University in the modern history of the Jewish national movement.
BBC Sounds
Israel Studies. Moshe Behar speaks to Anna Jameson on BBC Sounds about the Israel-Palestinian conflict (begins 2:23). Listen again.
Screen & Talk
UK Jewish Film Festival. The Centre for Jewish Studies is proud sponsor of the screening of award-winning shorts programme British-Jewish Life on Film on Tuesday 19 November 2024, 18:00, at HOME, Manchester. This event includes a pre-screening pitching event for UKJF short film funding at 17:00, and a post-screening networking reception. This event is part of the UK Jewish Film Festival 2024.
Online seminar, Spaces of Treblinka
Holocaust studies. The Centre for Jewish Studies and the Holocaust Centre North at the University of Huddersfield will host an online seminar by Dr. Jacob Flaws (Kean University, New Jersey). Dr. Flaws will present his recently published book, Spaces of Treblinka: Retracing a Death Camp (University of Nebraska Press, 2024). Prof. Jean-Marc Dreyfus will chair the event. Online seminar, Tuesday 3 December 2024, 5pm GMT. Tickets and further information here.
Whitworth Debate on Antisemitism/Anti-Zionism
“Is antizionism antisemitism?” A debate on the controversial topics of antizionism and antisemitism features as the second Whitworth debate at The University of Manchester. Raphi Bloom co-founder and current co-Chair of North West Friends of Israel will share the floor with Abdullah Al Andalusi, co-founder of the discussion forum The Muslim Debate Initiative (MDI). The pair will discuss the opinion that antizionism is the same thing as antisemitism, in a debate chaired by Joseph Timan, politics writer at the Manchester Evening News. The discussion will take place at The University of Manchester’s Whitworth Hall, Oxford Road, on 31 October between 7pm and 9pm. If you are a member of staff or a student and would like to attend the event, register here. Further information.
Ehrhardt Seminars
Dr Jeremy Penner (University of Manchester) ‘What is Ancient Liturgy?’ 5 December 2024, University Place 6.207 and on Zoom. Time and Zoom details TBC.
Scriptural Encounter 2024
A new series of Scriptural Encounter titled, ‘Faith responses to peace-making in the Israel-Palestine conflict’ will begin in October 2024. The first webinar will be presented by Dr Kerim Balci, a Turkish writer, journalist, academic and human rights activist. Thursday 10 October, 4-5.30pm on Zoom. Places are free but you must register here to receive the Zoom details. Further information.
PhD student, learned society committee member
Jewish Studies. Kerry McCall has been awarded the British & Irish Association for Jewish Studies Studentship. This stipend comes with responsibilities for sitting on the BAIJS committee and carrying out projects with the aim of promoting Jewish studies in the UK and Ireland. Further information.
Radio 4, Sunday programme
Jewish education. MA student Yehudis Fletcher was interviewed by Edward Stourton on Radio 4 about her charity’s report on the state of ultra-Orthodox Jewish schooling. 15 September 2024. Interview runs 10:55-15:33. Listen again.
Social Responsibility
Jewish Studies. R&T's MA student Yehudis Fletcher is interviewed in the Jewish Chronicle in relation to her charity's call for further regulation of schools within the Charedi Jewish community, sometimes known as the ultra-Orthodox community. Critical of some aspects of Charedi education she considers the "deliberate denial of secular education" to be a form of "inward-facing extremism," which she believes is detrimental to the community's future. 11 Sept 2024. Further information.
Book Award
Jewish Studies. CJS Hon. Research Fellow Dr Jane Brooks recently published "Jewish Refugees and the British nursing profession" (Manchester University Press, 2024), which has won the Lavinia Dock award. The award is for "outstanding research and writing produced by an experienced scholar in nursing history who submits a book" from the American Association for the History of Nursing. This is a hugely prestigious award in the discipline. Congratulations!
Conference papers
Jewish Studies. The annual conference of the British and Irish Association for Jewish Studies takes place from 8 – 10 July in Bristol. Katja Stuerzenhofecker will deliver a paper entitled ‘The Jew who was there too: Orthodox women claiming mainstream ritual’ and lead a workshop on teaching gender in Jewish studies. She will also participate in a panel discussion ‘Where is the contemporary in Jewish studies?’ together with Centre for Jewish Studies Fellow Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz. Lou Schlagheck will present a paper titled ‘The “verjüdelte” Women’s Movement – Intersecting Antisemitism and Misogyny in the reception of the German Women’s Movement’. Kerry McCall will present a paper titled, ‘“Domestic Servant, Nothing Else”: Jewish Domestic Service Refugees and the Jewish Chronicle in 1930s Britain’.
AHRC Studentship success
Jewish Studies. Rabbi Aaron Lipsey has been awarded an AHRC Doctoral Studentship in the Religious Studies pathway for a project entitled 'The Responses of the Lubavitcher Rebbe to the Holocaust: A Study of His Letters, Talks and Teachings'. The project will be supervised by Alex Samely and Daniel Langton in the Dept of Religions and Theology, commencing in Sept 2024. Michael Hoelzl, lead for the North West Consortium Doctoral Training Programme for the Religions pathway commented "This PhD project represents an excellent opportunity to investigate some fascinating aspects of the so-called ultra-Orthodox Jewish community. I congratulate Aaron, who is an exceptional student and who graduated from our MA degree programme in the Study of Religions and Theology several years ago, on winning this prestigious AHRC award. I hope that this will encourage other mid- and late-career candidates, and even post-career students, to apply for external funding and to undertake a PhD at the University of Manchester."
Stephen Smalley, 1931-2024
New Testament Studies. We are sorry to learn of the death of Stephen Smalley who was Lecturer, then Senior Lecturer, in New Testament in the Faculty of Theology at the University of Manchester from 1970-1977 in the era of F.F. Bruce, and Dean of Chester 1987-2001. Stephen wrote several books and articles on the Johannine Literature, some of which remain in print and are much used, including John Evangelist and Interpreter (1984), Thunder and Love: John's Revelation and John's Community (1994), The Revelation to John: A Commentary on the Greek text of the Apocalypse(2005), and Hope for Ever: The Christian View of Life and Death (2005). Philip Alexander will represent informally the University and the Department at the funeral.