Research paper, Hebrew University

Dead Sea Scrolls. PhD student John Darby gave a paper entitled 'Singing, performing and Textuality in the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice', chaired by George Brooke. Zoom, 6 April 2022. Further information.

New publication

Dead Sea Scrolls. Hon research fellow Helen R. Jacobus, "Science Fiction in the Dead Sea Scrolls: The Case of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and the Nephilim," in Fountains of Wisdom. In Conversation with James H. Charlesworth, eds. Gerbern S. Oegema, Henry W. Morisada, and Loren T. Stuckenbruck (London: T & T Clark, 2022), 455-466. She presented a paper of the same title at the Festschrift Conference for James Charlesworth, the McGill-Munich-Grinnell Conference on 40 Years of Pseudepigrapha Research, in Montreal, on April 3-5, 2022. Further information.

Screen and Talk

Jewish Studies. The Centre for Jewish Studies and the Department of Drama at Manchester University are pleased to announce that the next Screen & Talk event will be the streaming of ‘The Commissar’ Aleksandr Askoldov’s topical Soviet film The Commissar (1967) tells the story of a pregnant Red Army commissar, who stays with a Jewish family to give birth during the Russian civil war in Ukraine. Co-written by the Ukrainian Jewish writer Vassiliy Grossman, the film was among the rare productions of its era that featured Jewish protagonists and referenced the Holocaust in ways that subtly undermined the Soviet-state narrative of revolutionary heroism. The film and its director were immediately banned after completion and Commissar premiered internationally only at the 1988 Berlin Film Festival, when late Soviet Glasnost policies had finally enabled the film’s release. 7 April 2022, 5.45pm BST, online, register here. Further information.

MA fees bursary in Jewish Studies

Masters degree studies at the University of Manchester, 2022-23. This is a home/EU fees bursary for MA students who make Jewish Studies topics their main study focus in their MA in Religions and Theology. One bursary will be awarded on a competitive basis. There are no eligibility criteria based on nationality, but please note that the bursary is restricted to the maximum cost of UK fees. Applications to this fee bursary will be considered from the beginning of March 2022 onwards, with applications encouraged as soon as possible, and no later than 5pm on 2 May 2022. The competition involves an online application to the Religions and Theology MA programme and the MA Funding Application Form. Further information.

Old publication

Jewish Studies. Bill Williams, "Displaced Scholars: Refugees at the University of Manchester" in Melilah vol.2 (2005), 1-29. "The paper explores the responses of one institution of higher learning in Britain, the University of Manchester, to those academics and students displaced by the rise of European Fascism and particularly by the discriminatory polices of the Nazi regime. Drawing on material in the Vice Chancellor’s Archive at the University it assesses the degree to which the undoubtedly liberal intentions of the University hierarchy, which found expression in the formation of a Joint Committee of Council and Senate on Assistance to Foreign Scholars (JCAFS), were complicated by its willingness to work within the restrictions on alien immigrants imposed by the British state, by considerations of self-interest and by the innate elitism of the Manchester academy..." Further information.

Podcast, Screen & Talk discussion

Jewish Studies. Podcast now available for discussion of the film 'Jacob the Liar', co-hosted by the Centre for Jewish Studies and the Department of Drama at Manchester University on 2 Feb 2022. Watch the discussion on the CJS YouTube channel. Further information.

Podcast, Bogdanow Lectures 2022

Holocaust Studies. The 2022 Bogdanow Lectures by Prof. Marion Kaplan (New York University) on 'Refugees and gender studies: new perspectives in Holocaust studies' are now available to view online. The lectures are entitled: (1) Hitler's Jewish Refugees: Hope and Anxiety in Portugal, 1940-1945, and (2) Gender and the Holocaust. Originally presented on 8 and 9 Feb 2022. Further information.

Conference Paper, Erlangen-Nürnberg

Jewish Studies. Philip Alexander and Daniel Langton have co-authored a paper on origins/creation in Judaism, focusing on Gen 1-3, for an online conference on 'The Concept of Protology in Judaism, Christianity and Islam'. Bavarian Research Center for Interreligious Discourses, Friedrich Alexander University, Erlangen-Nürnberg. This project involves a workshop paper and a book chapter in Key Concepts in Interreligious Discourses (de Gruyter). 16-17 Feb 2022. Further information.

Research Seminar

German & Jewish Studies. Dr Yael Almog (Assistant Professor in German, Durham University) ‘German/Exile: On the Jewish Longing for Europe’. German & Jewish Studies Research Seminar. Hybrid Event Samuel Alexander Building, Room A116 and on zoom 9 Mar 2022 16.30 - 18.00. Further information. 

Public lecture

Jewish Studies. Moshe Behar continues to co-convene the annual Lecture Series (in Hebrew) of Israel's Academia4Equality Mizrahi Perspectives on the Middle East before and after 1948. On 28 November Behar delivered the year's Opening Lecture titled “Communitarianism, Liberalism, ‘Black Pantherism’, Academism, Masortism & Feminism in the Sephardi-Mizrahi Undertaking, 1897-2020.” Further information.     

Scriptural encounters

Reading challenging sacred texts. Scriptural Encounters bring together different faiths to debate and discuss controversial topics. In this series on Gender Diversity Dr Shanon Shah of Kings College London will present from an Islamic perspective. 1600-17:30 on zoom. Thu 3 March 2022. Further information.

Bogdanow Lectures 2022

Holocaust Studies. We are delighted to announce that the Bogdanow Lectures in Holocaust Studies 2022 will be given by Prof Marion Kaplan, Skirball Professor of Modern Jewish History at NYU on the topic 'Refugees and gender studies: new perspectives in Holocaust studies'. These will be free online lectures 6pm (GMT) on Tue 8 and Wed 9 February 2022. Further information.

Klezmer performance

Michael Kahan Kapelye performance. The University's klezmer band, in conjunction with the The Klezmorim of Manchester, will perform at the event 'Vessels of Song: Journeys into the worlds of Klezmer'. 7.00- 9.30pm, 24 March 2022 at the Manchester Jewish Museum. Further information.

Call for papers, European Association for Biblical Studies

Biblical Studies. George Brooke is serving his first year as President of the European Association of Biblical Studies which will culminate in the Association's annual conference being held in Toulouse 4-7 July 2022. The Call for Papers for the meeting, much of which will also be available on-line, has recently been issued. Further information.

Project Award, SALC Research Development Fund

Reading Texts for Business and Faith Meetings. Alex Samely has been awarded £5,624 to fund a project entitled "Supporting the efficiency of meetings with preparatory reading”. All over the world organisations devoted to commerce, administration, education or faith routinely use meetings with “pre-reads” to conduct their business. In such meetings people will often understand what they say to each other by recalling meanings from the document, or the document may become quoted and discussed. The project will explore how the results of recent research, which Alex Samely conducted for a forthcoming book on Reading and Experience, may support training to make such meetings more productive and beneficial.

Project Award, SALC Research Development Fund

Jewish Studies. Daniel Langton and Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz have been awarded £6800 to fund an impact-related project entitled "Learning from Limmud’s Relationship with the Third Sector”, which will be conducted by Dr Taylor-Guthartz. It will focus on the relationship between Limmud, a major Jewish educational charity with branches in 47 countries, whose unique inter-denominational programme occupies a highly influential place within wider sectarian Jewish society and organisations.

Project Award, Faculty of Humanities Research Fund

Jewish and New Testament Studies. Daniel Langton has been awarded £9800 to fund a project entitled "What would Jesus (the Jew) do? Relationship Building and Engagement with US Christians.” The aim is to develop resources that relate to an area of internationally-recognised research expertise in the subject area of Religions & Theology (R&T) and the associated Centre for Jewish Studies (CJS), namely, the Jewish background to the New Testament and the associated history of Christian anti-Judaism.

PhD completion

History of Jewish-Christian relations. Congratulations to Lawrence Rabone on the successful defence of his doctoral thesis 'Eschatology and the Readmission of the Jews to England, 1655-56'. His supervisors were Profs. Philip Alexander, FBA, and Daniel Langton, and the external examiner was Prof. Crawford Gribben (Queen's University Belfast). See the list of current PhD students in the area of Jewish Studies at Manchester.

New publication

Jewish Studies. Moshe Behar published an essay titled "Were There—and Can There Be—Arab Jews?"  In the Contending Modernities project. Further information.

New publication

Jewish studies. Moshe Behar's essay "The IHRA, Israel, and Antisemitism" was published in Arabic in the Journal Israel Affairs. Further information.