April 18-19, 2024
Conference Information
The Center of Global and International Studies and the Jewish Studies Program at the University of Kansas are pleased to announce the "Jews in the Americas” conference, April 18th and 19th, 2024. This hybrid and interdisciplinary conference will bring together scholars from a variety of fields, including history, religion, sociology, politics, anthropology, literature, and the arts, to explore the rich and diverse experiences of Jews in the Americas.
The conference includes online panels of original research on Yiddish in South America, Israel-related connections, Jewish art, culture, and identity, Sephardic and Mizrahi Jews, Speculative fiction, Jewish women, Antisemitism, and Jewish education and pedagogy. The conference features a few in-person components: two keynote speakers, a conference reception at the Spencer Museum of Art, and an exhibit about the history of Kansas Jewry at KU Hillel. Interpretation will be provided from/to Spanish and Portuguese in selected panels. While this event will be hybrid, with most sessions online, we welcome participants to visit us at the main conference venue at the Sabatini Multicultural Resource Center on the KU campus in Lawrence, Kansas.
For any questions, please contact: Dr. Luciano Tosta lucianotosta@ku.edu, Dr. Samuel Brody samuelbrody@ku.edu, Dr. Rami Zeedan rzeedan@ku.edu.
This event has ended. We had more than 55 scholars with us presenting their original research on Jews in the Americas. More than 250 visitors have joined us online and in person.
We will edit the recordings of the 14 panels and the two keynotes, and they will be available to the public on this website by mid-May 2024.
Conference Program
(all times are Central Day Time- CDT)
Day 1: April 18th, 2024
Conference Opening: Dr. Luciano Tosta, University of Kansas (USA) (Hybrid: online and in person at Sabatini Multicultural Resource Center).
You can join this session on Webinar 1: https://kansas.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_lA0BaEF_RDOLVA6yT7x2aA
9:30-11:00 Panel 1: Transnational Yiddish Culture in Postwar South America (Hybrid: online and in person at Sabatini Multicultural Resource Center)
Panel chair: Dr. RB Perelmutter, University of Kansas (USA)
Participants:
- Dr. William Pimlott, University of London (UK): “Yiddish South America and the Futures of Global Yiddishland: Argopteyl and its International Reception” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. Michael Rom, Harvard University (USA) : “Press Politics: Polish Jewish Cultural Activists in Postwar Brazil” (Presentation in English)
- Mr. Ernesto Honigsberg, Universidade de São Paulo (Brazil), “Trajectory and production of Yiddish artists in 20th century São Paulo” (Presentation in English)
You can join this session on Webinar 2: https://kansas.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_cGpALGOaSAmsiFa7G0dYhw
9:30-11:00 Panel 2: Jews in the Americas: Israel Connections, Politics, Identity, and Ideas (Hybrid: online and in person at Sabatini Multicultural Resource Center)
Panel chair: Dr. Rami Zeedan, University of Kansas (USA)
Participants:
- Dr. Nitai Shinan, Israeli National and University Library (Israel): “Twin nations” –The beginning and development of the "special relationship" between Israel and Costa Rica and the contribution of the Jewish community to its success” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. Moria Ran, Brandeis University (USA): “JOFA and The Formation of a New Female Religious Identity: The Intersection Between Feminism and Modern-Orthodox Judaism in The Last Half-Century in the USA” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. Avi Shilon, Tel-Hai College (Israel): “Hillel Kook in America: What can we learn from his story about the status of the Jews in the U.S during the 1940s’” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. Gal Levy, Open University of Israel (Israel): “Are Jews White folks? Diversity and political activism among American Jewry” (Presentation in English)
You can join this session on Webinar 1: https://kansas.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_lA0BaEF_RDOLVA6yT7x2aA
11:00-11:30 Coffee Break
11:30-12:45 Keynote: Dr. Sarah Imhoff, Indiana University Bloomington (USA): We have always been American: Jewish origin stories.” (Hybrid: online and in person at Sabatini Multicultural Resource Center)
Moderator: Dr. Samuel Brody, University of Kansas (USA)
You can join this session on Webinar 1: https://kansas.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_lA0BaEF_RDOLVA6yT7x2aA
12:45-13:45 Lunch break
13:45-15:15 Panel 3: Artists, Superheroes, and Cultural Brokers Across Continents
(Hybrid: online and in person at Sabatini Multicultural Resource Center)
Panel chair: Dr. Samuel Brody, University of Kansas (USA)
Participants:
- Mr. João Gabriel Covolan Silva, Scuola Normale Superiore (Italy): “Portuguese Jews and New Christians as Commercial and Cultural Brokers between the Americas and Italy: a methodological Survey” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. Armin Langer, University of Florida (USA): “Navigating Exile: Spanish and Jewish Refugee Artists in Trujillo’s Dominican Republic” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. David M. K. Sheinin, Trent University (Canada): “Boxing and Modernity in Argentina and Canada” (Presentation in English)
- Mr. Gideon Remez, Truman Institute, Hebrew University of Jerusalem (Israel): “A Real-Life Immigrant Hero Behind American Superhero Comics” (Presentation in English)
You can join this session on Webinar 2: https://kansas.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_cGpALGOaSAmsiFa7G0dYhw
13:45-15:15 Panel 4: Jewish Identity and Culture in the USA and Canada (Hybrid: online and in person at Sabatini Multicultural Resource Center)
Panel chair: Dr. Henry Bial, University of Kansas (USA)
Participants:
- Dr. Chana R. Kotzin, independent scholar: “Braided identities; Buffalo Jews on the Niagara Frontier” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. David Katzman and Dr. Andrea Weis, independent scholars: “Beyond Delancey Street: Small-Town Jewish Midwestern Life” (Presentation in English)
- Mr. Jonah Greene, The University of Kansas (USA): “Hair That Screams: Jew”: Staging the “Good” Contemporary Jewish American in Joshua Harmon’s Bad Jews” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. Alex Tepperman, University of Winnipeg (Canada): “White Picket Fencers: Jews and Suburban Crime in Post-War North America” (Presentation in English)
You can join this session on Webinar 1: https://kansas.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_lA0BaEF_RDOLVA6yT7x2aA
15:15-15:45 Coffee break
15:45-17:15 Panel 5: Sephardic and Mizrahi Jews in the Americas Across Time (Hybrid: online and in person at Sabatini Multicultural Resource Center; Interpretation will be provided English<>Portuguese)
Panel chair: Dr. Mechele Leon, University of Kansas (USA)
Participants:
- Dr. Merav Bellaiche, Bar Ilan University (Israel): “The place and status of Sephardic-Oriental Jewish women among their communities in New York at the beginning of the 20th century” (Presentation in English)
- Ms. Adriana Bialski, Universidade de São Paulo (Brazil): “De Beirute e Sidon a São Paulo (1900 - 1930): uma proposta de patrimonialização da memória judaica” [From Beirut and Sidon to São Paulo (1900 - 1930): a proposal for the Jewish memory heritagization] (presentation in Portuguese)
- Ms. Shirley Nigri Farber, independent scholar: “Jews of Lebanon immigration to Brazil the tale of my families Chattah and Nigri” (Presentation in English)
You can join this session on Webinar 2: https://kansas.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_cGpALGOaSAmsiFa7G0dYhw
15:45-17:15 Panel 6: Exploring Jewish Speculative Fiction in the Americas (Hybrid: online and in person at Sabatini Multicultural Resource Center)
Panel chair: Dr. Luciano Tosta, University of Kansas (USA)
Participants:
- Ms. Valerie Estelle Frankel, Mission College and San Jose City College (USA): “A Rabbi and a Pirate Make a Magical World… Considering South American Sephardic Children’s Fantasy” (Presentation in English)
- Akiva Hoffman, independent scholar: “The Long Conversation: Far Future Talmud in Benjamin Rosenbaum's The Unraveling” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. R.B. Lemberg Perelmutter, the University of Kansas (USA):”The Queer Speculation of Indecent and the Jewish American Utopia as an iterative process” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. Bogi Perelmutter, the University of Kansas (USA): ”Rediscovering William Sleator as a Jewish author” (Presentation in English)
You can join this session on Webinar 1: https://kansas.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_lA0BaEF_RDOLVA6yT7x2aA
17:15-17:30 Coffee break
17:30- 19:30 Conference reception, art exhibit, and music performance (In person only, at the Spencer Museum of Art)
- 17:30-18:00 Food, drinks, and music
- 18:00-18:30 Welcome remarks by the College Executive Dean, Prof. Arash Mafi, and music performance of Jewish-themed songs by the band “The Bigs”.
- 18:30-18:45Guided tour of the art exhibit
- 18:45-19:15 Tour the art exhibit and the Museum
Day 2: April 19th, 2024
7:30-9:00 Panel 7: With or Against the Law? Eastern European Jewish Women Navigating Transatlantic Migration in the Early Twentieth Century (online only)
Panel chair: Dr. Rebecca A. Kobrin, Columbia University (USA)
Participants:
- Dr. Aleksandra Jakubczak, Harvard University (USA): "Fake Ksuves and Passports to America: Polish Jews Circumventing Immigration Restrictions in the 1920s" (Presentation in English)
- Dr. Geraldine Gudefin, Hebrew University of Jerusalem (Israel): "In the Shadow of the Law: East European Jewish Women’s Strategies against Gender-based Abuse in the early-20th century United States" (Presentation in English)
- Ms. Lelia Stadler, Columbia University (USA): "Divorce Papers: Jewish Divorce in Interwar Migration from Poland to Argentina" (Presentation in English)
You can join this session on Webinar 2: https://kansas.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_cGpALGOaSAmsiFa7G0dYhw
7:30-9:00 Panel 8: Jews in the Americas and Israel-related connections: diaspora relations (online only)
Panel chair: Dr. Rami Zeedan, University of Kansas (USA)
Participants:
- Dr. Zohar Segev, University of Haifa (Israel): “Israel and the Jewish Diaspora after the establishment of the state: The American Jewish Perspective” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. Gilad Halpern, University of Haifa (Israel): “Covering Israel 'en famille': The international edition of the 'Palestine Post'” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. Hagar Lahav, Sapir Academic College (Israel): “On non-religious Jewish believers” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. Elazar Ben-Lulu, Ariel University (Israel): “A Queer Promised Land: LGBTQ+ Jewish Immigration to Israel” (Presentation in English)
You can join this session on Webinar 1: https://kansas.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_lA0BaEF_RDOLVA6yT7x2aA
9:00-9:30 Coffee break
9:30-11:00 Panel 9: Jewish Culture, Historiography, and Identity in Latin America (Hybrid: online and in person at Sabatini Multicultural Resource Center;Interpretation will be provided English<>Spanish<>Portuguese)
Panel chair: Dr. Luciano Tosta, The University of Kansas (USA)
Participants:
- Dr. Lorena Ojeda-Davila, Universidad Michoacana de San Nicolás de Hidalgo (Mexico): “La cultura judeo mexicana a través de la obra artística de Tere Metta” [“Mexican Jewish culture through the artistic work of Tere Metta”](Presentation in Spanish)
- Mr. Octávio Augusto F. Soares, Federal University of Goiás (Brazil): “Beyond Borders: Clarice Lispector's Literary Consecration and the Erasure of Jewish Identity in the Americas” (Presentation in Portuguese)
- Ms. Mira-Briana Haydu, University of Kansas (USA): “Brazilian History or Jewish History? Examining Moacyr Scliar’s The Strange Nation of Rafael Mendes Through a Historiographic Lens” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. Mauricio Dimant, Hebrew University of Jerusalem (Israel): “Israel's Tech Turn and Its Impact on Latin American Jewish Diaspora Relations’” (Presentation in Spanish)
You can join this session on Webinar 2: https://kansas.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_cGpALGOaSAmsiFa7G0dYhw
9:30-11:00 Panel 10: Centering the Enslaved People in Sephardic Households in the Americas (Hybrid: online and in person at Sabatini Multicultural Resource Center)
Panel chair: Dr. Samuel Brody, University of Kansas (USA)
Participants:
- Ms. Amalia S. Levi, Bonn University (Germany): “Record-Keeping Dependencies in the Caribbean: Locating the Enslaved in Sephardic Households in Barbados” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. KB Dennis Meade, Northwestern University (USA): “The Intimate Paradoxes of Freedom: Jewish Slaveholding in 18th and 19th century Jamaica” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. Natalia da Silva Perez, Erasmus University (Netherlands): “Strategies of Autonomy Across the Atlantic” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. Sophie Rose, University of Tubingen (Germany) : “The Intimate Economy of Slavery and Jewish Family Life in the Eighteenth-century Dutch Caribbean” (Presentation in English)
You can join this session on Webinar 1: https://kansas.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_lA0BaEF_RDOLVA6yT7x2aA
11:00-11:30 Coffee break
11:30-12:45 Keynote:Dr. Lyslei Nascimento, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais (Brazil): “Jewish writers: a Jewish face of the Brazilian literature” (Hybrid: online and in person at Sabatini Multicultural Resource Center; Interpretation will be provided English<>Portuguese)
Dr. Luciano Tosta, The University of Kansas (USA)
You can join this session on Webinar 1: https://kansas.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_lA0BaEF_RDOLVA6yT7x2aA
12:45-13:45 Lunch break
13:45-15:15 Panel 11: Jewish Diversity, Politics, and Antisemitism in the Americas (Hybrid: online and in person at Sabatini Multicultural Resource Center)
Panel chair: Dr. Samuel Brody, The University of Kansas (USA)
Participants:
- Dr. Steven J. Hirsch, Washington University (USA): “Jews and the Peruvian APRA Party, 1931-1948” (Presentation in English)
- Mr. Dror Birger, Cornell University (USA):”The war over the war against antisemitism - the current Jewish double bind” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. Robert A. Kenedy, York University (Canada):”Jewish Students Campus Experiences of the New Antisemitism, Anti-Israelism, and “Whiteness” in the Era of BDS and Beyond” (Presentation in English)
You can join this session on Webinar 2: https://kansas.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_cGpALGOaSAmsiFa7G0dYhw
13:45-15:15 Panel 12: Grounds for Reinvention: Early Interpretations of Jewish History in the Americas (Hybrid: online and in person at Sabatini Multicultural Resource Center)
Panel chair: Dr. Omri Senderowicz, University of Kansas (USA)
Participants:
- Dr. Hilit Surowitz-Israel, Rutgers University (USA): “A Tiny Island of Hope: A Consideration of Curaçao’s Jewish Communal Origins Story” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. Michael Hoberman, Fitchburg State University (USA): “Revisiting Sampson Simson’s 1800 Columbia Commencement Speech” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. Shai Zamir, Northwestern University (USA): “Violence and Lust in Tío Anton’s Tavern” (1905)” (Presentation in English)
You can join this session on Webinar 1: https://kansas.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_lA0BaEF_RDOLVA6yT7x2aA
15:15-15:45 Coffee break
15:45-17:15 Panel 13: “Including Latin America in Your Jewish Studies Syllabus” (Hybrid: online and in person at Alcove E room in the Kansas Union)
Panel chair: Dr. Luciano Tosta, University of Kansas (USA)
Participants:
- Dr. Adriana Brodsky, St. Mary’s College of Maryland (USA): “Teaching about Zionist Youth Movements from Latin America” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. Naomi Lindstrom, University of Texas at Austin (USA): “Teaching Jewish Latin American Film from a Comparative Perspective” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. Ariana Huberman, Haverford College (USA): “Teaching about the Jewish Gauchos of the Pampas” (Presentation in English)
- Ms. Elaine Fitz Gibbon, Harvard University (USA): “Teaching about Jewish Latin American Music History” (Presentation in English)
You can join this session on Webinar 2: https://kansas.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_cGpALGOaSAmsiFa7G0dYhw
15:45-17:15 Panel 14: Jewish Theology, Education, Language ,and Identity in the Americas (Hybrid: online and in person at Alcove F room in the Kansas Union)
Panel chair: Dr. Samuel Brody, University of Kansas (USA)
Participants:
- Dr. Stephen Katz, Indiana University, Bloomington (USA): “To Be As Others: Hebrew Literature in the New World” (Presentation in English)
- Dr. Ira Robinson, Concordia University (Canada): “The Montreal Yeshiva: an Early Experiment in Talmudic Education in North America” (Presentation in English)
- Ms. Angelica Gimenez Ravanelli, University of Connecticut (USA): “Rabbi Marshall Meyer: Holocaust memory and Jewish theology in the fight for Human Rights in Argentina” (Presentation in English)
You can join this session on Webinar 1: https://kansas.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_lA0BaEF_RDOLVA6yT7x2aA
17:15-17:30 Conference Closing: Dr. Samuel Brody, The University of Kansas (USA)
You can join this session on Webinar 1: https://kansas.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_lA0BaEF_RDOLVA6yT7x2aA
Registration & Information
More Information and Registration
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Conference Program
Visit us in person
Visit us in person: The Spencer Museum of Art
Visit us in person: "Homemaking: Building the Jewish Community of Kansas"
This exhibit explores the community-building efforts of Jewish Kansans from the early 1900s to the present day. Focusing on the often unseen and underappreciated work of Jewish women, these documents and objects showcase the continual processes of support needed to create welcoming communities in the isolated setting of the Midwest. This poignant exhibit tells the story of how immigrants were received, how communities were built, and the mutual support networks providing shelter, food, and industry to new Americans.
Visit us in person: A Celebration of Jewish Art & Jewish Songwriters of The Americas
Featured Content on Jews in the Americas
Featured Content on Jews in the Americas
Annotated bibliography of selected books held by KU Libraries about Jews in North, Central, and South America
Annotated bibliography of sources on Jews in the Mid-West
The Legacy of Kansas City's Holocaust Survivors | All These Delicate Sorrows
Conference Organizers, Support Staff, and Sponsors
The "Jews in the Americas" conference is organized by the Center of Global And International Studies & the Jewish Studies Program at the University of Kansas. The academic committee is made up of Dr. Luciano Tosta, Dr. Sam Brody, and Dr. Rami Zeedan. Assistant to the academic committee- Ms. Mira Briana Haydu. Conference management team: Ms. Tyra Kalman and Ms. Jennifer Duhamel. The conference support team includes Dominique Stringer (curator of the exhibit at KU Hillel) and Jewish Studies student employees- Zac Kitay, Bree Katz, and Sammi Grofsky. At the Spencer Museum of Art: Celka Strughn and Ruby Mackinnon-Love. At Sabatini Multicultural Resource Center: Sunnie Clapsaddle. This event is made possible thanks to the support of our campus sponsors and partners at the University of Kansas:
Community Sponsors and Partners
This event is made possible thanks to the support of our sponsors and partners in the community:
We are grateful for the support from the local community in Lawrence and the Kansas City metro area.
We thank the Jewish Faculty Staff Council for their support of the conference.
We thank Dr. David Katzman and Sharyn Brooks Katzman for their support of the conference.
We thank our contributors to the exhibit: Dr. David Katzman and Sharyn Brooks Katzman, the Lawrence Jewish Community Congregation, the Midwest Center for Holocaust Education, the Michael Klein Collection at The Temple, Congregation B'nai Jehuda.
We thank Bailey Nakelsky, Ben Davis, Noa Savir, and Ben Novorr at KU Hillel for providing the space for the exhibit.
We thank Sam Kricsfeld (Editor) and Lacey Storer (Assistant Editor) at the Kansas City Jewish Chronicle, for helping advertise the event.
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