Jewish Studies events

23rd Annual Contemporary Israeli Voices

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The series this year will continue to explore the most updated, diverse, innovative, creative, and fascinating Israeli Voices. The series will be inaugurated with a presentation entitled Hunting in America: Writing at the Intersection of Gender, Work and Violence. In this lecture Tehila Hakimi will introduce her new novel Hunting in America (Penguin, 2025), an award-winning, thrillingly subversive novel about an Israeli woman who moves to America, takes up hunting, and is drawn into a world of predator, prey, and dark attraction. In her work Hakimi explores the links between capitalism, workplace power dynamics, and femininity. By examining the impacts of migration, weaponry, and war, she reveals how these themes intersect with the cultural narratives of both American and Israeli cultures.

The event will take place on Thursday, September 18, 2025, at 8:00 PM in Frank Center for Public Affairs (PAC) Room 100 (238 Church Street). Hors d’oeuvre reception from 7:30-8:00 PM (same location)

In the second presentation, Iddo Geffen, a writer and neurocognitive researcher at Columbia University, will explore How the Brain Understands Stories. The talk will explore how narratives shape memory, decision-making, and our perception of reality. The audience will dive into the brain’s mechanisms for processing stories, the link between fiction and lived experience, and how storytelling can influence our emotions and beliefs. Through examining scientific insights and literary examples, the speaker will uncover a deep connection between storytelling and the human mind.

The event will take place on Thursday, October 16, 2025, at 8:00 PM in Frank Center for Public Affairs (PAC) Room 100 (238 Church Street). Hors d’oeuvre reception from 7:30-8:00 PM (same location)

The series will end on a high note with a presentation by the internationally renowned writer Etgar Keret who is back to Wesleyan by popular demand. Keret will speak about his latest collection of short stories Autocorrect in a talk entitled Can Autocorrect Save the Human Condition? Autocorrect includes stories about underdogs, modern dance, Artificial Intelligence, Hassidic wisdom, and his beloved white rabbit Hanzo. This not-to-miss presentation will present Etgar Keret’s darkly funny stories as he explores themes of identity, reality, and meaning.

The event will take place on Thursday, November 14, 2025, at 8:00 PM in Frank Center for Public Affairs (PAC) Room 100 (238 Church Street). Hors d’oeuvre reception from 7:30-8:00 PM (same location)

All events are free and open to the public. More information can be found at http://civ.site.wesleyan.edu

I hope you and your guests will join our conversations and I look forward to welcoming you, Dalit Katz, curator of CIV series.

Upcoming lectures in the fall semester

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We have reached the “midterm” period.  Israel and Jewish Studies Certificate Program has hosted several lectures and events, in September, Professor Lawrence Fine gave a lecture “We are bound to one another as if we were one person: Spiritual Friend”.

In early October, we hosted an event “Rembering Vilna.”  A new documentary, “The World Was Ours,” on pre-war and wartime Vilna by Mira Jedwabnik Van Doren was screened. Following the film, in a musical interlude, vocalist Maria Krupoves sang songs of the Vilna Ghetto. The program also included a panel discussion by Mira Jedwabnik Van Doren, Executive Producer, and the director of The Vilna Project; Professor Samuel Kassow, Trinity College; and Dr. Michael Good, author of “The Search for Major Plagge”. The event was also made possible by a gift from the Denise and Gary Rosenberg Fund.

And just this week, Michael Morgan, Chancellor Professor of Philosophy & Jewish Studies, Emeritus, at Indiana University  spoke on “Messianism, Israel, and Judaism in America”. The event was co-sponsored by College of Letters and Jewish and Israel Studies Certificate Program.

For the remainder of the semester we have several exciting events:
Thursday, October 29, Loren Spielman, our visiting instructor in the Religion Department, will speak on Gladiators and God-fearers: Jewish and Christian Reactions to Sport and Spectacle, at 4:15pm in PAC 421

Thursday, November 4, Professor Sara Lipton will lecture on “Becoming Visual: The Emergence of the Visible Jewess in Later Medieval Art,”  at 4:15 at PAC 001. Professor Lipton is the author of Images of Intolerance: The Representation of Jews and Judaism in the Bible Moralisee, which won the John Nicholas Brown Prize for Best First Book and was a finalist for the Koret Jewish History Book Prize.  The lecture is based on her new book Dark Mirror: Jews, Vision, and Witness in Medieval Art (forthcoming from Metropolitan Books).  The lecture breaks new ground in the study of medieval Jewish and Christian history, visual evidence, and Christian theology. The event is co-sponsored by Jewish & Israel Studies Certificate Program, History Department, & Medieval Studies.

On Thursday, November 11, Dan Bahat, a leading Israeli Archaeologist and a member of the Faculty of the University of St. Michael’s College at the School of Theology, University of Toronto, will discuss his research with us.  4:15, 118 Downey House.

We hope you will join us!