Formation | December 1968 |
---|---|
Founder | Leon Jick |
President | Laura Arnold Leibman |
Website | associationforjewishstudies.org |
The Association for Jewish Studies (AJS) is a scholarly organization in the United States that promotes academic Jewish Studies.
The Association for Jewish Studies (AJS) was founded in December 1968 by a small group of scholars at Brandeis University seeking a forum for exploring methodological and pedagogical issues in the merging field of Jewish studies. AJS held where it held its first annual conference that year at Brandeis. [1] [2] [3] [4]
In 1976, the AJS began to publish a scholarly journal, the AJS Review . In 1986, the new Women's Caucus of AJS spearheaded the introduction of women's studies into Jewish studies. [3]
AJS celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2018, by when it had grown to over 2,000 members from 26 countries, the largest academic Jewish studies organization in the world. The group's membership was nearly equal between men and women. [1]
In 2023, the AJS's executive committee signed a statement authored by the American Council of Learned Societies against HB 999 in Florida. [5]
In 2023, Professor Steven Fine of Yeshiva University, the founding editor of AJS Perspectives: The Magazine of the Association for Jewish Studies, criticized the AJS for becoming politicized and "taken over by the progressive left" and renounced his membership in AJS. [6]
Brandeis University is a private research university in Waltham, Massachusetts, United States. It is located within the Greater Boston area. Founded in 1948 as a non-sectarian, coeducational university, Brandeis was established on the site of the former Middlesex University. The university is named after Louis Brandeis, a former Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.
The American Jewish Committee (AJC) is a civil rights group and Jewish advocacy group established on November 11, 1906. It is one of the oldest Jewish advocacy organizations and, according to the New York Times, is "widely regarded as the dean of American Jewish organizations".
American Jewish University (AJU) is a private Jewish university in Los Angeles, California. It was formed in 2007 from the merger of the University of Judaism and Brandeis-Bardin Institute.
Lawrence Harvey Schiffman born in 1948, is a professor at New York University ; he was formerly Vice-Provost of Undergraduate Education at Yeshiva University and Professor of Jewish Studies. He had previously been Chair of New York University's Skirball Department of Hebrew and Judaic Studies and served as the Ethel and Irvin A. Edelman Professor in Hebrew and Judaic Studies at New York University (NYU). He is currently the Judge Abraham Lieberman Professor of Hebrew and Judaic Studies at New York University and Director of the Global Institute for Advanced Research in Jewish Studies. He is a specialist in the Dead Sea Scrolls, Judaism in Late Antiquity, the history of Jewish law, and Talmudic literature.
Alpha Epsilon Phi is an American sorority and a member of the National Panhellenic Conference. It was the second Jewish sorority formed in the United States.
The Schechter Day School Network, formerly the Solomon Schechter Day School Association, located at 820 Second Avenue, New York, New York, is an organization of Jewish day schools that identify with Conservative Judaism. The network provides guidance and resources for its member schools in the United States and Canada.
The Jewish Book Council, founded in 1943, is an American organization encouraging and contributing to Jewish literature. The goal of the council, as stated on its website, is "to promote the reading, writing and publishing of quality English language books of Jewish content in North America". The council sponsors the National Jewish Book Awards, the JBC Network, JBC Book Clubs, the Visiting Scribe series, and Jewish Book Month. It previously sponsored the Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature. It publishes an annual literary journal called Paper Brigade.
Hebrew College is a private college of Jewish studies in Newton Centre, Massachusetts. Founded in 1921, the college conducts Jewish scholarship in a pluralistic, trans-denominational academic environment. Its president is Rabbi Sharon Cohen Anisfeld. Hebrew College offers undergraduate completion and graduate degrees, Hebrew-language training, a rabbinical school, a cantorial program and adult-learning and youth-education programs.
Alexander Altmann was an Orthodox Jewish scholar and rabbi born in Kassa, Austria-Hungary. He emigrated to England in 1938 and later settled in the United States, working productively for a decade and a half as a professor within the Philosophy Department at Brandeis University. He is best known for his studies of the thought of Moses Mendelssohn, and was indeed the leading Mendelssohn scholar since the time of Mendelssohn himself. He also made important contributions to the study of Jewish mysticism, and for a large part of his career he was the only scholar in the United States working on this subject in a purely academic setting. Among the many Brandeis students whose work he supervised in this area were Elliot Wolfson, Arthur Green, Heidi Ravven, Paul Mendes-Flohr, Lawrence Fine, and Daniel Matt.
Jonathan D. Sarna is the Joseph H. and Belle R. Braun Professor of American Jewish History in the department of Near Eastern and Judaic Studies and director of the Schusterman Center for Israel Studies at Brandeis University in Waltham, Massachusetts.
The American Jewish Press Association (AJPA) is an organization of Jewish newspapers, magazines, journalists, and affiliated organizations in North America. It was established in 1944 and is based in Phoenix, Arizona. Back then the Jewish Press was referred to as 'Anglo-Jewish press' and some publishers and editors were not comfortable with this tag. This organization was the brainchild of Gabriel Cohen, editor and publisher of the National Jewish Post & Opinion.
Gender and Jewish Studies is an emerging subfield at the intersection of gender studies, queer studies, and Jewish studies. Gender studies centers on interdisciplinary research on the phenomenon of gender. It focuses on cultural representations of gender and people's lived experience. Similarly, queer studies focuses on the cultural representations and lived experiences of queer identities to critique hetero-normative values of sex and sexuality. Jewish studies is a field that looks at Jews and Judaism, through such disciplines as history, anthropology, literary studies, linguistics, and sociology. As such, scholars of gender and Jewish studies are considering gender as the basis for understanding historical and contemporary Jewish societies. This field recognizes that much of recorded Jewish history and academic writing is told from the perspective of “the male Jew” and fails to accurately represent the diverse experiences of Jews with non-dominant gender identities.
Tablet is a conservative online magazine focused on Jewish news and culture. The magazine was founded in 2009 and is supported by the Nextbook foundation. Its editor-in-chief is Alana Newhouse.
The Anti-Defamation League (ADL), formerly known as the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith, is a New York-based international non-governmental organization that was founded to combat antisemitism, as well as other forms of bigotry and discrimination. ADL is also known for its pro-Israel advocacy. Its current CEO is Jonathan Greenblatt. ADL headquarters are located in Murray Hill, in the New York City borough of Manhattan. The ADL has 25 regional offices in the United States including a Government Relations Office in Washington, D.C., as well as an office in Israel and staff in Europe. In its 2019 annual information Form 990, ADL reported total revenues of $92 million, the vast majority from contributions and grants. Its total operating revenue is reported at $80.9 million.
Lynn Schusterman is an American billionaire philanthropist. She is the co-founder and chair emerita of Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Philanthropies, and founder of several other philanthropic initiatives.
The Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law (LDB) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization founded by Kenneth L. Marcus in 2012 with the stated purpose of advancing the civil and human rights of the Jewish people and promoting justice for all peoples. LDB is active on American campuses, where it says it combats antisemitism and anti-Zionism.
Students for Justice in Palestine is a pro-Palestinian college student activism organization in the United States, Canada and New Zealand. Founded at the University of California in 2001, it has campaigned for boycott and divestment against corporations that deal with Israel and organized events about Israel's human rights violations. In 2011, The New York Times called it "the leading pro-Palestinian voice on campus". As of 2024, National SJP has over 350 chapters in North America.
The American Studies Association (ASA) began an ongoing boycott of Israeli educational institutions in December 2013. The ASA's decision to boycott was controversial because it was the first major American scholarly organization to do so. In April 2016, four ASA members aided by the pro-Israeli Brandeis Center sued the ASA, but the lawsuit was dismissed in 2019 when the judge ruled that plaintiffs lacked standing.
A Jewish summer camp is a summer camp dedicated to Jewish communities. In the United States these camps grew in popularity in the years after World War II and the Holocaust as an effort by American Jewish leaders to preserve and produce authentic Jewish culture. Outside the United States, similar camps are generally organized by various philanthropic organizations and local Jewish youth movements.
Joyce Antler is an author and Professor Emerita of American Jewish History and Culture, and of Women's, Gender and Sexuality Studies at Brandeis University; she retired from her teaching roles in 2016.