Catherine Chatterley

Last updated

Catherine Chatterley is a Canadian historian, specializing in the study of modern European history, the Holocaust, and research on antisemitism, [1] and is the Founding Director of the Canadian Institute for the Study of Antisemitism (CISA). Chatterley is Founding Editor-in-Chief of Antisemitism Studies, the first scholarly journal devoted to the study of antisemitism. It is published by Indiana University Press. [2] [3] Chatterley appeared in the documentary called "Unmasked: Judeophobia" (2011), where she was one of the scholars interviewed. [4] [5] That same year, she was invited as an expert scholar to participate in the Canadian All-Party Parliamentary Inquiry into Antisemitism, which produced the Ottawa Protocol.

Contents

Her undergraduate studies included European history and Near Eastern and Judaic Studies at the University of Manitoba, European Intellectual History at Concordia University (Montreal), followed by a doctorate in Modern European and Jewish History, and German-Jewish Literature, which she completed at The University of Chicago under the direction of Moishe Postone and Michael Geyer.

Syracuse University Press published her first book, Disenchantment: George Steiner and the Meaning of Western Civilization After Auschwitz, in their series on Religion, Theology, and the Holocaust, edited by Steven T. Katz. Disenchantment was named a 2011 National Jewish Book Award Finalist in the category of Modern Jewish Thought and Experience. Alongside Juan Asensio in France and Ricardo Gil Soeiro in Portugal, Chatterley is recognized as a leading scholar of George Steiner, an internationally renowned cultural critic, and has published two chapters in international collections about his work, both edited by Ricardo Gil Soeiro. Steiner died on February 3, 2020, and Chatterley wrote an obituary for the Times of Israel. [6]

As the Founding Director of CISA, Catherine Chatterley was invited to be a member of the official government delegation to Israel in January 2014. [7] From 2002 to 2008 Chatterley taught history at the University of Winnipeg and from 2007 to 2018 at the University of Manitoba. [8]

Founding of CISA

Chatterley created the Canadian Institute for the Study of Antisemitism (CISA) in the summer of 2010 to "help facilitate the scholarly study of antisemitism and to educate Canadians about the phenomenon in its classical and contemporary forms." [9] CISA is the first national academic institution in Canada dedicated to the scholarly study of a subject that is usually addressed by political advocacy organizations. It is the only such institution in the world founded by a non-Jewish scholar. [10] [11] [12] The Institute sponsors the leading academic periodical on the subject. Antisemitism Studies is published by Indiana University Press and Chatterley is Editor-in-Chief.

Involvement in public debates

Chatterley was involved in the public debate over the place of a permanent Holocaust gallery proposed for the Canadian Museum for Human Rights (CMHR). [13] In an editorial criticizing the attempt to remove the proposed Holocaust gallery from the museum, she stated, "the problem with the CMHR is it is mired in the politics of Canadian ethnic identity rather than rooted in the scholarly study of genocide, Holocaust, and human rights. Subjective feelings are influencing content and design choices rather than objective historical and legal reality and this does not bode well for the international reputation of this institution." This article also described the offensive UCCLA postcard campaign using Orwellian imagery to target supporters of the Holocaust gallery, depicting them as pigs. Chatterley stated unequivocally, "the fact that this kind of postcard was distributed in Canada in 2011, without shame or conscience, by an organization that claims to protect civil liberties, is astonishing. This alone demonstrates the clear need for this museum, its permanent Holocaust gallery, and for the Canadian Institute for the Study of Antisemitism." [13] [14] [15] In 2013, Chatterley interviewed the former curator of the Holocaust gallery and provided the first concrete published information about the content of the CMHR for the public. [16] Holocaust and Genocide Studies published her study of the conflicts and controversies at the CMHR, entitled "Canada's Struggle with Holocaust Memorialization: The War Museum Controversy, Ethnic Identity Politics, and the Canadian Museum for Human Rights."

Israel Apartheid Week (IAW) was another cultural controversy she addressed in the media. In Canada's National Post , she said that IAW is a Canadian invention, established at the University of Toronto in 2005, and "while the event is new, the ideology at the heart of IAW is not. The accusation that Zionism is racist and imperialist by nature is as old as Israel. The Soviet Union was a leading proponent of this conception of Zionism; and it drew on the long history of leftist antisemitism, identifying Jewish nationalism and capitalist imperialism with Judaism and the Jewish bourgeoisie." [17] After Chatterley expressed her concerns about IAW in the national daily, the president of the University of Winnipeg addressed the issue and said both sides of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and of wider Middle East issues should be presented and debated. Chatterley expressed her hope that an "intelligent and responsible scholarly approach" would be followed by all university administrations in Canada and worldwide. [18] Lloyd Axworthy, the president of the University of Winnipeg, invited Catherine Chatterley to lecture on the subject of antisemitism during Middle East Week in March 2013.

As a scholar of German history and the Holocaust, Chatterley was consulted in 2014 about the problem of stolen art in Canadian museum collections. [19] Heritage Canada sponsored the Holocaust-era Provenance Research and Best-Practice Guidelines Project, through which they investigated six art galleries in Canada including the Winnipeg Art Gallery.

Chatterley has also critiqued comments made by religion writer Karen Armstrong in the wake of the Charlie Hebdo and Kosher Grocery murders in Paris. In a Dutch interview, Armstrong claimed that the murders of French Jews by the Hebdo terrorists had nothing to do with antisemitism: "The supermarket attack in Paris was about Palestine, about ISIS. It had nothing to do with antisemitism; many of them are Semites themselves. But they attempt to conquer Palestine and we're not talking about that. We're too implicated and we don't know what to do with it." [20] In response, Chatterley wrote a critical op-ed for The Huffington Post correcting her historical and conceptual errors and arguing that the murders of Jews in Paris had everything to do with antisemitism. [21]

In September 2023, Chatterley called for the Speaker of the House of Commons, Anthony Rota, to be fired for inviting a member of the 14th Waffen-SS Grenadier Division (known as the Galicia Division), a Nazi unit composed of Ukrainian volunteers, to attend Volodymyr Zelensky’s speech to Parliament and for valorizing Yaroslav Hunka, 98 years old, as “a Ukrainian hero, a Canadian hero, and we thank him for all his service.” Members of Parliament, then, gave this elderly Ukrainian Nazi soldier a standing ovation, which Chatterley characterized as a "disgusting embarrassment that is now making international news."

Chatterley was one of the first scholars of antisemitism to publicly condemn the Hamas massacre of Israeli citizens on October 7, 2023. She characterized the coordinated assault on civilians as a pogrom and drew attention to the sexual violence and torture perpetrated on women and children. Many subsequent developments unfolded as Chatterley predicted in her October 9th article, "The Time is Now for Intellectual and Moral Clarity."

Publications

Her book, Disenchantment: George Steiner and the Meaning of Western Civilization After Auschwitz, is an intellectual biography of the literary critic. It focuses on his neglected writings on the Holocaust and antisemitism, and explains how and when the Holocaust enters Western consciousness in the decades after World War II. [22] [23] [24] [25]

Related Research Articles

Antisemitism is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. This sentiment is a form of racism, and a person who harbours it is called an antisemite. Though antisemitism is overwhelmingly perpetrated by non-Jews, it may occasionally be perpetrated by Jews in a phenomenon known as auto-antisemitism. Primarily, antisemitic tendencies may be motivated by negative sentiment towards Jews as a people or by negative sentiment towards Jews with regard to Judaism. In the former case, usually presented as racial antisemitism, a person's hostility is driven by the belief that Jews constitute a distinct race with inherent traits or characteristics that are repulsive or inferior to the preferred traits or characteristics within that person's society. In the latter case, known as religious antisemitism, a person's hostility is driven by their religion's perception of Jews and Judaism, typically encompassing doctrines of supersession that expect or demand Jews to turn away from Judaism and submit to the religion presenting itself as Judaism's successor faith—this is a common theme within the other Abrahamic religions. The development of racial and religious antisemitism has historically been encouraged by anti-Judaism, though the concept itself is distinct from antisemitism.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Elie Wiesel</span> Romanian-born American writer (1928–2016)

Eliezer "Elie" Wiesel was a Romanian-born American writer, professor, political activist, Nobel laureate, and Holocaust survivor. He authored 57 books, written mostly in French and English, including Night, a work based on his experiences as a Jewish prisoner in the Auschwitz and Buchenwald concentration camps.

Holocaust denial is an antisemitic conspiracy theory that asserts that the Nazi genocide of Jews, known as the Holocaust, is a myth, fabrication, or exaggeration. Holocaust denial involves making one or more of the following false claims:

The Institute for Historical Review (IHR) is a United States–based nonprofit organization which promotes Holocaust denial. It is considered by many scholars to be central to the international Holocaust denial movement. Self-described as a "historical revisionist" organization, the IHR promotes antisemitic viewpoints and has links to several neo-Nazi and neo-fascist organizations.

Israel Harold "Izzy" Asper was a Canadian tax lawyer and media magnate. He was the founder and owner of the now-defunct TV and media company CanWest Global Communications Corp and father to its former CEO and President Leonard Asper, former director and corporate secretary Gail Asper, as well as former Executive Vice President David Asper. He was also the leader of the Manitoba Liberal Party from 1970 to 1975 and is credited with the idea and vision to establish the Canadian Museum for Human Rights.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Daniel Goldhagen</span> Harvard University Professor

Daniel Jonah Goldhagen is an American author, and former associate professor of government and social studies at Harvard University. Goldhagen reached international attention and broad criticism as the author of two controversial books about the Holocaust: Hitler's Willing Executioners (1996), and A Moral Reckoning (2002). He is also the author of Worse Than War (2009), which examines the phenomenon of genocide, and The Devil That Never Dies (2013), in which he traces a worldwide rise in virulent antisemitism.

David Cesarani was a British historian who specialised in Jewish history, especially the Holocaust. He also wrote several biographies, including Arthur Koestler: The Homeless Mind (1998).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yehuda Bauer</span> Israeli historian of the Holocaust (born 1926)

Yehuda Bauer is a Czech-born Israeli historian and scholar of the Holocaust. He is a professor of Holocaust Studies at the Avraham Harman Institute of Contemporary Jewry at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Gail Sheryl Asper is a Canadian heiress, philanthropist, and corporate lawyer. Daughter of the media magnate Izzy Asper, she serves as the president and a trustee of the Asper Foundation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Canadian Museum for Human Rights</span> Human rights museum in Manitoba, Canada

The Canadian Museum for Human Rights is a Canadian Crown corporation and national museum located in Winnipeg, Manitoba, adjacent to The Forks. The purpose of the museum is to "explore the subject of human rights with a special but not exclusive reference to Canada, to enhance the public's understanding of human rights, to promote respect for others and to encourage reflection and dialogue."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">International Holocaust Remembrance Day</span> International memorial day on 27 January for the victims of Nazi genocides

The International Holocaust Remembrance Day, or the International Day in Memory of the Victims of the Holocaust, is an international memorial day on 27 January that commemorates the victims of the Holocaust, which resulted in the genocide of one third of the Jewish people, along with countless members of other minorities by Nazi Germany between 1933 and 1945, an attempt to implement its "final solution" to the Jewish question. 27 January was chosen to commemorate the date when the Auschwitz concentration camp was liberated by the Red Army in 1945.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Aftermath of the Holocaust</span> Review of the topic

The Holocaust had a deep effect on society both in Europe and the rest of the world, and today its consequences are still being felt, both by children and adults whose ancestors were victims of this genocide.

Holocaust trivialization refers to any comparison or analogy that diminishes the scale and severity of the atrocities that were carried out by Nazi Germany during the Holocaust. The Wiesel Commission defined trivialization as the abusive use of comparisons with the aim of minimizing the Holocaust and banalizing its atrocities. Originally, holocaust meant a type of sacrifice that is completely burnt to ashes; starting from the late 19th century, it started to denote extensive destruction of a group, usually people or animals. The 1915 Armenian genocide was described as a "holocaust" by contemporary observers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rafael Medoff</span> American scholar and academic

Rafael Medoff (born c. 1959) is an American professor of Jewish history and the founding director of The David Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies, which is based in Washington, D.C. and focuses on issues related to America's response to the Holocaust.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Israeli Apartheid Week</span> Annual series of university activities

Israeli Apartheid Week (IAW) is an annual series of university lectures and rallies held in February or March. According to the organization, "the aim of IAW is to educate people about the nature of Israel as an apartheid system and to build Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaigns as part of a growing global BDS movement." Since IAW began in Toronto in 2005, it has spread to at least 55 cities, including locations in Australia, Austria, Brazil, Botswana, Canada, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Jordan, South Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, Norway, Palestine, South Africa, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

Antisemitism in Canada is the manifestation of hostility, prejudice or discrimination against the Canadian Jewish people or Judaism as a religious, ethnic or racial group. This form of racism has affected Jews since Canada's Jewish community was established in the 18th century.

Holocaust studies, or sometimes Holocaust research, is a scholarly discipline that encompasses the historical research and study of the Holocaust. Institutions dedicated to Holocaust research investigate the multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary aspects of Holocaust methodology, demography, sociology, and psychology. It also covers the study of Nazi Germany, World War II, Jewish history, religion, Christian-Jewish relations, Holocaust theology, ethics, social responsibility, and genocide on a global scale. Exploring trauma, memories, and testimonies of the experiences of Holocaust survivors, human rights, international relations, Jewish life, Judaism, and Jewish identity in the post-Holocaust world are also covered in this type of research.

The Canadian Institute for the Study of Antisemitism (CISA) is one of seven institutes in the world dedicated to the scholarly study of antisemitism. Founded in 2010 by Canadian historian Catherine Chatterley, the Institute is a national organization based in Winnipeg.

Jonathan Judaken was the Spence L. Wilson Chair in Humanities at Rhodes College. Judaken previously taught at the University of Memphis where he was the Dunavant Professor of History and Director of the Marcus Orr Center for the Humanities. His fields of expertise include European cultural and intellectual history, discussions of Jews and Judaism, race and racism, and post-Holocaust French philosophy. Judaken is a notable scholar of Jean-Paul Sartre and Sartre's relationship to Jews and Judaism and race and racism, as well as contemporary French Jewish philosophers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Grzegorz Rossoliński-Liebe</span>

Grzegorz Rossoliński-Liebe is a German–Polish historian based in Berlin, associated with the Friedrich Meinecke Institute of the Free University of Berlin. He specializes in the history of the Holocaust and East-Central Europe, fascism, nationalism, the history of antisemitism, the history of the Soviet Union, and the politics of memory.

References

  1. ↑ Academics dissect modern antisemitism. The Canadian Jewish News, 24 May 2012. Retrieved 22 August 2012.
  2. ↑ Cohen, Simone. "Doctor Chatterley's Passion". The Jerusalem Post. Retrieved 17 September 2020.
  3. ↑ Bradshaw, James. "Former BMO CEO Tony Comper revamps charity focused on anti-Semitism". The Globe & Mail. Retrieved 17 September 2020.
  4. ↑ Featured Commentator: Catherine Chatterley, PhD. Unmasked: Judeophobia. Retrieved 25 August 2012.
  5. ↑ Unmasking Rising Global Antisemitism: CISA's Screening of Gloria Greenfield's Unmasked:Judeophobia and the Threat to Civilization Archived 2014-03-02 at the Wayback Machine . Winnipeg Jewish Review, 23 January 2012. Retrieved 25 August 2012.
  6. ↑ Chatterley, Catherine. "George Steiner: Remembrancer". Times of Israel. Retrieved 25 June 2020.
  7. ↑ Spivak, Rhonda. "Jerusalem Vignettes". Winnipeg Jewish Review. Archived from the original on March 2, 2014. Retrieved February 15, 2014.
  8. ↑ Catherine Chatterley. University of Manitoba, Faculty of Arts - History. Retrieved 22 August 2012.
  9. ↑ Rhonda, Spivak (October 2, 2011). "CISA Announces Its First Academic Year of Programming". Winnipeg Jewish Review. Retrieved December 30, 2011.
  10. ↑ Spivak, Rhonda (December 23, 2010). "Wiesel to act as honorary chair of antisemitism institute". Canadian Jewish News. Archived from the original on May 3, 2012. Retrieved December 30, 2011.
  11. ↑ Chisvin, Sharon (March 26, 2011). "Local Institute to Combat Antisemitism". Winnipeg Free Press. Retrieved December 30, 2011.
  12. ↑ Hepburn, Ben (May 9, 2012). "Canadian Antisemitism Institute Aims to Fill Worldwide Void". Toronto Star. Retrieved May 22, 2012.
  13. 1 2 Catherine Chatterley leads Opposition to Holocaust Obfuscation campaign in Canada. Defending History, 7 April 2011. Retrieved 22 August 2012.
  14. ↑ Chatterley, Catherine (April 2, 2011). "The War Against the Holocaust". Winnipeg Free Press. Retrieved December 30, 2011.
  15. ↑ Moses, Dirk (May 2012). "The Canadian Museum for Human Rights: the 'uniqueness of the Holocaust' and the question of genocide". Journal of Genocide Research. 14 (2): 215–238. doi:10.1080/14623528.2012.677762.
  16. ↑ Chatterley, Chatterley. "Dr. Catherine Chatterley Interviews CMHR About Content Of Holocaust Gallery". Winnipeg Jewish Review. Archived from the original on March 2, 2014. Retrieved February 21, 2014.
  17. ↑ Chatterley, Catherine (March 3, 2011). "A History of Israel Apartheid Week". The National Post. Archived from the original on 2012-07-09. Retrieved December 30, 2011.
  18. ↑ Winnipeg university head fights Israel Apartheid Week. The Jerusalem Post, 14 March 2011. Retrieved 22 August 2012.
  19. ↑ Rollason, Kevin (February 7, 2014). "Art Sleuths on Nazi Trail". Winnipeg Free Press. Retrieved February 12, 2014.
  20. ↑ Thooft, Lisette. "Karen Armstrong: 'There is Nothing in the Islam More Violent Than Christianity'". www.nieuwwij.nl. Retrieved January 28, 2015.
  21. ↑ Chatterley, Catherine (January 27, 2015). "Don't Say the Paris Supermarket Attack Had Nothing To Do With Antisemitism". The Huffington Post. Retrieved January 27, 2015.
  22. ↑ "Jewish Book Council". 2011 National Jewish Book Awards. Archived from the original on January 13, 2012. Retrieved January 10, 2012.
  23. ↑ Bamberger, W. C. "Review of Disenchantment George Steiner and the Meaning of Western Civilization after Auschwitz". Raintaxi Review of Books. Archived from the original on May 13, 2012. Retrieved May 22, 2012.
  24. ↑ Spicer, Kevin P. (2012). "SOME BUILT IT; ALMOST ALL LET IT BE: Review of Chatterley and Lipstadt". The Review of Politics. 74 (1): 158–164. doi:10.1017/s0034670512000162.
  25. ↑ Steiman, Lionel. "Review of Disenchantment". Archived from the original on March 2, 2014. Retrieved May 22, 2012.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.