Jewish Studies

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Escape from the Pit

Originally published in Hebrew in 1944, this fascinating and moving account may well be the first memoir of the Holocaust.

Yiddish Cinema

Offers a bold new reading of Yiddish cinema by exploring the early diasporic cinema's fascination with media and communication.

Jewish Virtue Ethics

Explores the diversity of Jewish approaches to character and virtue, from the Bible to the present day.

Party Switching in Israel

Analyzes the history of legislative party switching and its regulation in the Israeli Knesset.

The Radical Isaac

Examines the Yiddish-Hebrew writer I. L. Peretz's alignment with the Jewish working-class in Eastern Europe and his devotion to progressive politics.

Amos Oz

Explores the writer's enduring literary and political legacy.

A Double Burden

Explores the delicate interplay between emigration of Jews from Israel to Germany and the construction of a new identity in the shadow of antisemitism both past and present in their new home.

Philosophy as Stranger Wisdom

The first complete intellectual biography of one of the most influential and controversial philosophers of the twentieth century, Leo Strauss.

Jewish Women and the Defense of Palestine

By Meir Chazan
Translated by Meir Chazan
Subjects: Area Studies

Examines the struggle of Jewish women to join defense and military activities during the decades leading up to the Israeli War of Independence.

Holocaust Consciousness and Cold War Violence in Latin America

Examines how community leaders, writers, and political activists facing state repression in Latin America have drawn on and debated the validity of Holocaust terms to describe human rights atrocities in their own countries.

The Jews of Long Island

The first comprehensive history of the development of early Jewish life on Long Island.

Ida Rubinstein

The critical biography of a dynamic and under-represented figure who produced and starred in some of the most innovative works of her day.

Hasidism, Suffering, and Renewal

Reconsiders the legacy of an important Hasidic mystic, leader, and educator who confronted the dilemmas of modernity after World War I and whose writing constitutes a unique testimony to religious experience and its rupture in the Warsaw Ghetto.

The Other/Argentina

Argues that Jewishness is an essential element of Argentina’s self-fashioning as a modern nation.

Leo Strauss and Contemporary Thought

Broadens the horizons of Strauss’s thought by initiating dialogues between him and figures with whom little or no dialogue has yet occurred.

Shadows in the City of Light

Examines the place of Paris in French Jewish literary memory, a memory that, of necessity, grapples with the aftermath of the Holocaust.

Portraits

Explores Elie Wiesel’s portraits of the sages of Judaism and elaborates on the Hasidic legacy from his life and his teaching.

The Hebrew Orient

Examines the role that images of Palestine played in the construction of prewar Jewish American identity.

Demons of Change

Demonstrates how conflict between a human adept as the divine warrior and an otherworldly antagonist plays a key role in early Jewish and Christian apocalyptic accounts.

Holidays of the Revolution

Shows how Israeli Communists developed a distinctive national identity outside the boundaries of Zionism.

Since 1948

A portrait of Israeli literature in its full transnational and multilingual complexity.

Jews Out of the Question

A provocative study of opposition to anti-Semitism in contemporary political philosophy.

Kabbalah in Print

Demonstrates the impact of print culture on the spread of Jewish mysticism, focusing on Kabbalistic study guides by R. Yissakhar Baer of seventeenth-century Prague.

Yiddish Plays for Reading and Performance

Three stageworthy plays and nine individual scenes that offer an introduction to Yiddish theater at its liveliest.

Michael Gold

An authoritative biography of the dean of American proletarian writers during the interwar years.

Qorbanot

A dynamic dialogue of poetry and art that reimagines the ancient, biblical concept of sacrifice.

A Permanent Beginning

Situates a Hasidic master in the context of his time, demonstrating his formative influence on Jewish literary modernity.

Off the Derech

Combines powerful first-person accounts with incisive scholarly analysis to understand the phenomenon of ultra-Orthodox Jews who leave their insular communities and venture into the wider world.

Blows to the Head

A provocative tale of an unlikely contender and her midlife transformation through boxing.

Power and Progress

Study of a fascinating medieval Jewish philosopher, focusing on his twin conceptions of history.

Waste Not

Traces the development of bal tashḥit, the Jewish prohibition against wastefulness and destruction, from its biblical origins to the contemporary environmental movement.

Levinas and the Torah

A Levinasian commentary on the Torah.

The Struggle for Understanding

An in-depth look at Elie Wiesel’s writings, from his earliest works to his final novels.

Eternity Now

Demonstrates that Rabbi Shneur Zalman's teachings regarding time and history enabled Habad's growth into a mass Jewish movement.

What Remains

Text by Ilan Stavans
Photographs by Jon Crispin
Subjects: New York/regional
Series: Excelsior Editions

Combining photography and essay, presents a speculative portrait of a Jewish immigrant living out the end of his days in New York's midcentury mental health system.

Birth Chart

A collection of poems weaving together astrology, motherhood, music, and literary history.

The Holocaust and Masculinities

Edited by Björn Krondorfer & Ovidiu Creangă
Subjects: History

Critically assesses the experiences of men in the Holocaust.

A Survivor Named Trauma

By Myra Sklarew
Subjects: History

Combines personal accounts with insights from psychology to understand the continuing impact of Holocaust trauma in Lithuania.

The First Zionist Congress

Translated by Michael J. Reimer
Introduction by Michael J. Reimer
Subjects: Jewish Studies

An indispensable primary source in the history of Zionism.

Jewish Veganism and Vegetarianism

A multidisciplinary approach to the study of veganism, vegetarianism, and meat avoidance among Jews, both historical and contemporary.

Possessed Voices

Analyzes audio recordings of interwar Hebrew plays, providing a new model for the use of sound in theater studies.

The Spiritual Transformation of Jews Who Become Orthodox

A psychological study, based on extensive interview data, of Jewish adults who take on a devout lifestyle.

New Directions in Jewish American and Holocaust Literatures

Surveys the current state of Jewish American and Holocaust literatures as well as approaches to teaching them.

Congress and Diaspora Politics

Studies the impact of lobbying efforts by domestic ethnic groups and foreign governments on US policymaking.

Queer Expectations

Examines how Jewish women have used poetry to challenge their historical limitations while rewriting their potential futures.

Signatures of Struggle

A Marxist history of Israeli literature, tracing the relations between economic, social, and aesthetic transformations.

The Infrahuman

Argues that Jewish writers used depictions of Jews as animals to question prevalent notions of Jewish identity.

An Archive of the Catastrophe

Comprehensive analysis of 220 hours of outtakes that impels us to reexamine our assumptions about a crucial Holocaust documentary.

Hearts and Minds

By Nachman Shai
Subjects: Area Studies

Uses Israel’s public diplomacy efforts during the second intifada (2000–2005) as a prime example of interactions between state security, diplomacy, and the media.

The Tragedy of Optimism

Complete collection of Schwarzschild’s essays on the neo-Kantian Jewish philosopher Hermann Cohen.

Religious Zionism and the Settlement Project

An in-depth account of the ideology driving Israel's religious Zionist settler movements since the 1970s.

A Queer Way Out

Argues that queer Israeli emigrants engage in a deliberately unheroic form of resistance to Zionism.

Storytelling

An innovative philosophical meditation on the muteness of Holocaust survivors and the human faculty of storytelling.

The Holocaust and the Nonrepresentable

Argues that Holocaust representation has ethical implications fundamentally linked to questions of good and evil.

Cities of Refuge

Contrasts the experiences of German Jewish refugees from the Holocaust who fled to London and New York City.

The Full Pomegranate

Translations of selected poems by the Yiddish writer, covering the entire breadth of his career.

Years I Walked at Your Side

The first book-length collection in English of this major Israeli poet.

We Are Going to Be Lucky

Edited by Elizabeth L. Fox
Notes by Elizabeth L. Fox
Subjects: History
Series: Excelsior Editions

Tells the story of a young couple in love during World War II, and the difficulties they faced both at war and on the home front.

The Politics of Unreason

The first systematic analysis of the Frankfurt School’s research and theorizing on modern antisemitism.

Sabina Spielrein

Explores the life and work of psychoanalyst Sabina Spielrein through a feminist and mytho-poetic lens.

Educational Oases in the Desert

By Jonathan Sciarcon
Subjects: History

A history of the French schools that pioneered female education in Ottoman Iraq's Jewish communities.

College Bound

Argues that first- and second-generation Jewish American writers had an ambivalent relationship with educational success.

The Greatest Mirror

A wide-ranging analysis of heavenly twin imagery in early Jewish extrabiblical texts.

Writing in Witness

A comprehensive survey of the most important writing to come out of the Holocaust.

Sovereign Jews

Offers a novel exploration of the relationship between religion and the state in Israel.

Movies and Midrash

Brings popular cinema and Jewish religious texts into a meaningful dialogue.

Herbert H. Lehman

The definitive biography of New York State's four-term Governor, US Senator, humanitarian, and Jewish liberal political reformer.

A Vanished Ideology

First comprehensive examination of the rise and decline of the Jewish communist movement in the English-speaking world.

Philosophy, History, and Tyranny

The first comprehensive examination of the debate between Leo Strauss and Alexandre Kojève on the subject of philosophy and tyranny.

Tongue of Fire

Examines the influence of the notorious American anarchist “Red Emma” on the shifting social geography of sex and gender at the turn of the twentieth century.

Leo Strauss, Philosopher

European scholars discuss Leo Strauss as a major figure in the history of philosophy.

Figures of Memory

Explores how the USHMM and other museums and memorials both displace and disturb the memories that they are trying to commemorate.

Out of Control

Explores the fundamental confrontations between Spinoza and Levinas in ethics, politics, science, and religion.

Jewish Feminism and Intersectionality

Addresses the absence of Jewish subjects in intersectionality studies and demonstrates how to do intersectionality work inclusive of Jewish perspectives.

Drunk from the Bitter Truth

By Anna Margolin
Edited and translated by Shirley Kumove
Introduction by Shirley Kumove
Subjects: General Interest
Series: SUNY series, Women Writers in Translation

The poems of Anna Margolin (1887–1952), appearing here both in the original Yiddish and in English translation.

Sharing the Burden

Examines a fascinating and important figure in the history of modern Jewish ethics.

Borges, the Jew

Explores Borges’ infatuation with Jewish history and culture.

The Death of Fred Astaire

When, in the late eighties, the author chooses to raise a child with her lesbian partner, she embraces a life outside the lines—one full of curious adventures as well as the usual catastrophes and everyday pleasures.

Sweet Burdens

By Sveta Roberman
Subjects: Sociology

Examines the lives of recent Russian-Jewish immigrants in Germany.

Bringing Zion Home

Demonstrates how American Jews used culture—art, dance, music, fashion, literature—to win the hearts and minds of postwar Americans to the cause of Israel.

Divine Scapegoats

Explores the paradoxical symmetry between the divine and demonic in early Jewish mystical texts.

Beyond Post-Zionism

By Eran Kaplan
Subjects: Area Studies

Comprehensive and critical analysis of the post-Zionist debates and their impact on various aspects of Israeli culture.

Forgetting Fathers

An eloquent personal reflection on the fascination of family history and the desire to both discover and escape origins.

Reality Crumbs

By Raquel Chalfi
Translated by Tsipi Keller
Afterword by Dan Miron
Subjects: General Interest
Series: Excelsior Editions

First book-length collection of the work of the celebrated Israeli poet.

Stop at the Red Apple

An entertaining inside story of how Reuben Freed's roadside eatery became the famous Red Apple Rest.

Inside Ocean Hill–Brownsville

The story of an Ocean Hill–Brownsville teacher who crossed picket lines during the racially charged New York City teachers’ strike of 1968.

The Study of Judaism

Considers Jewish studies as an academic discipline from its origins to the present.

Progressive Minds, Conservative Politics

Compelling account of Strauss's mature Maimonidean writings.

Black Harlem and the Jewish Lower East Side

Comprehensive analysis of how Harlem and the Lower East Side have been depicted over the course of the twentieth century in African American and Jewish American literature.

A Vigilant Society

Uncovers a fundamental change that took place in Western thinking, especially its departure from the Sephardic philosophy found in the Iberian Peninsula during the 13th century.

From the Shahs to Los Angeles

A fascinating look at the lives, culture, and religious and ritual observance of three generations of Iranian Jewish women in the United States.

Suckling at My Mother's Breasts

A fascinating discussion of the kabbalistic image of a nursing god, its historical context, and its theological implications.

Utopia of Understanding

A hermeneutics of language after Auschwitz.

The Gambler's Daughter

In exploring her father's own gambling addiction, the author uncovers a hidden history of gambling in the Jewish community.

The Masorah to Targum Onqelos

A critical edition, with notes and commentary, of the ancient Aramaic translation of the Torah.

Identity Papers

Argues that debates about Jewish identity and assimilation are signs of creative potential rather than crisis.

Dark Mirrors

Discusses the two most important figures in early Jewish mythologies of evil, the fallen angels Azazel and Satanael.

California Dreaming

Multidisciplinary study of the citrus industry in Palestine before World War II.

Hiding Places

A daughter struggles to get her mother to talk about her Holocaust experiences, and tries to understand how those experiences have shaped her own life.