Talya Fishman

EMPLOYMENT

July, 2001 - : Associate Professor, Department of Religious Studies, University of Pennsylvania.

Undergraduate courses: Introduction to Western Religions; Introduction to Judaism; Rabbinic Writings on the Rabbinic Process; Jewish-Christian Relations Through the Ages; Jewish Civilization II.

Graduate seminars: Spirit and Law; Jewish-Christian Relations in the Early Modern Period; Custom in Medieval Jewish Culture; Packaging Jewish Knowledge

Summer 2000: Visiting Associate Professor, Jewish Theological Seminary. Course: Spirit and Law.

Jan. 2000 - April '00: Visiting Associate Professor, Department of Religious Studies, Stanford University. Courses: Spirit and Law; Introduction to Jewish Culture, Graduate Seminar in Rabbinic Literature.

Aug. '99 - Dec. '99: Visiting Associate Professor, Department of History, University of California at Berkeley. Courses: The Other Within: Jews, Judaism and the Transformation of European Culture in the Early Modern Period" (graduate seminar); History of the Jewish People II.

Aug. '89 - June '98 (resigned): Associate Professor (1996), Department of History, Rice University, Houston, TX. Courses: History of the Jewish People I: Ezra-1492; History of the Jewish People II: 1492-1881; Introduction to Jewish Philosophy and Mysticism; Perceptions of Jews and Judaism from Tacitus to Toynbee; Power & Powerlessness in Jewish History.

Sept. '96 - June '97: Visiting Associate Professor, Department of Religious Studies, Stanford University. Courses: Introduction to Rabbinic Culture; Spiritualizing the Law: Philosophers, Mystics and Pietists in Jewish Culture; Representing the Other: Jews and Judaism in Western Thought; Hasidism and Modernity.

Jan. '89 - June '89: Visiting Assistant Professor, Department of History, Columbia University. Courses: "Medieval Jewish History from the Geonic Period to the Spanish Expulsion"; "Dissent and Critique in Medieval Rabbanite Culture" (a graduate seminar).

Sept. '84 - June '88: Lecturer, and from 9/86, Assistant Professor, Department of Religion, Boston University. Courses: "Introduction to Western Religions"; "Judaica in the Humanities"; "Introduction to the Genres of Rabbinic Literature"; "Themes in Medieval Jewish Philosophy"; "Jews of Medieval Europe: Ideas and Institutions"; "Critiques of Judaism and Responses Through the Ages"; "Introduction to Jewish Mysticism".

Sept. '80- May '84: Adult Education Instructor, Jewish Intellectual History from the Expulsion from Spain through the Emanicipation; Social and Spiritual Revolutions in Jewish History. Boston Hebrew College and the Havurah Adult Education of Greater Boston.

Sept. '78- Jan. '79: Research Assistant, Jewish Ceremonial Art Collection, Jewish Museum, NY.

June '76 - Jan. '78: Founder and coordinator of Areivim, an volunteer service and documentation project in Diaspora Jewish communities, under the auspices of the World Union of Jewish Students, London.

EDUCATION

May, 1986: Ph.D., Post-Biblical Jewish History and Literature, Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, Harvard University.

May, 1979: Interdisciplinary M.A. (Jewish History, Rabbinics, Jewish Philosophy, Hebrew Literature), Jewish Theological Seminary of America, New York.

May, 1976: B.A., summa cum laude, Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT. (Majored in the College of Letters, an interdisciplinary program in the history of Western thought studied through literary and philosophical texts.) University and Highest Honors for Senior Thesis, "Reflections on Spinoza's Theological Political Treatise: The Question of Authority in Scriptural Interpretation and Political Theory".

PUBLICATIONS

“Rhineland Pietists’ Sacralization of Oral Torah”, Jewish Quarterly Review, forthcoming.

"Rhineland Pietist Approaches to Prayer and the Textualization of Rabbinic Culture in Medieval Northern Europe", Jewish Studies Quarterly, vol. 11 (2004), pp. 313-331.

Website of the Mellon Workshop on Early Modern Jewries: Intoductions to, and annotated translations of Hebrew texts reflecting anxiety about Jewish identity in Early Modern Europe: Two rabbinic responsa by Rabbi Zemah ben Shlomo Duran; anti-Christian polemic by R. Zemah ben Shlomo Duran; selection from Kol Sakhal’s critique of rabbinic authority; selection from an epistle of Orobio de Castro. (posted Fall, 2004.)

“A Medieval Screed Against Textual Emendation”, CAJS Web Exhibit on “Challenging Boundaries: History and Anthropology in Jewish Studies”, Spring, 2004.

"Changing Jewish Discourse About Christianity: The Efforts of Rabbi Leone Modena", in David Malkiel, ed., The Lion Shall Roar: Leone Modena and His World, (Magnes Press: Jerusalem, 2002), pp. 159-194.

"The Penitential System of Hasidei Ashkenaz and the Problem of Cultural Boundaries", Journal of Jewish Thought and Philosophy, vol. 8, (1999), 201-229.

"Forging Jewish Memory: Besamim Rosh and the Invention of Pre-Emancipation Jewish Culture", in E. Carlebach, J. Efron, D. Myers, eds., Jewish History and Jewish Memory: Essays in Honor of Yosef Hayim Yerushalmi, (Brandeis University Press, 1998), pp. 70-88.

Shaking the Pillars of Exile: "Voice of a Fool"'s Early Modern Jewish Critique of Rabbinic Culture, (Stanford University Press, 1997).

"Saul Berlin", in R.J.Z. Werblowsky and G. Wigoder, eds., Oxford Dictionary of the Jewish Religion, (NY, 1997).

"A Kabbalistic Perspective on Gender-Specific Commandments: On the Interplay Between Symbol and Society", Association for Jewish Studies Review 17:2 (1992): 199-245.

"New Light on the Dating and Provenance of Kol Sakhal's Timeless Critique of Rabbinic Authority and Tradition", Tarbiz 59 (1990): l7l-l90 [Hebrew].

"A Medieval Parody of Misogyny: Judah Ibn Shabbetai's Minhat Yehudah Soneh HaNashim", Prooftexts, A Journal of Jewish Literary History 8 (1988): 89-119.

"On Women and Torah Study: Sefer HaKanah's Critique of Halakhah and Kabbalistic Response", Kabbalah, v. 2, #2, Summer 1987.

FELLOWSHIPS AND AWARDS

Sept. ’04- Dec. ’04: Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship. (Second half to be taken in Fall, 2006)

Sept. ’03 - June ’04: Center for Advanced Jewish Studies Fellowship, Anthropology and Jewish Studies Seminar, University of Pennsylvania.

Sept. '00 - Jul. '01: American Council of Learned Societies, Fellowship for Independent Scholars.

Sept. '98 - Aug. '99: Stanford University Program in Jewish Studies, Visiting Scholar.

Sept. '95 - Aug. '96: National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship.

Sept. '95 - Aug. '96: Stanford Humanities Center Fellowship

May '95: Yavneh Award for Jewish Education, Houston Jewish Federation.

Sept. '9l - Jul. '92: Yad HaNadiv - Barecha Foundation Fellowship, Hebrew University, Jerusalem.

Jun. – Aug. ‘90: Rice University Faculty Research Grant.

Sept. '86 - Aug. '87: Center for Jewish Studies Post-Doctoral Fellowship, Harvard University.

Sept. '83 - Jun. '84: Charlotte Newcombe Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship, Woodrow Wilson

Foundation.

Sept. '82 - Jun. '84: National Foundation for Jewish Culture, Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship.

Sept. '82 - Jun. '84: Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture Fellowship for Doctoral Candidates.

Sept. '80- Jun. '82: Sidney Solomon Fellowship, Harvard University.

RECENT PRESENTATIONS

Feb. ’05: “The Medieval Transformation of Talmud into a Legal Code”, Religious Studies Department Colloquium, University of Pennsylvania.

Nov., ’04: “Approaches to Jewish Mysticism”, Haverford College.

Nov., ’04: “Teaching Religious Traditions to Students to Disparate Faiths”, Colloquium of the Institute for Middle East Peace and Development, New York.

Oct., ’04: “The Textualization of Rabbinic Culture”, UNC-Duke University Colloquium in Jewish Studies.

Aug., ’04: “Anxieties About Jewish Identity in Early Modern Europe”, Mellon Workshop on Early Modern Jewries, Wesleyan University.

Apr. ’04: “Ashkenazic Sacralization of the Newly-Inscribed Oral Torah”, Center for Advanced Jewish Studies Conference, University of Pennsylvania.

Feb. ’04: "Rhineland Pietism's Masorah of Prayer and the Textualization of Rabbinic Culture in Medieval Northern Europe", Conference on Sefer Hasidim and Jewish-Christian Relations,

Princeton University.

Nov. ’03: “The Yeshiva Bokher as a Hot Catch: How Jewish Culture Came to Regard Mastery of an Antiquated Corpus as its Social and Religious Ideal”, Board of Trustees Retreat, Center for Advanced Jewish Studies, University of Pennsylvania.

Oct. ’03: “Custom’s Emergence as a Competitor to Law: A Revolution of Medieval Ashkenaz”,

Center for Advanced Jewish Studies, University of Pennsylvania.

Sept. ’03: “Women’s Midrash for the Ten Days of Penitence”, Temple Beth Hillel-Beth El.

Feb. ’03: “Functions of Decoration in Medieval Illuminated Hebrew Manuscripts”, Temple Beth Hillel-Beth El Night of Learning.

Dec. ’02: “Valorizing the Textual Artifact: Profet Duran’s Grammar of Religious Experience”, History of the Book Seminar, University of Pennsylvania.

Dec. ’01: “Changing Jewish Perceptions of Christianity in the Early Modern Period”, Religious Studies Colloquium, University of Pennsylvania.

Oct. ’01: “Tosafists, Pietists and the Challenge to Jewish Cultural Continuity in Twelfth Century Northern Europe”, Conference on Jewish Religious Leadership, Jewish Theological Seminary.

Dec., ‘00: "Was There a Clandestine Jewish Movement to Convert Gentiles in Early Modern Europe?", Association for Jewish Studies Annual Conference, Boston.

Feb., '00: "Subverting Rabbis: Tolerated Legal Dissent in Jewish Culture", Stanford University.

OTHER ACTIVITIES

Editorial Committee, Jewish Publication Society, Philadelphia.

Advisory Committee, Princeton University Program in Jewish Studies.

Editorial Board, Association for Jewish Studies Review.

Division Head for Medieval and Early Modern Jewish History and Thought, Association for Jewish Studies Annual Conference.

Board of Directors, Association for Jewish Studies.

Faculty Advisory Committee, Center for Advanced Jewish Studies, University of Pennsylvania

[last updated October 2005]