HJS People
HJS is a tight-knit community of academics from around the world, whose diverse research interests and teaching expertise create a vibrant intellectual atmosphere.
Academic Staff
| Name | Role | Research Interests |
Seth Anziska | Mohamed S. Farsi-Lindenbaum Professor of Jewish-Muslim Relations | Modern Middle Eastern History; Israel and Palestine |
Michael Berkowitz | Professor of Modern Jewish History | German Jewry; English-speaking Jewry; Holocaust Studies; Jews in science and technology |
Alinda Damsma | Lecturer (Teaching) in Ancient Hebrew and Aramaic | Witchcraft in biblical and post-biblical times; Aramaic dialectology |
Mark Geller | Jewish Chronicle Professor of Jewish Studies | Ancient Babylonian medicine; Syriac medicine; Talmud medicine |
Shirli Gilbert | Deputy Head of Department; Professor of Modern Jewish History | Jews in South Africa; Holocaust memory |
Sonia Gollance | Associate Professor of Yiddish Studies | Modern Jewish literature; Gender and Yiddish theatre |
François Guesnet | Professor of Modern Jewish History | Modern Jewish History; Polish Jewish History; Eastern Europe |
Lily Kahn | Head of the Department of Hebrew and Jewish Studies; Professor of Hebrew & Jewish Languages | Contemporary Hasidic Yiddish; Contemporary Ashkenazic Hebrew; Hebrew in Eastern Europe; Multilingualism in Hasidic communities |
Neill Lochery | Professor of Middle Eastern and Mediterranean Studies | |
Tali Loewenthal | Associate Professor (Teaching) | Hasidism and modernity; Jewish Mysticism; Orthodoxy/Gender in Orthodoxy |
Tamara Novis | Lecturer (Teaching) in Modern Hebrew | |
Shoshana Sharpe | Lecturer (Teaching) in Modern Hebrew | |
Sacha Stern | Professor of Rabbinic Judaism | Jewish history in Antiquity; Calendars and time; Rabbinic literature; Qaraites and Rabbanites |
Research Fellows
| Name | Role | Research Intereests |
Rina Kreitman | Honorary Research Fellow | Language education, education and antisemitism, Hebrew language education |
Simo Muir | Honorary Senior Research Fellow | Yiddish culture during and after Shoah, Jewish history in Finland, Postwar politics of memory |
Stephanie Pambakian | Research Fellow | Astronomy, Calendar, And Related Sciences In Near Eastern Cultures, Third-Eighth Centuries CE |
Abigail Pearson | Research Fellow in Syriac Astronomy and Related Sciences | Astronomy, Calendar, And Related Sciences In Near Eastern Cultures, Third-Eighth Centuries CE |
Nadia Vidro | Senior Research Fellow | Medieval Jewish intellectual and social history, Calendars, Jewish manuscripts; Astronomy, Calendar, And Related Sciences In Near Eastern Cultures, Third-Eighth Centuries CE |
Sonya Yampolskaya | Honorary Research Fellow | Maskilic and premodern Hebrew language; Yiddish dialects; Hasidic Yiddish |
Professional Services Staff
| Name | Role | |
Vanessa Richards | Department Manager | jewish.studies@ucl.ac.uk |
Casey MacKenzie Johnson | Department Administrator | c.mackenzie@ucl.ac.uk |
Sara Ben-Isaac | Institute of Jewish Studies Administrator | ijs@ucl.ac.uk |
Emeritus Staff
| Name | Role | Research Interests |
Helen Beer | Ben Zion Margulies Lecturer Emeritus in Yiddish | Yiddish language, literature, culture |
Tsila Ratner | Lecturer Emeritus in Modern Hebrew Literature | Modern Hebrew literature, Women’s writing, Gender studies |
Willem Smelik | Professor Emeritus of Hebrew and Aramaic | Aramaic Language and Literature, Hebrew Bible (esp. Former Prophets), Classical Rabbinic Literature, textual transmission |
Additional Associates
| Name | Role | Research Interests |
Vanessa Freedman | Subject Liaison Librarian: Hebrew & Jewish Studies | Library classification, history of UCL collections |
Bethany Gaunt | Honorary Lecturer | Jewish history, British Jewish history, migration history |
Research Students (Current & Recent)
| Name | Project Title | Supervisors |
Noa Ben David | Jewish identifications and minority integration in contemporary Norway | Prof François Guesnet, Dr Elettra Carbone (Scandinavian Studies, SELCS) |
Nir Ben-Porat | Minority Language and Mobility in Ethno-Nationalist Societies: The Case of Palestinians in Tel Aviv | Prof Seth Anziska, Prof Lily Kahn |
Tamara Gleason Freidberg | The Yiddish Press and the Holocaust in Mexico | Prof Shirli Gilbert, Dr Helen Beer |
Sarah Grabiner | Constructing and Connoting Multiple Liturgical Meanings via Translation in Hebrew-English Prayerbooks (1940-2022) | Prof Lily Kahn |
Ron Hassan | Zion, Yeshurun & Biblical Onomastics: a new outlook on the history of Hebrew & Israelite gods | Prof Mark Geller, Prof Lily Kahn |
Zeyu Jiang | Inter-Cultural Dynamics in the Globalisation of Scientific Practices: A Comparative Study of Babylonian and Chinese Medicine in the 1st Millennium BCE | Prof Mark Geller, Prof Vivienne Lo (Department of History) |
Rabbi Ofer Livnat | Sifrei Evronot: 16th-18th Century Jewish Calendar Manuals | Prof Sacha Stern |
Theodosis Pipis | An Escape from Eurocentrism and Hellenism: Cypriot History in an Arab Key, 1923-1974 | Dr Seth Anziska, Dr Ali Coşkun Tunçer (Department of History) |
Keren Rubner | Generational phonetic variation in the Hasidic English of Stamford Hill | Prof Lily Kahn, Dr Bronwen Evans (Speech, Hearing and Phonetic Sciences) |
Scott Saunders | Holocaust Journeys | Prof Shirli Gilbert, Prof François Guesnet |
Anna Switaj | The City, Despite Everything: Lviv Architecture as Witness, 1918-1947 | Prof François Guesnet, Prof Eva Branscome (Bartlett School of Architecture) |
