Norman E. Alexander Lectures
In 2008, The Columbia University Libraries received a gift of $4 million to establish the Norman E. Alexander Library for Jewish Studies which included three new endowments: a Jewish Studies Librarian, the General Jewish Studies Collection and the Special Collections in Judaica. In gratitude for this generous gift, the Columbia University Libraries established the Annual Norman E. Alexander Lectures in Jewish Studies.
CELEBRATION OF COLLECTIONS 2025
Beyond the Text: Reading Jewish History Between the Words featured the following talks: "How a Columbia Manuscript Brought Ashkenazic Traditions to Shulhan 'Arukh" (Prof. Edward Fram); "Repairing Divinity: Ezra da Fano, Textual Correction, and Kabbalah in Early Modern Italy" (Eugene Matanky); "Columbia's Illustrated Jewish Calendar Manuscript in Context" (Prof. Elisheva Carlebach)
Past Celebrations & Lectures
Brawls, Sickbeds, and Barnard: "Blood and Money: Jews and Justice in the Archives of a Late Medieval Italian City" (Rowan Dorin, Stanford University and Edward Loss, University of Bologna); "The story of illness and recovery of Isaac Poppers of Prague (1772) from a previously unknown manuscript" (Pavel Sládek, Charles University, Prague); "To raise the standard of Jewish women:" 1890s Scholarships for Jews at Barnard? (Cynthia Francis Gensheimer, Independent Scholar)
The Tales the Books Will Tell: centers around the physical aspects of books and manuscripts. Rabbi Dr Jacob J. Schacter discusses what he learned about Rabbis Ya'akov Emden and Tsevi Hirsch Ashekenazi through examination of their annotations in books; Abigail Slawik discusses some of the processes involved in conserving a 700 year old manuscript, and Shai Zamir discusses what he discovered when he examined two Ladino polemical works that seemed remarkably similar in form.
Fleeing France, Portraying the Plague, and Cultivating Commentaries: featuring Charles E. Steinman, Dr. Susan Einbinder, and Dan Klein. Collections discussed include a medieval French manuscript that echoes the expulsion of the Jews from France, a 17th century manuscript discussing the plague in Padua, and a 19th century Italian commentary of the Bible!
Places and Space, Sights and Sounds in the Norman E. Alexander Library, featuring Dr. Francesca Bregoli, Dr. phil. habil. Lea Schäfer, and Dr. M. (Maarten) Hell. Collections featured include the Franchetti Archive, the Language and Culture Archive of Ashkenazic Jewry, and the Spinoza Collection.
Mystics, Music, and Microscopes: Celebrating Ten Years of the Norman E. Alexander Lectures in Jewish Studies
Jewish Museum Practices: A Modern Cultural Innovation with Jeffrey Shandler (Rutgers University)
Reembracing the Lachrymose Theory of Jewish History: Dialogue with a Columbia Tradition with Benjamin R. Gampel (Jewish Theological Seminary)
Kabbalah in Art and Architecture with Alexander Gorlin, FAIA (Alexander Gorlin Architects)
Rock Solid: America's Relationship to the Ten Commandments with Jenna Weissman Joselit (George Washington University)
Missionaries, Meshumadim, and Maskilim: An Entangled History of Christians, Jews and Those In Between in Nineteenth-Century Europe with David Ruderman
Behind the Biblical Story of Joseph, or: The Divine Travel Agent with James Kugel
How (and Why) the Jews Invented Hollywood with Neal Gabler
Father's Court and Mother's Sabbaths: Fiction in Service of Truth that is Greater than Fiction with Ruth Wisse, Martin Peretz Professor of Yiddish Literature and Professor of Comparative Literature, Harvard University
General Grant and the Jews with Jonathan Sarna, Joseph H. & Belle R. Braun Professor of American Jewish History, Brandeis University