Having worked hard last year to establish the new Department of Judaism and Gender, interview and select candidates and build programs, Shalom Hartman Institute is ready to launch two new gender programs in the coming academic year. In doing so, the Institute aims to be at the forefront of exploring and helping to redefine women’s role and status in Israeli and Jewish life.
The first new program –
Seder Nashim – will provide a select group of 15 young Israeli graduate students – men and women alike – with a two-year study framework. These promising young scholars will enjoy the supervision of distinguished Hartman Institute senior academics. Receiving a monthly stipend, participants will meet for two full days each week to study a wide variety of subjects that explore gender issues, including Torah, Jewish history, Hebrew language and Jewish literature, Jewish education, Jewish philosophy and halakha. The modes of study in this bet midrash program include havruta study, discussion groups, frontal classes, writing groups, and reading groups.
Maskilot, the second new program opening this year, is part of the
Center for Advanced Jewish Studies. As a fellowship program, it provides outstanding female doctoral students with a new edge in completing their PhD’s and assuming their rightful place in Israeli academia. The five participants of the first cycle will receive a living stipend, mentoring, and admittance to a prestigious academic circle. They will be obligated to meet for study three days a week, practice teaching junior academics, and pursue their individual research in a collegial setting. This program is born of the many challenges women researchers face as they attempt to enter the academic world. Especially in the area of Jewish scholarship, men dominate virtually to the point of women’s total exclusion in Israel. The Maskilot program aims to take a step in correcting the serious lack of women academics in Jewish studies in Israel.
