The Institute of Living Judaism in Brooklyn, the Brooklyn Jewish Historical Initiative and the Kane Street Synagogue present “Strangers in a Strange Land: How We Ended Up in Brooklyn” next weekend.
A panel of leading Jewish History scholars will be featured, including Drs. Ilana Abramovitch, Annie Polland, Gerald Sorin and Daniel Soyer.
Dr. Ilana Abramovitch, co-editor of Jews of Brooklyn (Brandeis University Press, 2002) is pedagogical advisor to the Rutgers University Master Teachers Institute in Holocaust education, teaches in the CUNY system and is the conference program associate for the Association for Jewish Studies. For one decade, she has served as manager of curriculum at the MJH.
Dr. Annie Polland is the vice president for education and programs at the Lower East Side Tenement Museum, where she oversees exhibits and interpretation. She is the author, with Dr. Daniel Soyer, of Emerging Metropolis: New York Jews in the Age of Immigration, part of the City of Promises series, which won the 2012 National Jewish Book Award. She teaches at New York University.
Dr. Gerald Sorin, of Brooklyn, is a distinguished professor of American and Jewish studies and the director of the Louis and Mildred Resnick Institute for the Study of Modern Jewish Life at the State University of New York at New Paltz.
Dr. Daniel Soyer is professor of history at Fordham University. He is a scholar of American immigration and American Jewish history. Dr. Soyer has written on the history of ethnic fraternalism, immigrant autobiographies, immigrant transnationalism, Jews in New York City, the garment industry and New York City politics.
The Institute for Living Judaism (ILJB) is a nondenominational center for learning that aims to promote tolerance, moderation and pluralism in furthering the study and practice of the Jewish tradition. It offers quality programs to strengthen and expand Brooklyn’s Jewish community.
The Brooklyn Jewish Historical Initiative (BJHI) promotes access to information, documentation and understanding related to the diversity of the Brooklyn Jewish community, currently and in the past, and to provide opportunities for communicating, disseminating, preserving and celebrating Brooklyn Jewish life and culture.
The program begins at 5:30 p.m. on Sunday, June 1.
The Kane Street Synagogue (236 Kane St. near Court Street, 718-875-1550) hosts the program.
Admission is $5. Light snacks will be offered.