Todd Gitlin is Professor of Journalism and Sociology and Chair of the Ph.D. program at Columbia University. Gitlin, a UC Berkeley sociology alum and former Professor of Sociology, has been a political activist since 1960 and is the author of fifteen books. Gitlin will address the question of the ethical foundation of Jewish peoplehood, the significance of the concept of “chosenness,” and contemporary quandaries of American Jewish identity.
Is There Such A Thing As Jewish Literature?
Poet and critic Adam Kirsch of Columbia University will discuss whether there is something that unites Jewish writing across the boundaries of language and genre. Writing, literacy and text have always stood at the heart of Jewish identity. But in the modern period, as many Jews lost contact with the texts that defined their tradition, Jewish writing emerged as a paradox: a practice that seems characteristically Jewish while not necessarily dealing with Jewish subject matter or speaking a Jewish language.