What is Jewish theatre history? Form, Function, and Performance

Session Submission Type: Roundtable

Abstract

As scholars have recognized, attempts to strictly demarcate “Jewish theatre” tend to obscure both the complex evolution of Jewishness as a historical, cultural, and religious category and the dynamic history of theater as genre and medium. This roundtable brings together a diverse group of scholars to formulate new perspectives on the nexus between Jewishness and theatricality as it has changed over time. How has theatre performed in both Jewish and non-Jewish languages functioned historically as a site of mediation between Jews and non-Jews? What are the unique ways in which theatre has been able to stage Jewish difference, and how might the rise of performance studies help us reevaluate the work of the stage in this regard? What roles have Jews and Jewishness played in the making of modern theatre more generally? This roundtable uses these questions to offer methodological reflections on the writing of Jewish theatre history. Jonathan Hess, who will moderate the discussion, is Moses M. and Hannah L. Malkin Distinguished Professor of Jewish history and culture at UNC Chapel Hill; Hess has recently completely a monograph on theatre, popular culture, and Jewishness in the 19th century. Caroline Kita, assistant professor of Germanic Languages and Literatures at Washington University in St Louis, works on Jewish subjectivities and musical poetics in late-19th and early-20th century German-Jewish Biblical Dramas. Debra Caplan, assistant professor of theatre at Baruch College, City University of New York, and co-founder of the Digital Yiddish Theatre Project, works on Yiddish theater, theatrical travel, and global artistic networks. Melissa Kagen will be completing her Ph.D. in German Studies at Stanford University this June, with a dissertation on wandering in early 20th-century German-Jewish opera. Jeanette Malkin, chair of the Theatre Studies department at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, has written widely on modern and postmodern theatre; Edna Nahshon, professor of theatre and drama at the Jewish Theological Seminary, has published extensively on Jewish theatre. Most recently, Nahshon curated the exhibit, “New York's Yiddish Theater: From the Bowery to Broadway,” at the Museum of the City of New York.

Sub Unit

• Jews, Film, and the Arts

Moderator

• Jonathan M. Hess, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Discussants

• Caroline A Kita, Washington University in St. Louis

• Debra Caplan, Baruch College, CUNY

• Melissa Kagen, Stanford University

• Jeanette R. Malkin, Hebrew University of Jerusalem

• Edna Nahshon, The Jewish Theological Seminary