Meet the Director

Shulamit Reinharz, Ph.D.

Shula ReinharzShulamit (Shula) Reinharz is the Jacob Potofsky Professor of Sociology at Brandeis University.

Director of the Brandeis University Women’s Studies Program during the decade of the 90’s, she founded the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute in 1997.  The mission of the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute is to develop fresh ways of thinking about Jews and gender worldwide by producing and promoting scholarly research and artistic projects.

In 2001 Shula left the Women’s Studies Program to launch the Women’s Studies Research Center in a 10,000 square foot facility on campus that she designed and for which she raised all of the funds.

Born in Amsterdam, the child of Holocaust survivors, Shula grew up in the United States and has also lived in Israel.  She received her B.A. from Barnard College and her M.A. and Ph.D. from Brandeis University.

Shula is the author or editor of many books.  With Mark Raider she edited the anthology American Jewish Women and the Zionist Enterprise (2005) which explains the role of American Jewish Women is supporting the creation of the State of Israel.  With Penina Adelman and Ali Feldman she co-authored The JGirl’s Guide (2005) designed to help Jewish girls cope with everyday life.  With her husband Jehuda Reinharz she recently published, in Hebrew, the collected letters of Manya Shohat (2005).

Shula is the mother of two daughters, Yali and Naomi, and is married to Jehuda Reinharz, President of Brandeis University.