Prof. Gannit Ankori describes aspects of Israeli art to SIIS seminar participants.
Visiting Faculty
The Schusterman Center hosts visiting faculty, who hold appointments in various departments across the university.
2009-2010
Gannit Ankori, Art History
Gannit Ankori is the Henya Sharef Professor of Humanities at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Before coming to Brandeis she served as chair of the Department of Art History at Hebrew University. She has been a visiting scholar and associate professor at Harvard University and a visiting associate professor at Tufts University/ School of the Museum of Fine Arts. She has published two books and numerous articles on Frida Kahlo (e.g. Imaging Her Selves: Frida Kahlo’s Poetics of Identity and Fragmentation, 2002) and curated the acclaimed museum exhibition Frida Kahlo’s Intimate Family Picture. She has taught and lectured about Israeli and Palestinian art for many years and has published extensively on the visual representation of gender-related issues, the construction of identity, exile, trauma, and hybridity. Her book, Palestinian Art, was published by Reaktion Books, London, in 2006 and is distributed in the US by the University of Chicago Press. She won a Polonsky Prize for Originality and Creativity in the Humanistic Disciplines for this publication. Her forthcoming English-language book, Frida Kahlo, will be published as part of the prestigious Critical Lives series by Reaktion Books in London. At Brandeis, she plans to offer two courses: The first focuses on art in Israel, and explores Israeli artists of all ethnic backgrounds, emphasizing the Jewish majority and including Bedouin, Druze, Muslim and Christian artists who are also Israeli. A second course will focus on issues related to ‘Trauma and Art’ exploring the dialogue between Israeli art and the international art world. gannit@brandeis.edu
Yoram Bilu, Anthropology (Fall Semester)
Yoram Bilu holds a joint appointment at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in the Department of Psychology,
where he is the Sylvia Bauman Professor, and in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology. A clinical psychologist turned anthropologist, he is interested in the interface of culture and psychology as reflected in mental health, folk-religion, and altered states of consciousness. He received the Bahat Prize for his book, The Saint Impresarios: Dreamers, Healers, and Holy Men in Israel’s Urban Periphery, Haifa University Press (2005).
yobilu@gmail.com
Maoz Azaryahu, Anthropology (Spring Semester)
Maoz Azaryahu is an associate professor in the Department of Geography and Environmental Studies at the University of Haifa. He has written extensively on urban landscapes, memory, and society, and has recently published Tel Aviv: Mythography of a City (2006). He has been a visiting professor at the University of Colorado at Boulder, Penn State University, and Lakehead University, Ontario, Canada.
maoz.azaryahu@gmail.com
2008-2009
Benjamin Gidron, Heller School for Social Policy and Management & Hornstein Professional Jewish Leadership Program
Benjamin Gidron is director of the Israeli Center for Third Sector Research and the School of Management at Ben Gurion University of the Negev. He teaches courses on human service organizations, non-profit organizations, and third sector organizations. He has recently won an award for Innovation in Third Sector research from Ben Gurion University. He is the author of many books and articles, including the recent Third Sector in Israel: Between Society and State (2004). Gidron received a BA from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, an MSW from the University of Pittsburg, and a PhD from the University of Maryland School of Social Work and Community Planning. gidron@brandeis.edu.