Symposium Explores Jewish Sexuality, Psychoanalysis and Translation

Scholars Naomi Sheindel Seidman, Ken Frieden participate in keynote lecture, HC Mini-Seminar

Jewish sexuality, psychoanalysis and translation are the foci of a two-day program at Syracuse University.

On Thursday, March 21, at 7:30 p.m., renowned Jewish scholar Naomi Sheindel Seidman will explore “The Marriage Plot: Sexuality and Secularization in Literary History” in the Kilian Room (500) of the Hall of Languages. The following day at 10 a.m., she and SU’s Ken Frieden will participate in an HC Mini-Seminar titled “Translating Psychoanalysis/Psychoanalyzing Translation” in room 304 of the Tolley Humanities Building.

Both events are free and open to the public; however, people must register for the HC Mini-Seminar by emailing kmortega@syr.edu.

The events are sponsored by the SU Humanities Center; the Department of Religion; the Department of Languages, Literatures, and Linguistics (LLL); and the Judaic studies program, all of which are housed in The College of Arts and Sciences. The events are also part of the SU Humanities Center’s Faculty Fellow Symposia series. For more information, call 315-443-5708, or visit syacusehumanities.org.

In addition to being an HC Faculty Fellow, Frieden is the B.G. Rudolph Professor of Judaic Studies and is professor of religion, English and LLL.

“HC faculty fellows have the unique opportunity to bring their research to bear on students and faculty from across campus, while engaging with colleagues and outside experts,” says Gregg Lambert, Dean’s Professor of the Humanities and founding director of the SU Humanities Center. “These events nicely complement Syracuse Symposium, which we organize and present every fall for The College of Arts and Sciences.”

An expert in Judaic literature and culture, Frieden has held the B.G. Rudolph Professorship since 1993. He is the author of four landmark books, including “Classic Yiddish Stories of S. Y. Abramovitsh, Sholem Aleichem and I. L. Peretz” (2004), and is the series editor for “Judaic Traditions in Literature, Music and Art.” The book and series are published by SU Press.

Seidman is on the faculty of the Graduate Theological Union in Berkley, Calif., where she serves as the Koret Professor of Jewish Culture, director of the Richard S. Dinner Center for Jewish Studies and a core doctoral faculty member. Her expertise includes translation studies, especially involving the Bible; the sexual transformation of Ashkenaz, a descendant of Noah in the Bible; and Jewish Enlightenment literature of the 18th and 19th centuries.  Her publications include “Faithful Renderings: Jewish-Christian Difference and the Politics of Translation” (University of Chicago Press, 2006) and “A Marriage Made in Heaven: The Sexual Politics of Hebrew and Yiddish” (University of California Press, 1997).

“I am honored to collaborate with Professor Seidman, who’s at the forefront of contemporary Jewish thought, gender and sexuality, and modern Jewish literature and literary theory,” says Frieden, also an accomplished Klezmer bandleader and clarinetist. “Together, we will explore a variety of topics, including how language has shaped the identity and survival of the Jewish people.”