A conversation with Yechiel Weizman on his book
Unsettled Heritage: Living Next to Poland’s Material Jewish Traces after the Holocaust (Ithaca, 2022)
In Unsettled Heritage, Yechiel Weizman explores what happened to the thousands of abandoned Jewish cemeteries and places of worship that remained in Poland after the Holocaust. He asks how postwar Polish society in small, provincial towns perceived, experienced, and interacted with the physical traces of former Jewish neighbors. Combining archival research into hitherto unexamined sources and anthropological field work, the book uncovers the concrete and symbolic fate of Poland’s material Jewish remnants and shows how their presence became the main vehicle through which Polish society was confronted with the memory of the Jews and their annihilation. Leading the conversation with Weizman will be Monika Rice, and joining them will be Alon Confino and Amos Goldberg.
This event will be held via ZOOM Webinar.
Registration is required, register in advance here.
A celebratory event marks the 20th anniversary of the little Jewish Museum, located in the synagogue complex in the hill town of Pitigliano in southern Tuscany.
This year also marks the 400th anniversary of the imposition of a ghetto in Pitigliano.
Dr. Pieter Vlaardingerbroek will present an illustrated talk live from Amsterdam on the architecture and interior of the 1675 Portuguese Synagogue (the Esnoga) in Amsterdam and the synagogue’s direct influence on the architecture of the 1763 Touro Synagogue in Newport, Rhode Island.
Pieter Vlaardingerbroek, Ph.D., is a leading expert on Dutch architecture and material culture. He is an architectural historian for the City of Amsterdam, having served in a similar position for the Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands. He is an Assistant Professor of Architectural History and Conservation at the University of Utrecht. Professor Vlaardingerbroek is the author of many articles and books and served as editor for the definitive volume on the Portuguese Sephardic synagogue, The Portuguese Synagogue in Amsterdam, published by the City of Amsterdam in 2013.
There is no fee to participate, but reservations are required to receive the Zoom login information.
A number of events are marking the 80th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, including a conference, exhibit, monument dedication, at the POLIN Museum, Warsaw’s Okopowa Jewish cemetery, and elsewhere.
A Zoom webinar in English introducing the current temporary exhibition at MEIS — the National Museum of Italian Judaism and the Shoah in Ferrara— Houses of Life; Synagogues and Jewish Cemeteries in Italy.
The exhibition mainly features plans and architectural drawings of synagogues, as well as gravestones, tombs, and other architecture features, through the ages.
A historic ark and other Judaica are also featured.
Speakers in the webinar include the two curators of the exhibition, Andrea Morpurgo and MEIS director Amadeo Spagnoletto, as well as Dr. Jessica Del Russo.
Click here to receive the Zoom link
Volunteer to help clean up the old Jewish cemetery in Gliwice
The Centre for Religion and Heritage of the University of Groningen will host a half-day public symposium to launch the Bloomsbury Handbook of Religion and Heritage in Contemporary Europe. This event will also inaugurate a new European project on minority religious heritage.
The event takes place in person and also online. Click HERE to register
The organizers state:
The Handbook provides a state-of-the-art guide by leading international scholars, policy makers and heritage practitioners. With 46 chapters, we cannot address all the contributions, thus we have chosen to concentrate on those which examine how religious communities are using their rich heritage to make new meanings for themselves in Europe. Our focus will be on Jewish, Muslim and Christian heritage. We want to think together about the challenges facing these communities, as they grapple with being Jewish or Muslim minorities in a historically Christian landscape, or with being a minority of practicing Christians in the highly secularized society, such as that of Northern Netherlands. Reflecting on these questions together with our Handbook authors will aid the start of a new project in the Erasmus Plus program called European Pathways to Minority Religious Heritage (Miretage). Over three years we are exploring how minority religious heritage can be taught as a co-creative activity between heritage institutions, creative organizations and minority communities. On hand to participate in the symposium are partners from Storytelling Center Amsterdam, Autonomous University of Barcelona, Moslim Archief Rotterdam, KU Leuven, Future for Religious
Click here to see the program for the January 23 event
Speakers will look for answers to these and other questions during the webinar, entirely devoted to the role that places of difficult heritage can play in multidimensional education about human rights. They include memory activists, the academia, and individuals actively working with difficult heritage sites on a daily basis.
The meeting will be conducted in English with simultaneous interpretation to Polish. 
PROGRAM 18.15–18.35: Falstad Centre
18.35–19.00: Engaged Memory Consortium Poland & NeDiPa
19.00–19.15: The EU perspective: site-specific education about past violences and Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values programme of the EU?
19.15–19.45: Discussion – what the Polish and Norwegian partners can learn from each other? Is there a universal model?
19:15–20.00: Q&A
Guided tour of the Jewish Museum Lecce and the ancient Jewish district, with Fabrizio Ghio (architect and archaeologist, member of the Scientific Committee of the Jewish Museum Lecce), Fabrizio Lelli, director of the Jewish Museum Lecce and professor of Hebrew language and literature at the Sapienza University (Rome), and Claudio Fano, direct witness of the racial laws and the Jews deportation from the Ghetto of Rome on October 16th 1943.
Free admission, reservation required.
Telephone Number & WhatsApp: + 39 0832 247016
Email: info@palazzotaurino.com
Jewish cemetery clean-up, organised by the oPŘISe, z. s. NGO
Work will entail removal of ivy from gravestones and other necessary activities. Bring your own tools (sickles, scissors, machetes). Men need to wear head covering. Refreshments will be provided.
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