An international conference to officially launch the massive website and digital database of Jewish cemeteries in Turkey, A World Beyond: Jewish Cemeteries in Turkey 1583-1990.
The database and web site are a project of the The Goldstein-Goren Diaspora Research Center of Tel Aviv University. We wrote about it when it first went online last year as a beta version — though the site still says it’s in beta, the kinks that some users experienced appear to have been worked out, and we find it easy to search and use.
Dedicated to the memory of the oriental studies scholar Bernard Lewis, who died in 2018, the database is the culmination of decades of research by Prof. Minna Rozen (and others) and comprises digital images and detailed textual content of more than 61,000 Jewish gravestones from a variety of communities in Turkey from 1583 until 1990. Rozen’s onsite documentation of the cemeteries was carried out in 1988-1990. The material was digitized in the 1990s but until the web site was uploaded, it had not been publicly accessible.
Organised by the Bratislava Regional administration, the conference will mark recent developments and future plans regarding Jewish heritage in the Bratislava region, including the restoration of the synagogue in Senec and plans to restore the synagogue in Svaty Jur.
Topics will include:
- The importance of Slovak monuments in Europe
- Plans for the abandoned synagogues and cemeteries
- The story of the synagogue in Senec
- The monumental value of the synagogue in Svätý Jur
- Symbolism of tombstones in Jewish cemeteries
Click here to see the full program
The conference is organized by the Bratislava self-governing region on the occasion of 2021 European Cultural Heritage Days, with input from the SNM – Museum of Jewish Culture, the Academia Istropolitana Nova, the Monuments Office of the Slovak Republic and the Municipal Office for the Protection of Monuments in Bratislava.
The eighth annual conference dedicated to Jewish cultural heritage in Slovakia, including major projects and activities — and the people behind them.
This year, a focus will be the restoration of the synagogue in Trenčín, which is implemented with the support of the EHP Grant (Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway) with co-financing from the state budget of the Slovak community and resources of the Jewish community.
The conference will be available online at https://www.facebook.com/zidianaslovensku and https://tachles.tv/
Program
The Conference will focus on Sephardic Jews, between Messianism and Modernity
The conference gathers some 70 international researchers of Sephardic social, cultural, and art history, languages, and literature from before and after the Expulsion of 1492.
There will be papers on Jewish, Christian, and Muslim attitudes toward Jewish messianism as reflected in the scholars’ particular areas of interest. In addition, the Conference will focus on the overlooked Sephardic embracement of modernity and Virtual Sepharad’s gradual yet unwavering secularization, whether in the expanse’s south—the ex-Ottoman realms—or its northern extremities – Holland, England, and the Americas.
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