The Olamot Series in the Humanities and Social Sciences with Indiana University Press—edited by Irit Dekel, Jason Mokhtarian, and Noam Zadoff—translates recent and innovative books by Israeli scholars with the goal of making them more widely available to English-speaking audiences. Founded with an aim to publish on a wide range of topics, the series has recently come to focus on questions of contemporary Israeli society, especially regarding social diversity, gender and ethnicity, history, memory and social justice, migration, politics, rhetoric, and the arts.
Bringing diverse voices to a wider audience
Publications in the series
Titles in the Olamot Series in the Humanities and Social Sciences with Indiana University Press include:
The Jewish Eighteenth-Century: A Biography, 1700–1750 by Shmuel Feiner
"Shmuel Feiner describes a world populated not only by thinkers but by other sorts of people who reflect the spirit of a new age, even if they themselves are not particularly reflective. Drawing as much as possible on their own written testimony, while situating them within their disparate political, social, and intellectual enviornments, Feiner paints a comprehensive and compelling picture of a relatively negelected period of Jewish history." – Allan Arkush, The Jewish Review of Books
Germans against Germans: A Jewish History, 1938–1945 by Moshe Zimmermann
“A fascinating and extremely important book—not only because of its originality and daring, but also because it brings to life historical discussion.” – Boaz Neumann, Haaretz
The Jewish Eighteenth Century, Volume 2: A European Biography, 1750-1800 by Shmuel Feiner
This installment concludes Feiner's landmark study of the history of Jewish populations in the period. By combining an examination of the broad and profound processes that changed the familiar world from the ground up with personal experiences of those who lived through them, it allows for a unique explanation of these momentous events.
Finalist for the 73rd National Jewish Book Awards!
Purity and Identity in Ancient Judaism: From the Temple to the Mishnah by Yair Furstenberg
The concern for purity was the cornerstone of the religious culture of ancient Judaism. Purity and Identity in Ancient Judaism explores how this concern shaped the worldview of Jews during the Second Temple period as well as their daily practices and social relations.
I Am Your Dust: Representations of the Israeli Experience in Yiddish Prose, 1948-1967 by Gali Drucker Bar-Am
Israel's cultural space is frequently studied as if it were synonymous with the Hebrew-Israeli one. But within the borders of Israel, a fascinating culture was (and continues to be) created in many languages other than Hebrew, reflecting its reality from angles that the makers of Hebrew-Israeli culture did not know and all too often lacked the tools to express.
What's in a Name: Stories behind Arabic-Palestinian Place-Names in Israel by Amer Dahamshe
What's in a Name examines the geographical names used by the Palestinian minority living in Israel: their pronunciation in local dialects; their narratives, stories, and history; the motifs and themes underlying their bestowal; how they are perceived; and the cultural messages they communicate. Based on a rich repertoire of original fieldwork in Arabic, Amer Dahamshe analyzes the Arabic names of villages and towns as well as natural formations such as rivers, hills, and meadows in the Arab-Palestinian society in Israel. In doing so, Dahamshe provides different cultural explanations for the bestowal of these names, their origin as explained in the local stories of the Palestinian people, and their popular, communal, and autobiographical memories across generations.
