U.S. Jewish Historian Invited to a University in Cracow to Lecture on Jewish History

Prof. Hillel Levine, a Jewish historian on the faculty of Boston University, has been invited to lecture on Jewish history at the Jagiellonian University in Cracow during the current academic year, Boston University announced today.

Levine, who has accepted the invitation, will deliver a series of lectures entitled “The Sociology of Hope: Studies in Jewish History” in which he will assess the intellectual and social history of Polish Jewry against the background of Polish history.

He is also scheduled to speak at the Pontifical Institute in Cracow on “The History of Jewish Rituals” and, during the spring semester, will lecture at the Catholic University in Lublin and act as a consultant to the Jewish Museum in Cracow.

Levine, a Harvard-educated sociologist and historian, noted that for the first time since World War II, Polish universities have begun to acknowledge the subject of Jewish history. During his stay in Poland he will suggest ways in which Judaic studies can be integrated into different curricula in that country.

“There is a small but growing number of Poles, particularly those of the post-war generation, interested in the history of Polish Jews who once constituted 10 percent of the Polish population,” Levine said. “I am honored to offer these courses and to be able to restore to Polish historiography some knowledge of the Jewish past.”

Levine has been a member of the faculties of Harvard, Yale and the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. He has served as Deputy Director of the United States Holocaust Memorial Council in Washington and organized the Center for Judaic Studies at Boston University.