Jewish Studies

The Academy represents the oldest organization of Judaic scholars in North America. Fellows are nominated and elected by their peers and thus constitute the most distinguished and most senior scholars teaching Judaic studies at American universities. As the senior organization for Jewish scholarship on this continent, it is committed to enhancing Judaic studies throughout North American universities by creating a dynamic fellowship for its members and by providing programs and opportunities for more junior scholars and students entering the field.

The AAR is the largest scholarly society dedicated to the academic study of religion, with more than 8,000 members around the world. The AAR's mission is to foster excellence in the academic study of religion and enhance the public understanding of religion.

The American Historical Association is the largest professional organization serving historians in all fields and all professions. The AHA is a trusted voice advocating for history education, the professional work of historians, and the critical role of historical thinking in public life.

The Association for Jewish Studies is a learned society and professional organization whose mission is to advance research and teaching in Jewish Studies at colleges, universities, and other institutions of higher learning, and to foster greater understanding of Jewish Studies scholarship among the wider public. The Association for Jewish Studies (AJS) was founded in 1969 by a small group of scholars seeking a forum for exploring methodological and pedagogical issues in the new field of Jewish Studies. Since its founding, the AJS has grown into the largest learned society and professional organization representing Jewish Studies scholars worldwide. As a constituent organization of the American Council of Learned Societies, the Association for Jewish Studies represents the field in the larger arena of the academic study of the humanities and social sciences in North America.

The Association for the Social Scientific Study of Jewry is a cross-disciplinary organization of individuals whose research concerns the Jewish people throughout the world. The ASSJ encourages and facilitates contact among researchers, supports the dissemination of research, and assists in the cultivation of younger scholars.

Jewish studies as an academic discipline covers the full range of Jewish history, literature, languages, and culture. Practitioners of the discipline are those involved in teaching, researching, publishing, or curating museum exhibitions. Jewish studies includes a very wide range of subjects including, for example, Jews in the Graeco-Roman period, Jewish-Muslim relations, medieval Bible exegesis, Hebrew and Yiddish, modern Jewish thought and history, and the Holocaust. The European Association for Jewish Studies (EAJS) is the sole umbrella organisation for Europe representing the academic field of Jewish Studies. Its primary aim is to encourage and support the research and teaching of Jewish studies at university level in Europe, and other places of higher education and learning.

The Medieval Academy of America, founded in 1925, is the largest organization in the United States promoting excellence in the field of medieval studies. The Academy publishes the quarterly journal Speculum; awards prizes, grants, and fellowships; and supports research, publication, and teaching in medieval art, archaeology, history, law, literature, music, philosophy, religion, science, social and economic institutions, and all other aspects of the Middle Ages. Membership in the Medieval Academy is open to all persons concerned with the study and teaching of the Middle Ages, including, but not limited to, independent scholars, secondary teachers, graduate students, curators, librarians, and college and university professors of all ranks and at all types of institutions. We aim to foster an environment of diversity, inclusion, and academic freedom for all medievalists. Further, we affirm the right of students and junior faculty to receive supportive, professional mentoring that respects their intellectual freedom and personal integrity. We expect members to abide by and promote these values, in particular when participating in Medieval Academy programming or publicly affiliating with the Academy.

An international leader in scholarship on the Holocaust, the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies provides for continued growth and vitality in the field of Holocaust studies, promotes networking and cooperative projects among Holocaust scholars around the world, and ensures future generations of Holocaust scholars in the United States and abroad.

Published biannually, AJS Review is a peer-reviewed journal publishing scholarly articles and book reviews covering the field of Jewish Studies. From biblical and rabbinic textual and historical studies to modern history, social sciences, the arts, and literature, the journal welcomes articles of interest to both academic and lay audiences around the world.

The ASSJ's journal, Contemporary Jewry, serves as the single source for the social scientific consideration of world Jewry, its institutions, trends, character, and concerns. In its pages can be found work by leading scholars and important new researchers from North America, Europe, Australasia, and Israel. While much relevant scholarship about Jewry is published in general social science journals, as well as more narrowly focused periodicals, no single scholarly journal focuses primarily on the social scientific study of Jewry. Over 150 articles have been published in Contemporary Jewry since its inception. Each issue includes articles or review essays across a variety of social science disciplines, including anthropology, demography, economics, education, ethnography, history, politics, population, social psychology, and sociology. In addition, many issues include research notes or important work originally published in Hebrew but translated and made available to the English language reader. Special issues have focused on such topics as the National Jewish Population Survey, Jewish community surveys, Ultra-Orthodox Jews, women in the Holocaust, economic frameworks for understanding Jewry, and Jewry in Israel. Individual articles have ranged from Jewish identity in Syria, the Ukraine, to New Zealand, and Israel; from an analysis of rabbis’ salaries to an historical study of Jewish women physicians in Central Europe; from survey research to ethnography to historical analysis.

The major forum for scholarship on the Holocaust and other genocides, Holocaust and Genocide Studies is an international journal featuring research articles, interpretive essays, book reviews, a comprehensive bibliography of recently published relevant works in the social sciences and humanities, and an annual list of major research centers specializing in Holocaust studies. With content from the disciplines of history, literature, economics, religious studies, anthropology, political science, sociology, and others, Holocaust and Genocide Studies also prints work on other genocides and near-genocidal episodes. The journal is published three times a year in cooperation with Oxford University Press.

The premier academic journal in religious studies, the Journal of the American Academy of Religion publishes top scholarly articles covering the full range of world religious traditions together with provocative studies of the methodologies by which these traditions are explored.

Speculum, an English-language quarterly founded in 1926, was the first journal in North America devoted to the Middle Ages. It is open to contributions in all disciplinary fields and methodologies studying the Middle Ages, a period that ranges from approximately 500 to 1500. European, Arabic, Byzantine, Hebrew, and Slavic studies are included. In keeping with the Medieval Academy of America’s goal of representing all fields of medieval studies, individual issues usually include articles on a variety of subjects, from a variety of disciplinary perspectives. Articles on interdisciplinary topics or articles that tackle large interpretative questions, undertake the synthetic analysis of major methodologies, or consider newer theoretical approaches to medieval studies are encouraged. Authors should also consider the multidisciplinary audience of Speculum, should craft their material to appeal to a large audience of medievalists, and should provide sufficient context for readers who are not already experts in the subject matter of their articles.