“What good actor today is not a Jew?” Friedrich Nietzsche asked in 1882, posing a question that drew on a long tradition of regarding the Jews’ efforts at integration into the modern world as a mode of dissimulation. Guest speaker Jonathan M. Hess will explore the real and symbolic roles that the theatre played in shaping Jewish identity and the relations between Germans and Jews in the centuries before the Holocaust. Learn about the role theatre played in reinforcing anti-Semitic conceptions of Jews while also creating a liberal culture of sympathy with Jewish suffering. Hess is the Moses M. and Hannah L. Malkin Distinguished Professor of Jewish History and Culture at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. His forthcoming book is Playing Jewish: Theatre, Popular Culture, and the Liberal Imagination.

Join us for a pre-reception at 6:00 p.m. with speaker Jonathan M. Hess at the Poetry Center in honor of the Robert A. Burns Fund and conclusion of the 2016 Tucson Humanities Festival.

Event Sponsors: UA College of Humanities, Religious Studies and Classics, Institute for the Study of Religious and Culture, German Studies, Judaic Studies

Part of the Tucson Humanities Festival, a series of topical lectures, panel discussions and events presented by UA College of Humanities faculty and special guests. For more information, including the Festival schedule and presenters, go to humanitiesfestival.arizona.edu.

Questions? Contact Helen Bernard at 520-626-4319.

Guest Lecture: Jonathan Hess
UA DEPARTMENTS OF RELIGIOUS STUDIES AND CLASSICS, GERMAN STUDIES, JUDAIC STUDIES