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TITLE: Iranian Jewry: From Past To Present (Afternoon Session)
SPEAKER: various speakers
EVENT DATE: 11/03/2008
RUNNING TIME: 183 minutes
DESCRIPTION:
The Jews of Iran comprise not only one of the oldest populations of Jews in the world, but also one of the most ancient threads in the diverse fabric of the ancient Iranian community. Beginning with the Achaemenid period (550-330 B.C.) and lasting beyond the emigration of a portion of Iran's Jewish population to the United States and Israel in the late 1970s, Jews have had a complex interaction with the Persian state and culture.
The afternoon session focused on Jewish Material Culture and Folk Art and Jewish Culture in Twentieth Century Iran. Featured speakers and their topics of discussion were Judith Goldstein, "Muslim Rulers and Jewish Holy Men: Oral Tradition and the Imagination of Political Agency"; Shalom Sabar, "Persian and Kurdish Jewish Amulets: Shapes and Images, Texts and Social Function"; Evan Rapport, "Bukharian Jewish Musical Life and Its Relationship to Judeo-Persian Culture"; and Orly Rahimiyan, "The Iranian Shylock: The Image of the Jews in Iranian Cinema." Dalia Yasharpour, "Influence of the Jewish Persian rite on the Haggadah of the Kaifeng Chinese."
Iranian Jewry: From Past to Present was sponsored jointly by the African and Middle Eastern Division at the Library of Congress and the Joseph and Rebecca Meyerhoff Center for Jewish Studies and the Roshan Cultural Heritage Institute Center for Persian Studies at the University of Maryland. Visit this site for more information.

