David E. Fishman Appointed YIVO’s Jacob Kronhill Visiting Scholar for Spring 2015

(NEW YORK, February 19, 2015) – The YIVO Institute for Jewish Research is pleased to announce the appointment of Dr. David E. Fishman as the Jacob Kronhill Visiting Scholar in East European Jewish History for the Spring 2015 semester.

David E. Fishman is professor of Jewish History at The Jewish Theological Seminary of America (JTS), and serves as director of Project Judaica, a Jewish Studies program based in Moscow that is sponsored jointly by JTS and Russian State University for the Humanities. He is the author of numerous books and articles on the history and culture of East European Jewry, including Russia's First Modern Jews (New York University Press) and The Rise of Modern Yiddish Culture (University of Pittsburgh Press). He has taught at universities in Israel, Russia, Ukraine, and Lithuania, and serves on the editorial boards of Jewish Social Studies and POLIN.

As the Jacob Kronhill Visiting Scholar, Dr. Fishman will mentor graduate students, participate in public programs, and teach a public evening class, “Vilna: The History of a Jewish Cultural Citadel,” on Tuesdays from March 31 to May 19.

“We are honored to have Professor Fishman with us this semester and to provide him with a base for his ongoing research in our archives and library. The depth and range of his knowledge of the history and culture of East European Jewry are unparalleled. We are also very happy to be able to enable him to offer some of the fruits of his scholarship to students and the general public.”
—Jonathan Brent, Executive Director, YIVO Institute for Jewish Research

The Jacob Kronhill Visiting Scholar program at YIVO was established with a gift from the Kronhill Pletka Foundation, which was created by Irene Pletka in 2007 to honor the memory of her parents, Julia and Jacob Kronhill (Kronzylberg), who fled Poland in 1939. After spending the war in Japanese-occupied Shanghai, the family succeeded in reaching Australia, where they were active in Jewish community life, with Jacob particularly committed to Jewish welfare, increasing access to Yiddish education, freeing Soviet Jewry, and the defense of human rights.