DAVID N MYERS
PROFESSOR AND DIRECTOR, UCLA CENTER FOR JEWISH STUDIES
Office: 5387 BUNCHE Hall
Phone: 310-825-3780
Fax:
310-206-9630
E-mail:
myers@history.ucla.edu
Mailing Address:
6265 Bunche Hall
Box 951473
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1473
Field
Jewish, Europe, Modern Jewish intellectual and cultural history
Research Interests
David N. Myers received his A.B. from Yale College in 1982, and undertook graduate studies at Tel-Aviv and Harvard Universities before completing his doctorate at Columbia in 1991. He has written extensively in the fields of modern Jewish intellectual and cultural history, with a particular interest in the history of Jewish historiography. He has authored Re-Inventing the Jewish Past: European Jewish Intellectuals and the Zionist Return to History (Oxford: 1995), Resisting History: Historicism and its Discontents in German-Jewish Thought (Princeton, 2003), and the forthcoming “Between Jew and Arab: The Lost Voice of Simon Rawidowicz” (Brandeis University Press, 2008). Myers has edited six books, including The Jewish Past Revisited and Enlightenment and Diaspora: The Armenian and Jewish Cases.
At present, Myers is working on a book project with Nomi Stolzenberg on the Satmar Hasidic community of Kiryas Yoel, New York. He is also actively involved in a major project on the history of Jews in Los Angeles. Myers has taught at the École des hautes études en sciences sociales and the Russian State University for the Humanities, and visited at the Institute for Advanced Studies (Jerusalem) and the Center for Advanced Judaic Studies (Philadelphia). Since 2003, he has served as co-editor of the Jewish Quarterly Review. Myers is an elected fellow of the American Academy for Jewish Research. At UCLA, he teaches lectures and seminars in Jewish history.
Selected Publications
Books (Authored)
Between Jew and Arab: The Lost Voice of Simon Rawidowicz, Brandeis University Press, 2008
Re-Inventing the Jewish Past: European Jewish Intellectuals and the Zionist Return to History. New York: Oxford University Press, 1995.
Resisting History: Historicism and its Discontents in German-Jewish Thought (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2003).
Books (Edited)
David N. Myers and William V. Rowe, eds. From Ghetto to Emancipation: Historical and Contemporary Reconsiderations of the Jewish Community, introduction by D. N. Myers. Scranton, PA: University of Scranton Press, 1997.
David N. Myers and David B. Ruderman, eds. The Jewish Past Revisited: Reflections on Modern Jewish Historians, introduction by D. N. Myers. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998.
Elisheva Carlebach, John M. Efron, and David N. Myers, eds. Jewish History and Jewish Memory: Essays in Honor of Yosef Hayim Yerushalmi. Hanover, NH: University Press of New England, 1998.
Richard Hovannisian and David N. Myers, eds. Enlightenment and Diaspora: The Armenian and Jewish Cases. Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1999.
Michael Brenner and David N. Myers, Jüdische Geschichtsschreibung heute: Themen, Positionen, Kontroversen. Munich: Beck Verlag, 2002.
David N. Myers et. al. Acculturation and its Discontents: The Italian Jewish Experience between Integration and Exclusion University of Toronto Press, 2008.
Articles
“Glaube und Geschichte: A Vexed Relationship in German-Jewish Culture.” Modern Judaism and Historical Consciousness, edited by A. Gotzmann and C. Wiese (Leiden: Brill, 2007), 54-72.
“R. B. Kitaj and the State of ‘Jew-on-the-Brain.’” The Jewish Role in American Life 5 (2007), 69-73.
“Simon Rawidowicz, ‘Hashpaitis,’ and the Perils of Influence.” Transversal 7 (2006), 13-26.
“Vom Berlin nach Jerusalem: Zionismus, jüdische Wissenschaft und die Mühsal kultereller Dissonanz.” Janusfiguren: Jüdische Heimstätte, Exil und Nation im deutschen Zionismus (Berlin: Metropol Verlag, 2006).
“Can there be a Principled Anti-Zionism?: On the Nexus between Anti-Historicism and Anti-Zionism in Modern Jewish Thought.” Journal of Israeli History 25 (Marcy 2006), 33-50.
“A Third Guide for the Perplexed? Simon Rawidowicz ‘On Interpretation.’” History and Literature: New Readings of Jewish Texts in Honor of Arnold J. Band. Edited by William Cutter and David C. Jacobson. Providence: Brown Judaic Studies, 2002.
“Selbstreflexion im modernen Erinnerungsdiskurs.” Jüdische Geschichtsschreibung heute: Themen, Positionen, Kontroversen. Munich: Beck Verlag, 2002.
“Rebel in Frankfurt: The Scholarly Origins of Jacob Katz.” The Pride of Jacob: Essays on Jacob Katz and His Work. Edited by Jay M. Harris. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2002.
The Problem of History in German-Jewish Thought: Observations on a Neglected Tradition (Cohen, Rosenzweig, and Breuer). The Samuel Braun Lecture in the History of the Jews of Prussia. Ramat-Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press. 2001.
“Between Yiddish and Hebrew—and Greek? Thoughts on the Language(s) of Jewish History.” Commentary to roundtable discussion in Jewish Book Annual 55/56 (1997-1999), 45-52.
“Hazono shel Hazony, or Even If You Will It, It Can Still Be a Dream.” Israel Studies 6 (Summer 2001), 107-117.
“Hermann Cohen and the Quest for Protestant Judaism.” Leo Baeck Institute Year Book 46 (2001), 195-214.
'Mehabevin et ha-tsarot': Crusade Memories and Modern Jewish Martyrologies." Jewish History 13:2 (Fall 1999),49-64. Introduction and commentary, Enlightenment and Diaspora: The Armenian and Jewish Cases (Atlanta, 1999), 1-3, 125-130.
“Derrida’s Yerushalmi, Yerushalmi’s Freud: History, Memory and Hope in a Post-Holocaust Age.” La Sho’ah tra intrepetazione e memoria (Naples, 1999), 489-507.
“Response to Jay Harris’ Reading of the Israeli Declaration of Independence.” Textual Reasoning 8 (November) 1998, 1-4.
"Mashber ha-historicism u-misud mada`e ha-Yahadut" (The Crisis of Historicism and the Institutionalization of Jewish Studies). Mada`e ha-Yahadut (Journal of the World Union of Jewish Studies) (Fall 1998).
"Of Marranos and Memory: Yosef Hayim Yerushalmi and the Writing of Jewish History." Jewish History and Jewish Memory: Essays in Honor of Yosef Hayim Yerushalmi, (Hanover, NH, 1998), 1-21.
Introduction and "Between Diaspora and Zion: History, Memory and the Jerusalem Scholars." The Jewish Past Revisited, (New Haven, 1998), 1-15, 88-103.
Introduction and "'The Blessing of Assimilation' Reconsidered: An Inquiry into Jewish Cultural Studies," From Ghetto to Emancipation: Historical and Contemporary Reconsiderations of the Jewish Community (Scranton, PA, 1997), vii-xviii, 17-36..
"The Ideology of Wissenschaft des Judentums." Daniel Frank and Oliver Leaman, eds., History of Jewish Philosophy (London, 1997), 706-721.
"A New Scholarly Colony in Jerusalem: The Early History of Jewish Studies." Judaism (Spring 1996), 142-159.
"'Distant Relatives Happening onto the Same Inn': The Meeting of East and West as Literary Theme and Cultural Ideal." Jewish Social Studies I:2 (1994/95), 75-100.
"Was there a 'Jerusalem School?': An Inquiry into the First Generation of Historical Researchers at the Hebrew University." Studies in Contemporary Jewry (10) 1994, 66-92.
"Eugen Täubler: The Personification of 'Judaism as Tragic Existence'." Leo Baeck Institute Year Book (39) 1994, 131-150.
In Search of the "Harmonious Jew": Judah L. Magnes between East and West. John L. Sills Memorial Lecture. Berkeley, 1993.
"The Fall and Rise of Jewish Historicism: The Evolution of the Akademie für die Wissenschaft des Judentums (1919-1934)." Hebrew Union College Annual 63 (1992), 107-144.
"Remembering Zakhor: A Super-Commentary." History and Memory 4 (Fall/Winter 1992), 129-146.
Nomi Maya Stolzenberg and David N. Myers, "Community, Constitution and Culture: The Case of the Jewish Kehilah." Michigan Journal of Law Reform 25 (Spring and Summer 1992), 633-670.
"History as Ideology: The Case of Ben Zion Dinur, Zionist Historian 'Par Excellence'." Modern Judaism, May 1988, 167‑194.
"The Scholem‑Kurzweil Debate and Modern Jewish Historiography." Modern Judaism, October 1986, 261‑285.
Reviews
Review of The Jewish Century by Yuri Slezkine. Los Angeles Jewish Journal, December 31, 2004.
Review of Mémoire juive et nationalité allemande: Les juifs berlinois à la Belle Époque by Jacques Ehrenfreund. Jewish History, fall 2003.
"Ha‑Yahadut ha‑reformit: teguvah yehudit le‑modernah." Ha-Doar, 2.24.89, 14‑17. (Review essay of Michael A. Meyer, Response to Modernity.)
Review of Fateful Months: Essays on the Emergence of the Final Solution by Christopher Browning. Holocaust and Genocide Studies, Vol. 3, No. 1, 1988.
Review of Political Principles in Maimonidean Halakha (Hebrew) by Gerald J. Blidstein. AJS Review, Fall 1987, 282‑290.
Review of Hitler and the Armenian Genocide by Kevork Bardakjian. Holocaust and Genocide Studies, Vol. 2, No. 1,1987.
Other
Section Introduction, Western State Jewish History (special issue devoted to Pioneer Jews of Los Angeles in the Nineteenth Century) 38 (Spring/Summer 2006), 154-156.
Editor’s Introductions in the Jewish Quarterly Review 94: 1 (2004), 94:4 (2003); 95: 3 (2005).
Roundtable Special Feature: “The Israeli Settlements.” Yale Israel Journal 7 (Summer 2005), 34-35.
Interview , “Zu ‘Diaspora’ und den ‘Segnungen der Assimilation.’” Kalonymus 4 (2001), 23-27.
Entries in The Oxford Dictionary of Jewish Religion. "Dual Loyalty in a Post-Zionist Era". Judaism, summer 1989, 333-343.
Historical Appendix in Reuven Porat, The History of the Kibbutz: Collective Education, 1904-1929. Norwood Editions, Norwood PA: 1985, 150‑193.
Opinion pieces in the Los Angeles Jewish Journal, the Jewish Forward, and Los Angeles Times.
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