Mandelbaum Scholar-in-residence

The Mandelbaum Trust invites world class scholars to visit the college and take up the position of scholar-in-residence on a regular basis for up to six weeks at one time.

March 2019

Professor Gary A. Rendsburg, Blanche and Irving Laurie Chair in Jewish History, Department of Jewish Studies, Rutgers University

Professor Rendsburg’s teaching and research focus on ‘all things ancient Israel’ – primarily language and literature, also history and archaeology. His secondary interests include post-biblical Judaism, the Hebrew manuscript tradition, and Jewish life in the Middle Ages. He is the author of seven books, including How the Bible Is Written (2019), and more than 150 articles. He has also produced two ‘Great Courses’ series – ‘The Book of Genesis’ and ‘The Dead Sea Scrolls’.
He has visited all the major archaeological sites in Israel, Egypt, and Jordan; plus he has excavated at Tel Dor and Caesarea. He previously taught at Cornell University and Canisius College; and he has served as visiting professor or visiting research fellow at the University of Pennsylvania, Colgate University, UCLA, the University of Oxford, the University of Cambridge, the University of Sydney, and the Hebrew University. This is his third stay as Mandelbaum Scholar in Residence.

October 2018

Emeritus Professor Colin Shindler, School of Oriental & African Studies (SOAS), University of London

Colin Shindler is the first Professor of Israel Studies in the United Kingdom. He is also a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society in the UK. His first career was lecturing in chemistry while editing the Jewish Quarterly. He has taught numerous courses at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, and received the coveted Pears Senior Research Fellow in Israel Studies. His research interests include Israel and the far left in Europe as well as the history and evolution of the Israeli right. He is the author of nine books relating to Israel, including Israel and the European Left: Between Solidarity and Delegitimisation (2012), Israel, Likud and the Zionist Dream (1995) and The Triumph of Military Zionism: Nationalism and the Origins of the Israeli Right (2006). He is the founding chair of the European Association of Israel Studies. Professor Shindler holds an M.Sc. from the University of North London and a Ph.D. from Middlesex University.

May 2018

Professor Emerita Carole Fink, Ohio State University & University of North Carolina

Carole Fink has focused her career on International history and Jewish history and has most recently published Writing 20th Century International History: Explorations and Examples and the second edition of Cold War: An International History.
She is author of two prize-winning books, Defending the Rights of Others: The Great Powers, the Jews, and International Minority Protection, 1878-1938, and The Genoa Conference: European Diplomacy, 1921-1922, as well as Marc Bloch: A Life in History, which has been translated into six languages.

She has received numerous research awards, including a senior Fulbright Research Fellowship to Australia in 2004. Her next book, to appear in 2019, is on West German-Israeli relations between 1965 and 1974.