Thursday, April 27, 2023
6:30 – 8 pm EDT
Scheuer Auditorium

The Saul and Gladys Gwirtzman Lecture

Join us for a conversation between Dr. Atina Grossmann, Professor of History in the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at the Cooper Union and Dr. Joseph Sassoon, Professor of History and Politics at Georgetown University and Senior Associate Member at St. Antony’s College, Oxford as they discuss his most recent book, The Sassoons: The Great Global Merchants and the Making of an Empire. Presented in conjunction with the current exhibition The Sassoons, this conversation will also explore shared topics of interest such as displacement and diaspora in Jewish communities across the Middle East and Central Asia.

Co-presented with Jewish Book Council, copies of Joseph Sassoon’s book will be available for purchase and signing after the talk.

About the Speakers:

Joseph Sassoon is Professor of History and Political Economy at Georgetown's Center for Contemporary Arab Studies and holds the al-Sabah Chair in Politics and Political Economy of the Arab World. He is also a Senior Associate Member at St Antony’s College, Oxford, where he also completed his PhD. Professor Sassoon, whose research focuses on political economy, economic history, Iraq, Iraqi refugees, and authoritarianism, has published extensively and is the author of five books. His most recent book, The Sassoons: The Great Global Merchants and the Making of an Empire, was published in the United States by Pantheon Books (2022) and in the UK by Allen Lane under the title The Global Merchants: The Enterprise and Extravagance of the Sassoon Dynasty (2022). His prior books include The Iraqi Refugees: The New Crisis in the Middle East (London, I.B. Tauris, 2009); Saddam Hussein’s Ba‘th Party: Inside an Authoritarian Regime (Cambridge University Press, 2012), which won the prestigious British-Kuwait Prize for the best book on the Middle East; and Anatomy of Authoritarianism in the Arab Republics (New York: Cambridge University, 2016).

Atina Grossmann is Professor of History in the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at the Cooper Union in New York City. She received a Ph.D from Rutgers University and a B.A. from The City University of New York. Her current research focuses on “Trauma: Privilege, Adventure in Transit: Jewish Refugees from National Socialism in Iran, India, and Central Asia in Transnational Context.” Relevant publications in Jewish and Holocaust Studies include Jews, Germans, and Allies: Close Encounters in Occupied Germany (Princeton 2007, German 2012); Shelter from the Holocaust: Rethinking Jewish Survival in the Soviet Union (with M.Edele and S. Fitzpatrick 2017), and Our Courage/Unser Mut: Jews in Europe after 1945 (with K. Bohus 2020). Sheserved on the Scholars Advisory Board for the new permanent exhibit at the Museum of Jewish Heritage and is currently the Ina Levine Invitational Senior Scholar at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

Tickets: $22 General; $15 Students and Seniors; $12 Members 

Doors open at 6 pm, Includes Museum Admission