Henry Abramson

Henry (Hillel) Abramson (born 1963) is the Dean for Academic Affairs and Student Services at Touro College's Miami branch (Touro College South). He is also currently the interim Chair of Judaic Studies there.

Biography

Henry Abramson was born and raised in Iroquois Falls, Ontario. He received his doctorate in history from the University of Toronto. He was Assistant Professor of History/Jewish Studies at Florida Atlantic University from 2002–2006 and during that time held appointments at a number of institutions including Oxford University, Cornell University, Harvard University, and Hebrew University. While teaching at Hebrew University, he simultaneously attended a class with Rabbi Mendel Weinbach at Ohr Somayach, Jerusalem. In 2006, Abramson moved to his current position at Touro College South.

Scholarship

Henry Abramson is largely known for his scholarship in Ukrainian Jewish history and antisemitic iconography, but his interests also include the history of Orthodox Judaism and the Talmud. He authored the "Ukraine" entry in The YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe as well as the "Zionist movement" entry in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine. Abramson also was curator for an exhibit on the history of antisemitic iconography in Florida entitled "The Art of Hatred". He has written two introductory books directed toward general audiences about the Talmud and lectures regularly at Touro College South about the history of Orthodox Judaism .

Criticism

Lars Fischer, currently the Academic Director at The Woolf Institute, criticized Abramson's work for privileging claims made by historians largely sympathetic to traditional Ukrainian narratives while claiming to follow the trend of synthesizing of Jewish and Ukrainian historiographical approaches; Abramson, in a rebuttal, rejected this criticism. In a later article, Fischer noted that while he would "now be more prepared to acknowledge the extent to which Abramson has indeed succeeded in creating a historiographical synthesis," he "would add that it is precisely the desire to synthesise rather than radically deconstruct the existing paradigms that is in fact the problem" and still maintains Abramson's "approach fairly consistently privileges and perpetuates the paradigms that traditionally constitute the National Ukrainian approach" .

Partial bibliography

Henry Abramson, A Prayer for the Government: Ukrainians and Jews in Revolutionary Times, 1917-1920. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 1999.

Henry Abramson, Reading the Talmud. New York, NY: Feldheim, 2006, reprinted 2012 by Parnoseh Books at Smashwords.

Henry Abramson, The Art of Hatred: Images of Intolerance in Florida Culture. Miami Beach, FL: Jewish Museum of Florida, 2001.

Henry Abramson, The Sea of Talmud: A Brief and Personal Introduction Miami Beach, FL: Parnoseh Books at Smashwords, 2012.