Judaica at the Smithsonian: Cultural Politics as Cultural Model
Grossman, Grace Cohen, and Richard Eighme Ahlborn. Judaica at the Smithsonian: Cultural Politics as Cultural Model. Smithsonian Studies in History and Technology, number 52, 252 pages, 142 figures, 1997.—This study surveys the history of the Smithsonian Institution's ethnographic Judaica collection from its beginnings in the late nineteenth century to the present. It investigates how the particular cultural perspective of the curators and collectors plays a significant role in shaping acquisitions policy and interpretation of the collection through exhibitions and publications. In large measure, the analysis focuses on the period from 1887 to 1927, during which time the collection was substantially formed. The establishment of the Smithsonian's Judaica collection is framed in the context of the contemporaneous development of the field of Jewish cultural history, the general museum world as represented by the United States National Museum, and the study of Semitics in the academic realm. Special emphasis is given to Cyrus Adler, the founding curator, and to Ephraim Deinard, whose personal collection forms the majority of the Smithsonian's current Judaica holdings. This volume represents the culmination of the Smithsonian Judaica Project, a decade-long effort to document the entire collection, and the essay is followed by an illustrated catalog of selected objects and a comprehensive database. There is also a basic glossary of Judaica terms and a bibliography. It is projected that this presentation of technical and cultural information regarding the Smithsonian's Judaica will provide a reference source and a model for additional typological and social studies. OFFICIAL PUBLICATION DATE is handstamped in a limited number of initial copies and is recorded in the Institution's annual report, Annals of the Smithsonian Institution. COVER DESIGN: "Star-Spangled Banner" scroll, catalog number NMAH-PH 31842. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Grossman, Grace Cohen Judaica at the Smithsonian : cultural politics as cultural model / Grace Cohen Grossman with Richard Eighme Ahlborn. p. cm.—(Smithsonian studies in history and technology : no. 52) Includes an illustrated catalog of selected objects from the Smithsonian Judaica collection and a comprehensive database. Includes bibliographical references. 1. Judaism—Liturgical objects—Catalogs. 2. Judaism—Liturgical objects—Pictorial works. 3. Smithsonian Institution—Catalogs. 4. Jewish museums—History. 5. Jewish art and symbolism. I. Ahlborn, Richard E. II. Smithsonian Institution. III. Title. IV. Series. NK1672.G766 1997 296'.074'753—dc21 96-45219 ® The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials Z39.48—1984.
Exhibiting Cultures: The Poetics and Politics of Museum Display
"Throwing open to debate the practices of museums, galleries, and festivals, Exhibiting Cultures probes the often politically charged relationships among aesthetics, contexts, and implicit assumptions that govern how cultural differences and art objects are displayed. This innovative volume brings together museum directors and curators, art historians, anthropologists, folklorists, and historians to examine how diverse settings have appealed to audiences and represented the intentions and cultures of the makers of objects. The essays address such major issues in the politics of culture as how the learned experience of everyday life is used to make exhibitions comprehensible, what happens to minority and exotic arts when they are assimilated into the hegemonic context of the "great" museums, and why ethnographic museums have been neglected in an age of museum expansions" -- p.[4] of cover.
From Locke to Reitzenstein: the Historical Investigation of the Origins of Christianity
The historical investigation of the origins of Christianity began with the English deists, who, being philosophers and not professional historians, were for that very reason able to give the first forward impulse to the historical study of Jesus and of primitive Christianity. No purely historical interest could have induced Christian Europe to apply criticism to its sacred books, the facts of salvation, and the divine person of the Saviour. A new and philosophic conception of religion was required, directly opposed to the older view, if any serious effort was to be made to find in the writings of the New Testament and in the earliest Christian history the evidence for critically tested historical statements, and if these writings were to be read and the history studied from any other point of view than that of traditional dogmatism, Protestant or Catholic.