CFP: Jewish horticultural schools in Germany and their impact on Palestine / Israel

Posted on March 28, 2016 by Aryeh

Call for Papers: Jewish horticultural and agricultural schools / training centers in Germany and their impact on horticulture, agriculture and landscape architecture in Palestine / Israel

Place: Leo Baeck Institute Jerusalem

Date: September 26, 2016

Deadline: April 30, 2016

In the course of the late 19th and early 20th century, more than 30 Jewish horticultural and agricultural training centers and schools (Hachshara) were established in Germany to train Jews from Germany and other European countries, particularly Eastern Europe. While these institutions aimed to prepare their graduates to emigrate from Germany, they also reflected the lure of the students toward the local land and landscape, a topic which was relative neglected in the emerging research field of ‘everyday history’(Alltagsgeschichte) of Jewish life in Germany. Upon arriving in Palestine, graduates of these centers were involved in establishing new settlements, led agricultural and horticultural activities, pioneered agricultural education, and practiced landscape architecture. Nevertheless, in contrast to the rich documentation of the role of the “Yekkes” in the country’s development, there is surprisingly little research on this group’s contribution to the emergence of the local landscape.

Our research explores the scopes, goals, and contribution of these German educational institutions. It documents the history of the schools and training centers, their curricula, and the actual work and life of their students. In parallel we investigate the impact of these graduates, after their arrival in Palestine, on the local landscape. We explore their landscape perceptions, their settlement projects (mainly in the Kibbutzim but not exclusively), and their contributions to the fields of agriculture, horticulture, and landscape architecture.
On September 26, 2016 we will hold a workshop in Jerusalem, organized together with the Leo Baeck Institute in Jerusalem, in order to bring together German and Israeli researchers to discuss these issues and exchange knowledge and ideas. We invite scholars of all disciplines, including but not limited to architecture, horticulture, agriculture, the humanities, and the social sciences, to send proposals for papers addressing the research topics and related issues.

Interested scholars are invited to send an abstract of 300 words and a short bio of 100 words to Sharon Gordon sharon.n.gordon@gmail.com.

We encourage scholars to send full papers or work in progress prior to the workshop, though such exchange will not be obligatory.

Due date is 30/4/2016.

New Article: Neuman, Al Mansfeld and the Interpretation of the Israel Museum

Posted on October 30, 2015 by Aryeh

Neuman, Eran. “Al Mansfeld and the Interpretation of the Israel Museum.” Journal of Architecture 20.5 (2015): 803-30.

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13602365.2015.1092166

Abstract

Over the past few decades, the Israel Museum in Jerusalem has been the subject of post-colonial interpretations which likened the organisation of the pavilions that make up the museum to the form of an Arab village. Focusing on the organisational and formal similarities between the museum and the typology of the Arab village, these interpretations propose that Israel, even before the 1967 War and the conquest of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, had already begun to appropriate Palestinian symbols. These interpretations often refer to drawings made by Al Mansfeld, the museum’s architect. This essay argues that while the post-colonial interpretations may be correct, they neglect to address yet another big influence on Mansfeld’s thinking when he conceptualised the Israel Museum in the late 1950s. During the early 1930s in Berlin, Mansfeld was a student of two German Expressionist architects, Hans Poelzig and Heinrich Tessenow. During these years, Mansfeld was exposed to expressionist ideas about architecture that later permeated his designs and artwork, including the design of the Israel Museum.

Dissertation: Bardi, Cleansing, Constructing, and Curating the State: India/Pakistan ’47 and Israel/Palestine ’48

Posted on September 2, 2015 by Aryeh

Bardi, Ariel Sophia. Cleansing, Constructing, and Curating the State: India/Pakistan ’47 and Israel/Palestine ’48 , PhD Dissertation, Yale University, 2015.

URL: http://gradworks.umi.com/36/63/3663495.html

Abstract

This dissertation looks at the ways in which the landscape and the built environment have been called upon and transformed into conduits of national belonging, focusing on the near-simultaneous emergences of Israel, India, and Pakistan. It considers the role of space in consolidating new national bodies, drawing on a variety of texts from both regions: memoirs, films, archival and field photos, housing plans, and the architectural landscape itself.

The first chapter explores the Jewish and Indian Muslim bids for sovereign lands along with the rise of Hindu nationalism. Looking at the founding of Pakistan and Israel, it considers the self-replicative logic of partition and the emergence of the homeland state. Arguing for the importance of image and space in conjuring new nationhoods, the second chapter compares systems of spatial control, visual regimes that mounted and imposed new national imaginaries. In India, Pakistan, and Israel/Palestine, selective acts of destruction transformed formerly shared spaces, inflecting the landscape with three distinct new states.

The third chapter looks at post-state refugee rehabilitation projects, focusing specifically on Mizrahi, or Arab Jewish, immigration to the Israeli hinterlands, and Mizrahi, or Indian refugee, resettlement within the Pakistani province of Sindh. In both regions, housing projects re-circumscribed place of origin, challenging the purported unity of each religiously pooled state and relegating refugees to the margins of each new nation. Tracing the relationship between architecture and partition, it considers the different modalities bound up in the process of national absorption. The fourth chapter compares historical preservation projects in India, Pakistan, Israel, and Palestine, and examines the role of heritage sites in visualizing statehood and homogenizing mixed spaces. Considering the furor over India’s Babri Masjid, it posits preservation as a corollary to demolition, and examines a selection of heritage locations in Israel and Pakistan while arguing for the uses of the past in upholding majority collectivities. Finally, the conclusion considers the afterlives of partition in places such as Kashmir, the West Bank, and India’s far northeast, in ongoing occupations that are as visual and spatial as they are material, economic, and political.

ToC: Israel Studies 20.2 (2015); Special Section: Bodies In Question

Posted on May 6, 2015 by Aryeh

Israel Studies 20.2 (2015) Table of Contents:

Special Section: Bodies In Question

Wars of the Wombs: Struggles Over Abortion Policies in Israel (pp. 1-26)

Rebecca Steinfeld

Halutzah or Beauty Queen? National Images of Women in Early Israeli Society (pp. 27-52)

Julie Grimmeisen

‘Re-orient-ation’: Sport and the Transformation of the Jewish Body and Identity (pp. 53-75)

Yotam Hotam

‘Uniting the Nation’s Various Limbs into a National Body’ the Jerusalem People’s House (pp. 76-109)

Esther Grabiner

Articles

The Test of Maritime Sovereignty: The Establishment of the Zim National Shipping Company and the Purchase of the Kedmah, 1945–1952 (pp. 110-134)

Kobi Cohen-Hattab

Budgeting for Ultra-Orthodox Education—The Failure of Ultra-Orthodox Politics, 1996–2006 (pp. 135-162)

Hadar Lipshits

The Mizrahi Sociolect in Israel: Origins and Development (pp. 163-182)

Yehudit Henshke

Review Essay: The Theoretical Normalization of Israel in International Relations(pp. 183-189)

[Reviews of: The Political Psychology of Israeli Prime Ministers: When Hard-Liners Opt for Peace, by Yael S. Aronoff; Why Hawks Become Doves: Shimon Peres and Foreign Policy Change in Israel by Guy Ziv]

Brent E. Sasley

Notes on Contributors (pp. 190-191)

Guidelines for Contributors (pp. 192-194)

ToC: Israel Studies Review 30.1 (2015)

Posted on April 28, 2015 by Aryeh

Israel Studies Review, Volume 30, Issue 1, Table of Contents:

Editors’ Note

Editors’ Note
pp. v-vii(3)

Articles

Mapai’s Bolshevist Image: A Critical Analysis
pp. 1-19(19)
Bareli, Avi

Political Indoctrination of Soldiers in the IDF, 1948–1949
pp. 20-41(22)
Hazkani, Shay

Outsmarting the Nation, Together: Subversive Virtual Fraternity in the Israeli Men’s Magazine Blazer
pp. 42-65(24)
Fraiberg, Steven; Kaplan, Danny

Men and Boys: Representations of Israeli Combat Soldiers in the Media
pp. 66-85(20)
Israeli, Zipi; Rosman-Stollman, Elisheva

The Kibbutz between the Past and the Present
pp. 86-100(15)
Gertz, Nurith

Kibbutz Landscape and Architecture as Represented in Film and Television: Kibbutz Yakum as a Case Study
pp. 101-129(29)
Har-Gil, Amir; Gitler, Inbal Ben-Asher

Review Essay

Right of Center: Rearranging the Israeli Political Map
pp. 130-143(14)
Peleg, Samuel

Book Reviews

Book Reviews
pp. 144-163(20)

New Article: Safran, Haifa al-Jadida

Posted on March 10, 2015 by Aryeh

Safran, Yair. “Haifa al-Jadida: The Surrounding Walls and the City Quarters.” Middle Eastern Studies 51.3 (2015): 452-61.

URL: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00263206.2014.976623

Abstract

`Haifa al-Jadida` (New Haifa) was erected in 1761 by order of the Bedouin ruler Daher el-Omar, governor of the Galilee. As part of the process of building the city, a wall was constructed to encircle it, with a tower overlooking it from above. After its establishment the ‘New Haifa’ became the urban core for the emergence of modern Haifa while the new city was gradually solidified and its characteristic outlines were moulded. From the end of the Ottoman period in 1918 until 1948, the urban expanse remained practically unchanged. In 1948 ‘New Haifa’ was almost destroyed except for the few ruins that were left. In spite of the centrality of the new city in the history of Haifa, very little is known about this area. This article reconstructs the image of ‘New Haifa’ by portraying the location of the city walls and the urban expanse. For the purpose of reconstruction, an 1841 sketch of the city is superimposed on an aerial photographmap of the area taken in 2008, and a map of the old city dated to 1937.

New Book: Hatuka et al, eds. City-Industry (in Hebrew)

Posted on November 24, 2014 by Aryeh

חתוקה, טלי, רוני בר, מירב בטט, יואב זילברדיק, כרמל חנני, שלי חפץ, מיכאל יעקובסון והילה לוטן. עיר-תעשייה. תל אביב: רסלינג, 2014.

URL: http://www.resling.co.il/book.asp?series_id=3&book_id=799

Most of us work somewhere, in a certain place. Our bodies perched above a machine for hours, our organs operate it. Thus, every day, in a repeated routine. But our days are not similar. Professional demands, working hours, employment conditions, the wages of our labor – all these separate us from one another. Our working environments are also different. The landscape of industry is diverse: streets, complexes, campuses, boxes, trains and towers whose design is linked to the production and branding system of the workplace. Landscapes follow the market’s mood, as it decides which factories will close, which will grow and develop, which company will be sold to an international corporate or relocated to a distant district. This is the landscape of production, a temporary landscape that influences and shapes our world.

An examination of the industrial landscape in Israel reveals a complex picture: the manifold industrial zones, sometimes in close proximity to one another, compete with each other with no comprehensive strategy; resources are distributed unjustly, and thus municipalities cannot always benefit from the profits of the industrial zones; construction expansion in open spaces wastes land resources; and mainly, an autonomous conceptualization of the industrial zone, with no spatial, administrative, or operative connection between it and the urban fabric. Nevertheless, even within this complex picture, situated in a context of time and place, one can discern patterns and spatial configurations in the background of the industrial landscape.

City-Industry is the product of the Laboratory for Contemporary Urban Design (LCUD) at Tel Aviv University. It is the second book in a trilogy on urban landscapes in Israel. The first book, Neighborhood-State, sought to investigate the dependent relationships between citizen and state in residential areas. The current volume exposes the overt and hidden relationships between city and industry. It follows the temporality and dynamics of work environments and recognizes them as arenas of precariousness. Within this temporariness, the authors – as planners – seek to raise awareness to relationships between worker and place, between the laborer and his city.

New Book: Rotbard, White City, Black City. Architecture and War in Tel Aviv and Jaffa

Posted on November 23, 2014 by Aryeh

Rotbard, Sharon. White City, Black City. Architecture and War in Tel Aviv and Jaffa. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2015.

URL: https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/white-city-black-city

n 2004, the city of Tel Aviv was declared by UNESCO a World Heritage Site, an exemplar of modernism in architecture and town planning. Today, the Hebrew city of Tel Aviv gleams white against the desert sky, its Bauhaus-inspired architecture betraying few traces of what came before it: the Arab city of Jaffa. In White City, Black City, the Israeli architect and author Sharon Rotbard offers two intertwining narratives, that of colonized and colonizer. It is also a story of a decades-long campaign of architectural and cultural historical revision that cast Tel Aviv as a modernist “white city” emerging fully formed from the dunes while ignoring its real foundation—the obliteration of Jaffa. Rotbard shows that Tel Aviv was not, as a famous poem has it, built “from sea foam and clouds” but born in Jaffa and shaped according to its relation to Jaffa. His account is not only about architecture but also about war, destruction, Zionist agendas, erasure, and the erasure of the erasure.

Rotbard tells how Tel Aviv has seen Jaffa as an inverted reflection of itself—not shining and white but nocturnal, criminal, dirty: a “black city.” Jaffa lost its language, its history, and its architecture; Tel Aviv constructed its creation myth. White City, Black City—hailed upon its publication in Israel as ”path-breaking,” “brilliant,” and “a masterpiece”—promises to become the central text on Tel Aviv.

New Book: Wilhelm and Gust, eds. New Towns for a New State (German)

Posted on October 1, 2014 by Aryeh

Wilhelm, Karin and Kerstin Gust, eds. Neue Städte für einen neuen Staat. Die städtebauliche Erfindung des modernen Israel und der Wiederaufbau in der BRD. Eine Annäherung. Bielefeld: transcript, 2013.

URL: http://www.transcript-verlag.de/978-3-8376-2204-1/neue-staedte-fuer-einen-neuen-staat

Abstract

Israel and Palestine – What is today presented as a seemingly hopeless political situation, began with optimism, albeit a naive dream, towards building a peaceful society for all religions with the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948. For this purpose, the economist Edgar Salin (1892-1974) founded in 1958 “The Israel Economic and Sociological Research Project (IESRP),” which was to play a central role in the establishment of the “new towns” in Israel. The contributions here examine for the first time in a systematic way this project and its cultural and political importance, as well as relevant topics including planning debates and construction issues in the Federal Republic of Germany.

With contributions by Eliezer Ben-Rafael, Meron Benvenisti, Jörn Düwel, Zvi Efrat, Anton Föllmi, Rachel callus, Ruth Kark, Anna Minta, Andreas Nachama, Willi Oberkrome, Martin Peschken, Bertram Schefold, Axel Schildt, Julius H. Schoeps, Korinna Schönhärl, Yaakov Sharett, Thomas Sieverts, Joachim Trezib, Stefan Vogt, Georg Wagner Kyora, Karin Wilhelm, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn and Moshe Zuckermann.

Click here for a Table of Contents (in German)

Cite: Spiegel, Constructing the City of Tel Aviv

Posted on November 3, 2012 by Aryeh

Spiegel, Nina S. “Constructing the City of Tel Aviv: Urban Space, Physical Culture and the Natural and Built Environment.” Rethinking History 16.4 (2012): 497-516.

URL: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13642529.2012.697279

Abstract

This article investigates the intersection of space, culture and the moving body in Tel Aviv during the British Mandate of Palestine. Established in 1909 as a garden suburb of Jaffa, by the 1920s Tel Aviv had become the dynamic cultural and economic center of the Jewish community in Palestine. The culture of Tel Aviv was highly influenced by its natural setting but, as the ‘first Hebrew city’, it was also impacted by the processes of urbanization. Through analysis of a variety of developments in the physical culture arena, this article uncovers how the burgeoning metropolis both drew from and shaped the physical environment.

Reviews: Tzfadia and Yacobi, Rethinking Israeli Space

Posted on April 16, 2012 by Aryeh

Tzfadia, Erez and Haim Yacobi. Rethinking Israeli Space. Periphery and Identity. Routledge Advances in Middle East and Islamic Studies. London and New York: Routledge, 2011.

Reviews

Mazza, Roberto. “Review.” International Journal of Middle East Studies 44.2 (2012): 374-376.

Cite: Shehory-Rubin & Shvarts, The First Playgrounds in Palestine

Posted on May 17, 2010 by Aryeh

Shehory-Rubin, Zipora and Shifra Shvarts. "Teaching the Children to Play: The Establishment of the First Playgrounds in Palestine During the Mandate." Israel Studies 15,2 (2010): 24-48.

URL: http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/israel_studies/summary/v015/15.2.shehory-rubin.html

Abstract

The article discusses the establishment of the first three playgrounds in Palestine during the Mandate. They were founded on social and educational principles, and were among the first institutes of informal education in the country. It was from these playgrounds that clubs, afternoon centers for schoolchildren, summer camps, and, finally, community centers developed. What function did these playgrounds serve, and what were the forces that initiated them? The article focuses on the educational work carried out in the Guggenheimer-Hadassah playgrounds, examines their underlying principles, explains their unique significance during the period, analyzes what part they played in the development of informal education in Palestine and reveals the role played by the Hadassah American Zionist Women’s Organization in its formation.

Keywords: Israel: Architecture, British Mandate, History, Israel: Children and Youth, Israel: Culture

Cite: Smith, Hotel Design in British Mandate Palestine

Posted on March 25, 2010 by Aryeh

Smith, Daniella Ohad. "Hotel Design in British Mandate Palestine: Modernism and the Zionist Vision ." Journal of Israeli History 29,1 (2010): 99-123.

–

Abstract

From the early 1920s through the 1930s, an important yet forgotten avant-garde architectural phenomenon developed in the Zionist community of British Mandate Palestine. In cities and resort regions across the country, several dozen modernist hotels were built for a new type of visitor: the Zionist tourist. Often the most architecturally significant structures in their locales and designed by leading local architects educated in some of Europe’s most progressive schools, these hotels were conceived along ideological lines and represented a synthesis of social requirements, cutting-edge aesthetics, and utopian national ideals. They responded to a complex mixture of sentiments, including European standards of modern comfort and the longing to remake Palestine, the historical homeland of the Jewish people, for a newly liberated, progressive nation. This article focuses on Jerusalem’s most ambitious modernist hotel, the Eden Hotel, to evaluate how the architecture of tourism became a political and aesthetic tool in the promotion of Zionist Palestine.

–

URL: http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all~content=a919915811

–

Keywords: Zionist national style; Palestine tourism; Eden Hotel; King David Hotel; Palace Hotel; Alexander Baerwald; Julius Berger; Josef Frank; Gustave-Adolphe Hufschmid; Alexander Koch; Leopold Krakauer; Abraham Lifschitz; Julius Posener; Yohanan Ratner; Emil Vogt; Werner Joseph Wittkower, British Mandate, Israel: Tourism from, Israel: Architecture, Hotel Industry

ToC: Journal of Israeli History 29,1 (2010)

Posted on March 16, 2010 by Aryeh

The Journal of Israeli History has its first issue out for 2010. Below is the full Table of Contents, with links to abstracts and (limited) online access. As always, I will try (nut do not commit) to post the articles as separate entries, too.

Articles

A century of childhood, parenting, and family life in the kibbutz
Amia Lieblich
Pages 1 – 24
Abstract | References | Full Text PDF | Full Text HTML | Request Permissions
Related Articles
Online Access ACCESS