Dr. Steven Zipperstein

Professional Background

Professor Steven Zipperstein received a Ph.D. in Russian and Jewish history at the University of California, Los Angeles. He also studied history at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and was a rabbinic student at the Hebrew Theological College in Skokie, Illinois. During his fellowship at the Museum, he was the Daniel E. Koshland Professor in Jewish Culture and History, and Co-Director of the Taube Center for Jewish Studies at Stanford University in California. For his J.B. and Maurice C. Shapiro Senior Scholar-in-Residence Fellowship, Professor Zipperstein conducted research on his project “A Comprehensive History of East European and Russian Jewish History since the 18th Century.”

Professor Zipperstein is a leading scholar of modern European Jewish history. He is author or editor of several works on the histories of Zionism and the Jews of Odessa. In his Imagining Russian Jewry: Memory, History, Identity (Washington University Press, 1999), Professor Zipperstein explored how historians have written about Russian Jewry during the 20th century and particularly the impact of the Holocaust on Jewish historiography. His book Elusive Prophet: Ahad Ha’am and the Origins of Zionism (California University Press, 1993) won the National Jewish Book Award in 1994. He has served as an editor of the journal Jewish Social Studies: History, Culture and Society. His many essays have appeared in scholarly and popular publications, including The New York Times, Partisan Review, and Dissent, among others. Professor Zipperstein has sat on the boards of many professional associations, institutions, and scholarly publications including the Academic Advisory Board for YIVO, the Jewish University in Moscow and the American Association of Jewish Studies. He has received numerous fellowships at leading institutions of Jewish scholarship, such as the Institute for Advanced Studies at Hebrew University, Israel and the Maz Weinrich Center, YIVO.

Fellowship Research

During his tenure at the Museum, Professor Zipperstein conducted research on the Holocaust for a book he was writing on Jewish history from the 18th century to the present. Professor Zipperstein also gave a staff seminar on the history of Russian and East European Jewry during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and delivered the 2003 J.B. and Maurice C. Shapiro Annual Lecture on, “Past Revisited? Historical Reflections on Contemporary Anti-Semitism” during his stay at the Museum.

Professor Zipperstein was in residence at the Mandel Center from September 1, 2002 to January 15, 2003.