Mara Benjamin
{{Short description|American scholar of Jewish studies}}
{{Use American English|date=December 2024}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=December 2024}}
{{Infobox academic
| occupation = Jewish studies scholar
| partner = {{marriage|Miryam Kabakov|2004}}
| awards = Guggenheim Fellowship (2024)
| alma_mater = {{ublist|
}}
| thesis_title = Franz Rosenzweig and scripture
| thesis_year = 2005
| doctoral_advisor = Arnold Eisen
| discipline = Jewish studies
| sub_discipline = Modern Jewish studies
| workplaces = {{ublist|
}}
}}
Mara H. Benjamin is an American scholar of modern Jewish studies. A 2024 Guggenheim Fellow, she is the author of Rosenzweig's Bible and The Obligated Self and is Irene Kaplan Leiwant Professor of Jewish Studies at Mount Holyoke College.{{Cite web |title=Mara Benjamin |url=https://www.mtholyoke.edu/directory/faculty-staff/mara-benjamin |access-date=2024-12-16 |website=Mount Holyoke College}}
Biography
Mara Hillary Benjamin was born to Judith Benjamin, a North Seattle College ESL teacher, and Kenneth Collins, a Los Alamos National Laboratory senior security advisor. Her paternal grandfather, Samuel Carl Collins, was born to Jewish parents from Brownsville, Brooklyn, who had previously emigrated from Odesa in present-day Ukraine.{{Cite web |title=Samuel Collins Obituary (2006) – Fort Lauderdale, FL – Sun-Sentinel |url=https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/sunsentinel/name/samuel-collins-obituary?id=25965059 |access-date=2024-12-16 |website=Legacy.com}}{{Cite web |title=Samuel Carl Collins recollections of Jewish life in Brooklyn, New York |url=https://catalog.loc.gov/vwebv/search?searchCode=LCCN&searchArg=2012655523&searchType=1&permalink=y |access-date=2024-12-16 |website=Library of Congress Catalog}} She later adopted the surname of her stepfather, environmental engineer and University of Washington professor Mark M. Benjamin.{{Cite web |title=Mark M. Benjamin |url=https://www.ce.washington.edu/people/faculty/benjaminm |access-date=2024-12-16 |website=UW Civil & Environmental Engineering}} She attended Garfield High School, during which, amidst warming Soviet Union–United States relations, she was part of the KING-TV/Gosteleradio Teen Space Bridge project with students in 1988.{{Cite news |last=Zaugg |first=Karin |date=1988-01-01 |title=Teens have their own Russian link |url=https://www.newspapers.com/image/874118152/ |work=Kitsap Sun |pages=A4 |via=Newspapers.com}}
Benjamin obtained her BA at Hampshire College and her PhD (2005) in modern Jewish thought at the Stanford University Department of Religious Studies, as well as a diplomat in Jewish studies at Oxford Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies.{{Cite web |title=Biography |url=https://www.marabenjamin.com/biography |access-date=2024-12-16 |website=www.marabenjamin.com}}{{Cite web |title=Graduate Alumni |url=https://religiousstudies.stanford.edu/people/graduate-alumni |access-date=2024-12-16 |website=Stanford University Department of Religious Studies}} Her doctoral dissertation Franz Rosenzweig and scripture was supervised by Arnold Eisen.{{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=to4vAQAAIAAJ |title=Dissertation Abstracts International: The humanities and social sciences |publisher=University Microfilms |year=2005 |page=214}} She was the 2004-2005 Hazel D. Cole Fellow at the University of Washington Stroum Center for Jewish Studies{{Cite web |title=Hazel D. Cole Fellows |url=https://jewishstudies.washington.edu/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Hazel-D.-Cole-Fellows-Topics.pdf |access-date=2024-12-16 |website=University of Washington Stroum Center for Jewish Studies Stroum }} and the 2005–2007 Jacob and Hilda Blaustein Postdoctoral Fellow at Yale University.{{Cite web |title=Jacob & Hilda Blaustein Postdoctoral Associates in The Program in Judaic Studies |url=https://jewishstudies.yale.edu/sites/default/files/files/postdocs_list.pdf |access-date=2024-12-16 |website=Yale University }} In 2008, she joined St. Olaf College as Assistant Professor of Religion.{{Cite web |title=Academic Catalog 2008–09 |url=https://www.stolaf.edu/catalog/0809/people/faculty.html |access-date=2024-12-16 |website=St. Olaf College}} In 2017, she moved to Mount Holyoke College, where she had previously worked as an auditor for Mount Holyoke professor Lawrence Fine while studying at Hampshire, and subsequently became the Irene Kaplan Leiwant Professor of Jewish Studies.{{Cite news |last=Nyary |first=Sasha |date=2017-08-25 |title=Benjamin joins MHC as Jewish studies chair |url=https://www.mtholyoke.edu/news/news-stories/benjamin-joins-mhc-jewish-studies-chair |access-date=2024-12-16 |work=Mount Holyoke College}}
Benjamin specializes in modern Jewish studies. In 2009, she published her first book, a monograph on Jewish philosopher Franz Rosenzweig named Rosenzweig's Bible. She won the 2019 American Academy of Religion Book Award in Constructive-Reflective Studies for her next book The Obligated Self (2018).{{Cite web |title=Winners Book Awards |url=https://aarweb.org/AARMBR/AARMBR/About-AAR-/Award-Programs-/Awards/Book-Awards-/Winners-Book-Awards.aspx |access-date=2024-12-16 |website=American Academy of Religion}} In 2024, she was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in Religion.{{Cite press release |title=Announcing the 2024 John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellows |publisher=John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation |url=https://www.prweb.com/releases/announcing-the-2024-john-simon-guggenheim-memorial-foundation-fellows-302113717.html |via=PRWeb |access-date=2024-12-15}}
=Personal life=
In 2004, Benjamin entered a partnership with social worker Miryam Kabakov.{{Cite news |date=2004-06-27 |title=Mara Benjamin, Miryam Kabakov |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/27/style/weddings-celebrations-mara-benjamin-miryam-kabakov.html |access-date=2024-12-16 |work=New York Times}}
Originally frequenting a Conservative synagogue, Benjamin later shifted towards being shomer Shabbat after meeting Kabakov.{{Cite interview |last=Benjamin |first=Mara |interviewer=Meg Bernstein |title=Ecological disaster, grief, and hope: We need a new Jewish theology |url=https://washtenawjewishnews.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/April-23-WJN-final-1000-for-web-with-corrections.pdf |access-date=2024-12-16 |work=Washtenaw Jewish News |issue=8 |date=2023 |volume=XXIII}} She also planned to attend a Jewish seminary but decided against it after realizing that she would have to work on Shabbat as a rabbi.
Bibliography
- Rosenzweig's Bible (2009){{Cite journal |last=Plevan |first=William |date=2012 |title=Rosenzweig's Bible: Reinventing Scripture for Jewish Modernity |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/pub/115/article/494246 |journal=Conservative Judaism |volume=64 |issue=1 |pages=81–83 |doi=10.1353/coj.2012.0050 |issn=1947-4717 |via=Project Muse|url-access=subscription }}{{Cite journal |last=Sheppard |first=Eugene R. |date=2009 |title=Rosenzweig's Bible: Reinventing Scripture for Jewish Modernity |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/25654648 |journal=AJS Review |volume=33 |issue=2 |pages=412–414 |doi=10.1017/S0364009409990079 |jstor=25654648 |issn=0364-0094 |url-access=subscription }}
- The Obligated Self (2018){{Cite journal |last=Bahler |first=Brock |date=2020 |title=The Obligated Self: Maternal Subjectivity and Jewish Thought |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/747955 |journal=Journal of Jewish Identities |volume=13 |issue=1 |pages=127–130 |doi=10.1353/jji.2020.0014 |issn=1946-2522 |via=Project Muse|url-access=subscription }}{{Cite journal |last=Groenhout |first=Ruth |date=2023 |title=The Obligated Self: Maternal Subjectivity and Jewish Thought |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S088753672300017X/type/journal_article |journal=Hypatia |volume=38 |issue=4 |doi=10.1017/hyp.2023.17 |issn=0887-5367 |via=Cambridge University Press}}{{Cite web |date=2018 |title=The Obligated Self: Maternal Subjectivity and Jewish Thought |url=https://www.jewishbookcouncil.org/book/the-obligated-self-maternal-subjectivity-and-jewish-thought#judges-remarks |access-date=2024-12-16 |website=Jewish Book Council}}{{Cite journal |last=Pollock |first=Benjamin |date=2020 |title=The Obligated Self: Maternal Subjectivity and Jewish Thought |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/pub/3/article/778207 |journal=Nashim: A Journal of Jewish Women's Studies & Gender Issues |volume=37 |issue=1 |pages=188–193 |issn=1565-5288 |via=Project Muse}}{{Cite journal |last=Sullivan-Dunbar |first=Sandra |date=2019-12-12 |title=The Obligated Self: Maternal Subjectivity and Jewish Thought |url=https://academic.oup.com/jaar/article/87/4/1228/5559691 |journal=Journal of the American Academy of Religion |volume=87 |issue=4 |pages=1228–1231 |doi=10.1093/jaarel/lfz063 |issn=0002-7189 |via=Oxford University Press|url-access=subscription }}
References
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Category:Philosophers of Judaism
Category:21st-century American philosophers
Category:Philosophers from Washington (state)
Category:American religion academics
Category:American people of Ukrainian-Jewish descent
Category:Jewish American academics
Category:Garfield High School (Seattle) alumni
Category:Hampshire College alumni
Category:Stanford University alumni
Category:St. Olaf College faculty