This comparative talk will examine tropes and themes in cultural discourses and fictions about the legacies of conversion from the Americas to Europe and Turkey. In the contemporary imagination, conversion and “returns” are characterized by both sharply differentiated and convergent identities in highly imbricated Catholic, Sephardic, and Muslim cultural worlds. At the center of these representations are changing contemporary perceptions of Sephardic cultures and histories as well as global ideas about religion and ethnicity.
About the Speaker: DALIA KANDIYOTI researches and teaches comparative diaspora and ethnic studies as well as gender studies. She has specialized in Latina/o literature, comparative studies of ethnicity and race in the Americas, as well as in global Jewish studies.
