Jenna Weissman Joselit

Jenna Weissman Joselit, a historian of everyday life, specializes in the history and culture of America’s Jews and in U.S. cultural history from the late 19th century on through the 1950s.

Her work, both within and without the classroom, pays especially close attention to the relationship between material culture and identity. Her many books include "The Wonders of America: Reinventing Jewish Culture, 1880-1950," which received the National Jewish Book Award in History, and "A Perfect Fit: Clothes, Character, and the Promise of America." Professor Weissman Joselit is currently at work on a book about America’s embrace of the Ten Commandments.

A founding member of NYU’s Working Group on Jews, Media and Religion, she has also been a Senior Fellow at Princeton University’s Center for the Study of American Religion, a fellow at Yale University’s Center for Art and Material Culture and the University of Pennsylvania’s Center for Judaic Studies. Most recently, Professor Weissman Joselit has been a Distinguished Visiting Scholar at the John W. Kluge Center of the Library of Congress.

In addition to her academic pursuits, she writes a monthly column for The Forward newspaper on American Jewish culture, is a frequent contributor to The New Republic, TNR: The Book and Tablet. She blogs at FromUnderTheFigTree.com.

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