Jews dominated the liquor trade in Eastern Europe in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and the Jewish-run tavern became the center of leisure, hospitality, and business. When peasant drunkenness became endemic, that trade became threatened as reformers tried to ban Jews from selling alcohol. New archival discoveries reveal a vast underground Jewish liquor trade that was reliant on an impressive level of Jewish-Christian coexistence.
Professor Glenn Dynner will present “Jews, Liquor, and Life in Eastern Europe” on Thursday, October 20, 2016, at 12:30pm in the Class of ’47 Room at the Homer Babbidge Library as part of the Faculty Colloquium Series sponsored by the Center for Judaic Studies and Contemporary Jewish Life. The series is a forum for the presentation of faculty research. All are invited to attend. A kosher lunch will be provided.
Glenn Dynner is Professor of Religion and Chair of Humanities at Sarah Lawrence College. He is the author of “Men of Silk”: The Hasidic Conquest of Polish Jewish Society (Oxford University Press, 2006) and Yankel’s Tavern: Jews, Liquor & Life in the Kingdom of Poland (Oxford University Press, 2014). He is also editor of Holy Dissent: Jewish and Christian Mystics in Eastern Europe (Wayne State University Press, 2011); co-editor of Polin 27; and co-editor of Warsaw. The Jewish Metropolis: Essays in Honor of the 75th Birthday of Professor Antony Polonsky (Brill, 2015). He is a member of the Institute for Advance Studies at Princeton University and has been both a Fulbright Scholar and the Senior NEH Scholar at the Center for Jewish History.
For more information, contact: Aaron Rosman, Center for Judaic Studies and Contemporary Jewish Life at aaron.rosman@uconn.edu