The Story of the State vs. the Story of the People: A Lecture by Efrat Yerday

Join the Africana Studies Department for a virtual lecture with Dr. Efrat Yerday, visiting scholar at the Herbert D. Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies at the University of Pennsylvania.

Until today, the historiography of Ethiopian Jewish relations with the State has rarely focused on the pre-1975 years. It has tended to dwell on the "revelations" of Ethiopian Jews, their journey on foot to Sudan, and the high-profile rescue operations of the 1980s and 90s. This lecture aims to partially fill that gap by viewing the pre-1975 years as a critical moment in understanding the racialized character of how Ethiopian Jews were incorporated into Israel's polity and citizenship regime more broadly.

About the speaker: Efrat Yerday's research focuses on Ethiopian Jews and Blackness in Israel. From 2023 to 2024 she was a teaching fellow at the University of Maryland and American University, where she taught "Blackness in Israeli Popular Culture and Contemporary Art," a course she now teaches at the University of Pennsylvania. Beyond academia, she has served as chair of the Association of Ethiopian Jews for the past five years. She received her Ph.D. from Tel Aviv University.

The lecture will be followed by a live Q&A.

Zoom link: https://tennessee.zoom.us/j/85889413217