2026 Tenenbaum Lecture to Feature Dr. Rowan Dorin on "The Road to 1492: Jews, Christians, and the Spread of Mass Expulsion in Medieval Europe"
The Tam Institute for Jewish Studies (TIJS) at Emory University will feature Prof. Rowan Dorin of Stanford University as the speaker for this year’s Tenenbaum Family Lecture in Judaic Studies. The lecture, to take place on Tuesday, March 17th at 7:00pm, will address the topic: "The Road to 1492: Jews, Christians, and the Spread of Mass Expulsion in Medieval Europe." This free, on-campus event will be held in the Woodruff Library’s Jones Room, 3rd floor (540 Asbury Cir, Atlanta, GA 30322). Advanced registration is requested, which you may complete here: tinyurl.com/emorytenenbaumlecture.
Although the experience of expulsion looms large in Jewish history and memory, scholars have paid little attention to the wider history of forced migration in premodern Europe. In this talk, Prof. Dorin will explore how this phenomenon became a pervasive feature of European law and politics—with consequences that continue to reverberate down to the present.
Rowan Dorin is Associate Professor of History and Director of the Center for Medieval and Early Modern Studies at Stanford University, as well as core faculty of the Taube Center for Jewish Studies. His research and teaching focus on the history of premodern Europe and the Mediterranean, in particular Jewish-Christian relations, religious law, and digital humanities.
This year marks the 29th Tenenbaum Family Lecture in Judaic Studies, which salutes the family of the late Meyer W. Tenenbaum ’31C-’32L of Savannah, Georgia. Tenenbaum, a native of Poland, arrived in the United States at the age of thirteen knowing no English, and graduated from the Emory School of Law eleven years later. He went on to head Chatham Steel Corporation, now a major steel service center with headquarters in Savannah.
The lectureship was established in 1997 by Meyer’s son, Samuel Tenenbaum ‘65C, and honors the entire Tenenbaum family and its ethos of citizenship and public service, which is expressed through its support of religious, educational, social service, and arts institutions across the United States.
Emory’s Tam Institute for Jewish Studies is one of the leading research and teaching institutions for Jewish Studies in the Southern United States. Bringing together scholars and students from different departments and programs, it awards an undergraduate major and minor in Emory College of Arts and Sciences and provides support for doctoral-level work. In addition to the Tenenbaum Lecture, the Institute also sponsors the annual Rabbi Jacob M. Rothschild Memorial Lecture and many other events designed to share the insights of research in Jewish Studies with a broad public audience.
Contact TIJS Communications Coordinator, Brent Buckley, with any questions at brent.buckley@emory.edu.
Co-sponsored by: Emory University’s Campus Life, Candler School of Theology, Center for Ethics, Departments of English, French and Italian, German Studies, History, Middle Eastern and South Asian Studies, Religion, and Spanish and Portuguese, Fox Center for Humanistic Inquiry, Institute for Liberal Arts, Laney Graduate School, Medieval Studies Program, and Office of Spiritual and Religious Life.