Assistant professor's memoir finalist for literature award

Assistant professor Ilana Blumberg’s first published book was named runner-up for a national award and is one of five finalists in the running for the 2008 Sami Rohr Prize in Jewish literature.

The winner of the Sami Rohr Prize, which will be announced in February, will receive $100,000.

Blumberg’s memoir “Houses of Study: A Jewish Woman among Books” follows her life as a young woman in the Orthodox Jewish community. She said it was challenging to find a happy medium between her religious life and her life as an American woman.

“(The book is) about trying to put together a traditional Jewish upbringing with values of the secular American world,” she said. “I describe getting a double education in Jewish schools … and the more typical American curriculum.”

As an Orthodox Jewish woman, Blumberg said she didn’t have a difficult time figuring out what career to pursue because of her aspirations to lead an intellectual life.

“Part of the reason I found my profession in American academia is because there were not a lot of options in the traditional Jewish world,” she said. “If you grow up male and traditionally Jewish, you’re likely to become a rabbi. In the Orthodox Jewish world, there isn’t a parallel position for women. A teacher is the closest thing.”

Blumberg has two young children. She said she plans to give them the happy medium she struggled to achieve.

“As a mother, I want to educate them and give them a traditional Jewish lifestyle, but at the same time realize their potential,” she said.

Blumberg said her book also focuses on how Orthodox Judaism has changed since she was educated.

“There has been a lot of progress,” she said. “My daughter will have options that I didn’t have.”

Social relations and policy sophomore Nicole Iaquinto took one of Blumberg’s classes in the fall of 2007.

“She was an excellent teacher,” she said. “Very accommodating and flexible with students. She asked us for input on subject matter and let us be in control of the class discussion.”

Iaquinto recently bought a copy of Blumberg’s book and plans to read it soon.

International relations sophomore Anthony Mianecki took one of Blumberg’s classes while she was in the process of publishing her book.

“I have a couple friends who have read it already,” Mianecki said. I’m going to try and borrow their copies and read it this summer.”

While Blumberg said she would not teach her memoir to her classes, several of her colleagues have already done so. The University of Maryland used the book for the first time last semester and the University of Virginia plans to teach it in the fall.

Published on Thursday, January 24, 2008