Postdoc on Local Law under Rome

 [We have the following announcement.  DRE]

The [European Research Council] project Local Law under Rome is offering a number of Postdoctoral fellowships at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem beginning October 2024, or as soon as possible thereafter. Scholars who have received their Ph.D. after October 1st 2019 or will submit their Ph.D. no later the beginning of the Postdoctoral period are eligible to apply.

The successful candidate will be a part of a unique interdisciplinary team which will be engaged in comparative study of local legal cultures within their Roman imperial context. Together we seek to enhance the understanding of provincial legalism in its multiple manifestations.  

We are seeking experts in one (or more) of the following legal traditions, who are committed to a contextual and historical analysis of legal materials: (1) Early rabbinic law (2) Legal papyrology (3) Roman law in the provinces, or (4) Greek law. We also welcome applications by scholars of (5) Anthropology of Law who are interested in these materials.

The appointed fellow is expected to work closely with other team members. S/he will participate in the project’s ongoing activities and is expected to contribute to its collaborative outputs, produce project-related publications and provide materials for the comparative database.    

The scholarship will be granted for a maximum of 3 years. (subject to review at the end of each year). The fellow will receive a monthly stipend of approximately 11,000 NIS. Additional funding for travel will be available following approval. The fellow will have an office at the Mount Scopus Campus in Jerusalem and is expected to be present there regularly. Knowledge of Hebrew is not required.

Please submit the following documents (in one PDF file) to the e-mail address below:

• Introduction
• Letter describing your academic experience and motivation for participating in the project (2-3 pages)
• Curriculum vitae
• Abstract of the PhD dissertation
• Writing Sample: dissertation chapter or a paper that has been published or accepted for publication (no more than 30 pages)

In addition, please arrange for two Reference Letters to be sent directly.

We encourage potential applicants to contact us for additional information on the project, the
application procedure, The Hebrew University and life in Jerusalem.  Applications will be Reviewed beginning March 15, 2024.

Prof. Yair Furstenberg, Talmud Department, Mandel Institute for Jewish Studies, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel.  yair.furstenberg@mail.huji.ac.il

Hanley on nationality in Alexandria

Back in 2017, Will Hanley (Florida State University) published Identifying with Nationality: Europeans, Ottomans, and Egyptians in Alexandria with Columbia University Press. From the publisher:

Nationality is the most important legal mechanism sorting and classifying the world's population today. An individual's place of birth or naturalization determines where he or she can and cannot be and what he or she can and cannot do. Although this system may appear universal, even natural, Will Hanley shows that it arose just a century ago. In Identifying with Nationality, he uses the Mediterranean city of Alexandria to develop a genealogy of the nation and the formation of the modern national subject.

Alexandria in 1880 was an immigrant boomtown ruled by dozens of overlapping regimes. On its streets and in its police stations and courtrooms, people were identified by name, occupation, place of origin, sect, physical description, and other attributes. Yet by 1914, before nationalist calls for independence and decolonization had become widespread, nationality had become the defining category of identification, and nationality laws came to govern Alexandria's population. Identifying with Nationality traces the advent of modern citizenship to multinational, transimperial settings such as turn-of-the-century colonial Alexandria, where ordinary people abandoned old identifiers and grasped nationality as the best means to access the protections promised by expanding states. The result was a system that continues to define and divide people through status, mobility, and residency.

Praise for the book:

 "What nationality are you? In his stunning book, Will Hanley follows this modern question deep into the social existence of ordinary Alexandrians, demonstrating the contradictory effects of its imposition. The results open a portal, not simply on a unique city in the tumultuous years between Ottoman rule and Egyptian semi-sovereignty, but also on a pivotal global experience that historians have missed. In this lucidly written and well-researched book, Hanley rewrites the history of international law and intervenes brilliantly in multiple literatures. A must-read." -Samuel Moyn,

"Hanley's book is a superb historical and sociolegal account of the rise of nationality—the universal regime of legal identification that captures what is unique about the modern world. Along the way, Hanley vividly captures the loss of another world: of concrete and heterogeneous forms of life that sought protection in other networks of affiliation. I recommend this remarkably researched and beautifully written book to scholars in Middle Eastern studies, and also to anyone who is thinking about a key characteristic of our world—the persistence of statelessness." -Samera Esmeir

"Identifying with Nationality is a magisterial investigation into Alexandria's diverse population, which comprised interwoven European, colonial, local, imperial, and national entities. Will Hanley examines this patchwork setting, clarifies that nationality at the end of the nineteenth century was a European privilege, and explores the process by which it would become what it is today: the most fundamental human right. An illuminating masterpiece." -Patrick Weil

Further information is available here.