SUMMER EXPLORATIONS PART ONE

The Jewish People has so much potential to contribute to the dramatic and urgent needs of now. But we cannot do this without both understanding of and engagement with "the other.”

MONDAY, JULY 13 at 1:00pm: REVEREND KENNETH FLOWERS
Reverend Kenneth Flowers, senior Pastor of the Greater Mt. Moriah Baptist Church in Detroit Michigan, will speak with Peter Geffen, founder of KIVUNIM. We have asked Reverend Flowers to take us behind the scenes and help us to listen more carefully. He’ll help us to understand what we are hearing, and will share his ideas for what needs to be done. Reverent Flowers is one of the leading spiritual voices of our time. In addition to his dedication to his own community, Reverend Flowers has spent decades building relationships with Jews in Detroit, in Israel and around the world. His social activism has made him a sought-after speaker for a wide variety of interfaith events and programs.

In 2007 he traveled to Morocco with KIVUNIM. Reverend Flowers was mentored by Coretta Scott King who saw in him the traits and skills of her late husband, Martin Luther King.

THURSDAY, JULY 16 at 1:00pm: PETER GEFFEN
Join KIVUNIM's Founder and civil rights movement veteran Peter Geffen for an exploration of the relationship between Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and a comparison of their critical thinking on issues of race in America. The talk is aimed to suggest some elements of the "promise of the future." Geffen will recount his own experiences and weave throughout the teachings of King and Heschel that charted the course of his professional life for the past 50+ years. What guidance can we take from these two masters of a now by-gone era? Hint: a lot!

Peter Geffen worked for Dr. King in the summers of 1965 and 1966 in Orangeburg, SC and is the Founder of the Abraham Joshua Heschel School in NYC.

Our second week in the series will take us to Morocco, where a rich Jewish history has been interwoven with the local Arab-Berber culture for over two thousand years. This week’s speakers will share their work and its ongoing impact on the country, the region, and the world.

MONDAY, JULY 20 at 1:00pm: ANDRÉ AZOULAY
Hon. André Azoulay, Senior Advisor to King Mohammed VI of Morocco and distinguished member of the Moroccan Jewish community, will share the remarkable story of Convivencia, the unique and positive coexistence of Jews and Muslims in Morocco for hundreds of years. More than the history itself however, André will help us understand its implications, including his own unique role within the broader Arab world. Having devoted much of his professional, diplomatic and personal life to building bridges between Arabs and Jews, he will share through his own personal experience the power of positive thinking and engagement. His examples will no doubt surprise you and hopefully lead you to wonder what else you do not know and what we have not yet tried in the pursuit of peace.

THURSDAY, JULY 23 at 1:00pm: LAZIZA DALIL & EL MEHDI BOUDRA
Laziza Dalil and El Mehdi Boudra, co-Founders of The Mimouna Association, will share the remarkable story of their shared creation of a Muslim student organization dedicated to the study of Moroccan Judaism, Moroccan Jewish history and the Hebrew language. They'll detail the establishment of Mimouna’s dynamic outreach program to Moroccan Muslims of all ages, informing them of their shared history with the Moroccan Jewish community. After all, King Mohammad VI says, “The Jews are more Moroccan than the Moroccans.”

Laziza Dalil received her Bachelor of Arts degree in International Studies from Al Akhawayn University in Ifrane, Morocco (AUI) and has spent the past decade working in international diplomacy in the US and Brazilian embassies.

El Mehdi Boudra holds a Master of Arts degree in Coexistence and Conflict Resolution from Brandeis University and a Bachelor of Arts degree in International Studies from Al Akhawayn University in Ifrane, Morocco (AUI).

KIVUNIM is devoted to understanding the global Jewish story, both of our long history and in our own times. We believe that our international story, even with its ups and downs, provides a model for peaceful coexistence, cultural interrelationship, and even inter-dependence. In weeks three and four we move to another volatile and pivotal setting, the State of Israel, where we will encounter a few of the many outstanding coexistence figures of the Arab-Jewish divide.

MONDAY, JULY 27 at 1:00pm: DR. SARAB ABU-RABIA
We will learn from the first Bedouin woman PhD, Dr. Sarab Abu-Rabia, and begin to understand the complex reality of minority life under a Jewish majority in the State of Israel. She will share her own story as the daughter of the first Bedouin physician and the granddaughter of a distinguished Sheikh. As a sociologist, her research has focused on Bedouin women and the importance of their receiving an education even while living within a traditional society:

“I can see this in my own research that education creates local leadership in our people and in our communities, and these leaders can link to our past in order to create a better future. I think that now this issue of local leadership is very important because according to our research, leadership brings loyalty to the region, as opposed to loyalty to just the tribe.”

Sarab received her PhD from Ben-Gurion University in 2006.

THURSDAY, JULY 30 at 1:00pm: GROUP DISCUSSION
For Thursday, July 30th we have rescheduled to have an open mic to allow participants in our summer program to offer comments, ask questions, and hopefully begin a discussion that will take us beyond our formal program. The 30th is Tisha B’av, the day on which the Jewish Tradition marks the historic tragedies of our people’s history. It is a full fast day, like Yom Kippur, and the rituals attached to the day (from the mournful chant of the Book of Lamentations in the morning and evening, to the abstaining from wearing leather, makeup, or festive clothing) seek to personalize the historic. The day is often thought of as divided between Hurban, destruction, and Binyan, rebuilding, with 1 PM often seen as the actual dividing line. Hence our session will be cast in the mood of the optimism necessary to reconstruct after much that we have treasured has been destroyed.  We believe the symbolism fitting for our Summer Explorations.  

The scheduled session with Rabbi Hanan Schlesinger will take place on MONDAY, AUGUST 10 at 1:00 PM EDT.  

We continue where we left off in week three, in Israel, to speak with two more figures influencing the course of history, working in the fields of education, justice-seeking, and mutual understanding among all of Israel’s inhabitants.

MONDAY, AUGUST 3 at 1:00pm: DR. AMAL ELSANA ALH’JOOJ
Dr. Amal Elsana Alh’jooj, the leading Bedouin activist in the Negev and now Director of International Community Action Network (ICAN) at McGill University in Montreal, will share her time with us:

“Since day one, I was really aware of the issues of justice and fairness and women's rights. The issue of being part of a (Bedouin) minority in Israel, and also being part of a patriarchal system: understanding that you are excluded from both, based on who you are as a person, and who you are as a woman. Very early in my life I became aware of this. The fact that I took action wasn't because I was more aware than other people. First, I had the support of my father. Second were the (direction and encouragement) of my grandmother. [But remember,] I was a shepherd from the age of 5 to the age of 17.”

“I CAN” was Amal's signature long before she came to Montreal. Her leadership has changed the face of Bedouin life in the Negev for women and men as well. Amal received her PhD in Social Work from McGill University and a post-doc fellowship at Harvard.

THURSDAY, AUGUST 6 at 12:00pm: SAID ABU SHAKRA
We will talk with Said Abu Shakra, founder of the Umm El-Fahm Gallery where art has become a vehicle of mutual understanding and respect between Israeli Jews, Israeli Arabs and Palestinians. Imperfect, of course. But the gallery is but the beginning of Said's unique vision to create a Museum in which Palestinian art and history will be shown and studied thereby lending dignity to the Arab story in the Jewish State. Again the story offers parallels. Here in the United States we remain mostly ignorant of the experiences of our Black fellow citizens: where they were enslaved, the experience of reconstruction, the period of Jim Crow, the indignities of segregation. When we do not know the story of our neighbor we cannot understand their pain. The Umm El-Fahm Gallery shines a light into a darkness and allows beauty to emerge.

Said Abu Shakra is a retired Jerusalem policeman, an accomplished artist, and an honored and respected citizen of the State of Israel.

MONDAY, AUGUST 10 at 1:00 PM EDT: RABBI HANAN SCHLESINGER
We will talk with Rabbi Hanan Schlesinger one of the founders of Roots/Shorashim/Judur, The Palestinian Israeli Grassroots Initiative for Understanding, Nonviolence and Transformation. Currently he serves as its Director of International Relations. Can Jews and Palestinians ever reconcile their differences? Is reconciliation possible? These questions, at the heart of the Palestinian-Israeli struggle, are in many ways part of the worldwide awakening — seeking to find a way out of the box we find ourselves in. Rabbi Schlesinger will speak from his experience in one of the most contested regions of the world; he will speak personally and intimately.

Prior to the founding of Roots, Rav Hanan spent his whole career teaching Jewish studies in various seminaries, colleges and frameworks in the Jerusalem area, among them Pardes.

SUMMER EXPLORATIONS PART TWO:
”Beyond Conflict:
Arts, Music, New Directions”

THURSDAYS, AUGUST 13th & AUGUST 20th at 1:00 PM EDT: KAREN GERSON ŞARHON
Karen Gerson Şarhon is the Coordinator of the Ottoman-Turkish Sephardic Culture Research Center In Istanbul, Turkey where she was born in 1958. Karen holds a BA in English Language and Literature, an MA in Social Psychology and an MA in Applied Linguistics and wrote both her MA theses on the Judeo-Spanish language. She taught English at the university level from 1984 to 2003 when, at the request of the Jewish community administrators, she founded the Sephardic Culture Research Center, where she has been working as its coordinator ever since. The Sephardic Center of Istanbul is dedicated to the preservation and documentation of all aspects of the Sephardic culture. She is the chief editor of the only monthly newspaper in the world that is entirely in Ladino, El Amaneser and also of the Judeo-Spanish page(s) of the weekly Şalom newspaper. In 2011, she was awarded the medal of Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres de la République Française by the Ministry of Culture of France for her contribution to the world culture and her efforts in the preservation of Judeo-Spanish, an endangered language. In addition she is a talented popular singer of Ladino music and is the founder, singer and presenter of the group Los Pasharos Sefaradis, the most authentic group in Turkish Sephardic music.

Karen will do two sessions, covering Turkish Sephardic Culture in one and Ladino music in the other with some overlap.

MONDAY, AUGUST 17th at 1:00 PM EDT: MICAH HENDLER
Micah Hendler (Forbes 30 Under 30 for Music) is a musical changemaker working to harness the power in each of our voices to make a difference. Micah is the Founder and Artistic Director of the Jerusalem Youth Chorus, an Israeli-Palestinian music and dialogue project featured for its innovative musicianship and integrity of purpose and process from the Late Show with Stephen Colbert to the New York Times. Through the co-creation of music and the sharing of stories, the chorus empowers young singers from East and West Jerusalem to speak and sing their truths as they become leaders in their communities and inspire singers and listeners around the world to join them in their work for peace, justice, inclusion, and equality.

Micah has founded, directed, sung with, or played with dozens of musical ensembles of varying global styles, including the Yale Whiffenpoofs. Micah has also been involved in dialogue work for more than 15 years and has written and presented in many local and global forums about his work with the Jerusalem Youth Chorus, including sharing the keynote presentation of the East-West Philosophers’ Conference with leading Palestinian intellectual and peacemaker Dr. Sari Nusseibeh, as they explored together how sound can be used as a tool to create shared spaces in Jerusalem. Micah is a Founding Partner of Raise Your Voice Labs, a startup social venture that helps groups in transformation create brave spaces to have the discussions that matter—and embody new visions of community in song. He also writes for Forbes.com on music, society, and social change in a global context. He currently lives in Washington, DC.

MONDAY, AUGUST 24th at 1:00 PM EDT: FREDERIC BRENNER
Frederic Brenner was born in Paris in 1959, attended the Sorbonne, where he received a BA in French Literature and Social Anthropology in 1981. He later studied at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales and earned an MA in Social Anthropology awarded by the Sorbonne. In 1981, Brenner undertook a chronicle of Jewish communities around the world, exploring what it means to live and survive with a portable identity: how Jews adopted the traditions and manners of their home countries and yet remained part of the Jewish people. From Rome to New York, India to Yemen, Morocco to Ethiopia, Sarajevo to Samarkand, he spent 25 years in over 40 countries recording the diaspora of the Jews and creating a probing pursuit of the multiplicity of dissonant identities. Along the way, he published five books and directed three films (Marranos, Madres de Desaparecidos, Tykocin). He also began to show his work in museums and galleries around the world. He has been represented by Howard Greenberg Gallery in New York since 1990. Today, Brenner is recognized as the pre-eminent ethnographic photographer of the Jewish people. His slide lecture was the inicial inspiration for KIVUNIM's international program and his collection is unparalleled in the depth of insight and understanding it provides.

THURSDAY, AUGUST 27th at 1:00 PM EDT: TOBI KAHN
Tobi Kahn has been KIVUNIM's Artist-in-Residence for almost two decades. Kahn is a painter and sculptor whose work has been shown in over 40 solo exhibitions and over 60 museum and groups shows since he was selected as one of nine artists to be included in the 1985 Guggenheim Museum exhibition, New Horizons in American Art. Works by Kahn are in major museum, corporate, and private collections. Throughout his career, Kahn has been steadfast in the pursuit of his distinct vision and persistent in his commitment to the redemptive possibilities of art. In paint, stone, and bronze, he has explored the correspondence between the intimate and monumental. While his early works drew on the tradition of American Romantic landscape painting, his more recent pieces reflect his fascinating with contemporary science, inspired by micro-images of cell formations and satellite photography.

“The meditative spaces I create are designed for a range of settings, offering a respite in our fractured world, an interlude of healing. In recent years, I have been making paintings, sculpture, and environments to shape spaces for communities that seek both contemplation and commemoration.

As an artist I am obsessed by memory and its imperatives – time’s passing, the possibility of loss, an abrupt reversal of safety. In the face of the world’s instability, I want to reveal not the evident reality but its essence, its immanent vitality.

My outdoor installation and meditative spaces are not a rupture with the past. Rather, they are an exploration and expression of memory’s living possibilities.”