Jay Prosser
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jaydprosser.bsky.social
Jay Prosser
@jaydprosser.bsky.social
Prof Humanities @universityofleeds. Personal and cultural stories to head off divisive times. Mixed race, Asian Jewish, trans veteran. Most recent: Loving Strangers. Working on: Holocaust Torah scroll shoe soles from Salonika. https://www.jayprosser.com
Pinned
Real privilege to do this conversation on objects, parents, grief and Jews from the Middle East with my dear friend Leslie Hakim-Dowek. jewishliteraryfoundation.co.uk/videos/lovin...
Loving Strangers - Jewish Literary Foundation
Watch Loving Strangers on the JLF Player. This event, featuring Jay Prosser and Leslie Hakim-Dowek, is from Jewish Book Week 2025.
jewishliteraryfoundation.co.uk
Real privilege to do this conversation on objects, parents, grief and Jews from the Middle East with my dear friend Leslie Hakim-Dowek. jewishliteraryfoundation.co.uk/videos/lovin...
Loving Strangers - Jewish Literary Foundation
Watch Loving Strangers on the JLF Player. This event, featuring Jay Prosser and Leslie Hakim-Dowek, is from Jewish Book Week 2025.
jewishliteraryfoundation.co.uk
October 26, 2025 at 9:17 PM
Reposted by Jay Prosser
In the meantime, you can read the story of this object and the Roth Collection here: www.leeds.ac.uk/news-arts-cu...
Opening up pioneering Jewish historian’s treasured collection
Looked at from one side, it’s the leather sole of a child’s shoe, a scarce resource re-purposed during wartime.
www.leeds.ac.uk
July 10, 2025 at 5:27 PM
Reposted by Jay Prosser
This complex, fraught, and tragic object is currently being investigated by a team at the University of Leeds led by @jaydprosser.bsky.social. The sole has several layers, and multi-spectral imaging is being undertaken to understand the whole object. What are the other layers? We'll know soon.
July 10, 2025 at 5:27 PM
I am seeking academic and sectoral partners to join a consortium for a Horizon (EU) 2025 funding bid for a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Doctoral Network focused on Jewish Cultural Heritage. #Jewish #Heritage #Museums #Tourism #Culture www.b2match.com/e/radiance-m...
MSCA DN 2025: Jewish Cultural Heritage | The Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Matchmaking Platform
The platform provides an opportunity for companies, SMEs, Universities, Research Centres, NGOs, to find partners and offer opportunities to future MSCA fellows
www.b2match.com
June 24, 2025 at 3:18 PM
June 9, 2025 at 10:26 AM
Applying for EU funding. Please contact me if this call resonates for you: Bridging historical past and future potential through conservation, preservation, and adaptive use of Europe’s contentious and dissonant heritage. platform.crowdhelix.com/opportunitie....
Crowdhelix login
platform.crowdhelix.com
June 9, 2025 at 9:29 AM
A year ago today. Paperback and US edition coming soon. Nothing without this person.
May 28, 2025 at 4:56 PM
REF2029: 'shatters the artificial barrier between “prestigious” research and real-world impact.'. www.timeshighereducation.com/opinion/lets...
Let’s embrace the REF’s radical redefinition of academic excellence
We finally have a mechanism to overthrow the UK’s neo-feudal system of academic gatekeeping, say Krzysztof Nawratek and Lakshmi Priya Rajendran
www.timeshighereducation.com
May 1, 2025 at 7:07 PM
Not anymore apparently, Simone. www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crim...
April 16, 2025 at 6:06 PM
As I return fro the US researching Salonika Holocaust material culture in Jewish archives, I am reeling from what they, and my friends, are facing. Maybe In a few months time, I would not have been able to do such independent research. @uk.theconversation.com theconversation.com/universities....
Universities in Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union thought giving in to government demands would save their independence
Before the Nazis, German universities were among the best in the world. Step by step, the universities gave up their independence until they were instruments of the state.
theconversation.com
April 11, 2025 at 5:12 PM
Today I met a curator of a small Holocaust museum in Nebraska who's already had to cancel an exhibition. www.artnews.com/art-news/new...
Trump Administration Threatens Extreme Cuts to the National Endowment for the Humanities
Under the Trump administration, DOGE recommended staff cuts by as much as 70 to 80 percent, as well as the cancellation of all outstanding grants.
www.artnews.com
April 8, 2025 at 11:31 PM
Wednesday April 2 2025, 6-7:30 PM. Loving Strangers: A Camphorwood Chest, a Legacy, a Son Returns. A conversation, with respondents Carol Becker (Columbia School of the Arts) and Mikhal Dekel (CUNY Graduate Center). Faculty House, Columbia University. Register here. docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...
March 23, 2025 at 3:55 PM
My article on the Jewish mahallah of Singapore now out with Journal of Transcultural Studies. Thanks to National Archives and Jewish Welfare Board Singapore for their fantastic resources. Looking forward to further collaboration on mapping the mahallah. heiup.uni-heidelberg.de/journals/tra...
March 10, 2025 at 10:28 AM
Reposted by Jay Prosser
A new issue of the Journal of Transcultural Studies is now available open-access! It features articles by @jaydprosser.bsky.social (Leeds), Alexander Vesey (Tokyo), Ori Sela (Tel Aviv) and Dhruv Raina (New Delhi/Pune).

Great reads all; check them out here:
heiup.uni-heidelberg.de/journals/tra...
Vol. 15 No. 1-2 (2024) | The Journal of Transcultural Studies
heiup.uni-heidelberg.de
March 7, 2025 at 2:23 PM
I interviewed my mother about why my Chinese grandmother became such a strong Jew. Here's what she said. More of this story of loving strangers @jewishliteraryfoundation.co.uk on Sunday. jewishliteraryfoundation.co.uk/events/lovin...
March 5, 2025 at 8:41 PM
My brilliant filmmaker niece, Rosa Prosser, is working on a film about our Asian Jewish legacy in Singapore. Here's a clip. More to come at jewishliteraryfoundation.co.uk/.../loving-s...
February 28, 2025 at 2:57 PM
Returns to our mothers' archives. A visual conversation with Leslie Hakim-Dowek at @jewishliteraryfoundation.co.uk next week. Still a few tickets left. jewishliteraryfoundation.co.uk/events/lovin...
February 27, 2025 at 8:24 PM
Next up: really excited to be in conversation @jewishliteraryfoundation.co.uk Book Week with my dear friend, photographer Leslie Hakim-Dowek, on our parallel journeys into our mothers' archives. The things they keep. jewishliteraryfoundation.co.uk/events/lovin...
Loving Strangers - Jewish Literary Foundation
Loving Strangers: A Camphorwood Chest, a Legacy, a Son Returns is a powerful family memoir reimagining Jewish identity beyond the familiar landscapes of Europe and the Shoah, journeying through Iraq, ...
jewishliteraryfoundation.co.uk
February 23, 2025 at 9:15 PM
Now is precisely the time for loving strangers. @mcrjewishmuseum.bsky.social tonight. Please join me. www.manchesterjewishmuseum.com/event/secret...
February 20, 2025 at 2:32 PM
Reposted by Jay Prosser
These would be used for storing tallit and tefillin and were gifted to Abdallah Iny, for his bar mitzvah in 1883.

It’s just incredible to think that these objects survived over 140 years and now have a home in our collection!
February 19, 2025 at 4:36 PM
Reposted by Jay Prosser
Is there an object that fascinates you?

Tomorrow, author Jay Prosser is leading a creative workshop for families, where we’ll write stories inspired by special objects in our lives.

We asked Jay to share an object that holds deep meaning for him and here’s what he said 👇@jaydprosser.bsky.social
February 19, 2025 at 4:36 PM