Professors Aaron D. Rubin and Lily Kahn came back on the show to discuss their new book Jewish Languages From A to Z. The book is a comprehensive survey of Jewish languages, covering more than 50 different languages and language varieties and sheds light on the rich variety of languages spoken and written by Jews over the past three thousand years. The book also features a number of photographs of various manuscripts that help bring the languages to life. Aaron D. Rubin is the Malvin E. And Lea P. Bank Professor of Classics and Ancient Mediterranean Studies, Jewish Studies, and Linguistics at Penn State University and Lily Kahn is a Professor of Hebrew and Jewish Languages at University College London. You can purchase the book on Amazon here

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Michael Philip Penn is a professor of religious studies at Stanford University and the author of Envisioning Islam: Syriac Christians and the Early Muslim World as well as the book When Christians First Met Muslims. Professor Penn’s book and research examine Syriac sources to better understand how Christians in the Middle East perceived the early Muslims and in doing so challenge some widespread cultural assumptions about early Christian-Muslim relations.  You can purchase Envisioning Islam on Amazon at this link as well as When Christians First Met Muslims here.

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Sue Frumin is a post-doctoral researcher at Bar Ilan University and archaeobotanist. Sue works in the archaebotany lab run by Professor Ehud Weiss at the university. She is one of the co-authors of a 2015 paper that examined the impact of the Philistine migration on biodiversity in the Southern Levant. You can check out the paper here

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Gideon Bohak is a Professor in the Department of Jewish Philosophy and Talmud at Tel Aviv University. He is a specialist in Jewish magic, especially in Antiquity and the Middle Ages, and in the study of the Cairo Genizah. In this episode of the podcast, we spoke about Jewish magical practices of late antiquity and the use of Jewish amulets, incantation bowls, and manuals in Aramaic and Hebrew. You can purchase Professor Bohak's book Ancient Jewish Magic on Amazon.

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Professor David Ilan has come back to discuss the Chalcolithic age in the Southern Levant (4500 - 3700 BC) and specifically theories concerning religious beliefs about death and reincarnation. Professor Ilan serves as the Director of the Nelson Glueck School of Biblical Archaeology at the Hebrew Union College in Jerusalem and the Director of the Tel Dan excavations. You can read a paper that he co-authored with Professor Yorke Rowan of the University of Chicago, "Deconstructing and Recomposing the Narrative of Spiritual Life in the Chalcolithic of the Southern Levant" here.

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Roni-Henkin is an Associate Professor at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. We spoke about the contact between Palestinian Arabic and Israeli Hebrew and how the two languages have interacted with one another for over a century. One item we did not get around to discussing, but is still important, is the major phenomenon of codeswitching among young Palestinians, and the sociolinguistic implications as it relates to education, social status, and ethnic loyalties. You can download Professor Henkin's research on this topic at Academia.edu

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Lily Kahn is a Professor of Hebrew and Jewish languages at University College London. Professor Kahn is also a scholar of the Yiddish language and published the book Colloquial Yiddish, which can be purchased on Amazon.

In our talk, we examined the history of Yiddish, its rise, fall, and resurgence, and also how the language continues to change and develop.

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Professor David Ilan serves as the Director of the Nelson Glueck School of Biblical Archaeology at the Hebrew Union College in Jerusalem and the Director of the Tel Dan excavations. Our discussion focused on Professor Ilan’s new theory surrounding the emergence of Israelite settlements in the hill country of Canaan.

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Eric Cline is a Professor of Classical and Ancient Near Eastern Studies and Anthropology and the Director of the GWU Capitol Archaeological Institute. He's also the author of the book 1177 BC: The Year Civilization Collapsed, which covers the Bronze Age collapse, its causes, and what we can learn from it. You can purchase the book on Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

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In this episode of the podcast, we spoke with Nesrin Amin, the founder, and host of the Bilmasri blog and podcast. Bilmasri is a blog & podcast dedicated to the Egyptian dialect, its sounds, structures, vocabulary, and the culture behind it. You can download episodes of the Podcast from Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and others and check out the blog at Bilmasri.com 

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