The fellowship program invites roughly twenty scholars each year to conduct research on a specific theme within the various fields of Judaic studies. Each fellow is given an office at the Herbert D. Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies in downtown Philadelphia, and receives research support from the Katz Center's staff and amazing librarians. During the course of the year the fellows work on their individual projects and meet at weekly seminars to discuss their on-going work in the company of their colleagues. The atmosphere of intellectual camaraderie, of sharing and mutual learning in a company of diverse but focused interests, is the essence of the Katz Center's program. The fellows have ample opportunity to get involved with the academic life on Penn's campus, and to interact with students. At the close of the year, the results of the year's research are presented at a colloquium at which the Katz Center, in consultation with the fellows, invites other scholars to join the fellows for a public conference that brings together the findings, collective and individual, of the year's research and opens new avenues of inquiry. The papers are published by the University of Pennsylvania Press. 

The 2008 - 2009 program will be

JEWS, COMMERCE, AND CULTURE