Genealogies of the Future

BISA lecture (recorded on 09/12/15) - The work of determining lines of Jewish kinship is primarily understood as oriented toward the past, as a recovery of memory or “heritage,” often in the service of present identity. In fact, the recitation of what we commonly call “blood ties” has always been oriented toward the future as well - often, but not only, in the process of contracting marriages and thus perpetuating kinship itself. And the converse is true as well: kinship and marriage become less important at historical moments when one’s identity is seen as less dependent on one’s genealogy. Yet this future orientation may be more dominant than ever in our practices of kin-making today.
Drawing on documents ranging from a late story by Grace Paley, to recent ethnography of Yiddish philanthropy as fictive kinship, to artistic re-imaginings of a lost family album, Professor Boyarin will begin to articulate the hopes and anxieties underlying the tenuous image of the future in which our records of the past take shape.