SCJS-2026 Featured Speakers

The Stanley M. Hordes Distinguished Scholar Lecture

Roger Martinez, Univ. of Colorado, Colorado Springs: Crypto-Judaism: The Southern Atlantic Jewish Experience

The Stratton-Petit Sosin Address to Advance Scholarship in the Crypto-Judaic Arts

  • Marcia Fine: Crypto-Jews as Inspiration in Historical Fiction: Understanding How the Trauma of Duality Shaped Jewish Life

The Ben-Zvi Research Fellowship: Global Field Investigations into Crypto-Jewish Communities

  • Malka Shabtay: The Ben-Zvi Research Fellowship: Supporting Emerging Scholarship on Crypto-Jewish Communities
  • Rabbi David A. Kunin: From Kisar to Ambon: Converso Traditions and Emerging Jewish Identity in Indonesia’s Maluku Islands
  • Gabriel Gualán Maldonado: Hidden Heritage in Southern Ecuador: The Crypto-Jewish Legacy of Loja
  • Juliana de Albuquerque: Shifting perceptions of Jewish identity within groups of the Brazilian population with ties to the Jewish people

Sephardic and Crypto-Judaic Studies

  • Hélène Jawhara Piñer: The Chocolate Diaspora: Sephardic Jews and the Journey of Cacao
  • Diego Martínez Serrano: Baths and Synagogues: Material Evidence of Crypto-Jewish Life in Colonial Mexico City
  • Mark A. Schneegurt: Pamphlets and Periodicals Published by A. C. Barros Basto for the Crypto-Jewish Communities of Northern Portugal
  • César David Ciriano Vela and Magda Moreno Ciriano: The Philosephardic Movement and the Reconnection of the Sephardic and Hispanic Worlds: 1869–2026
  • Leah Stein: Reading Between the Lines, Speaking into the Silences: Doctor John de Sequeyra and Being Jewish in Eighteenth-Century Virginia
  • Isaac Amon: From Crypto-Jew to Jewish Pioneer: Dr. Samuel Nunes and the Founding of Jewish Savannah
  • David Gonzalez Guajardo: The Invisible Return: Modern Anusim, Microaggressions, and the Barriers to American Jewish Integration
  • Ricardo Villarreal De Silva: A Rooster’s Double Meaning: Symbolism, Persistence, and Converso Concealment (more on an artifact published in HaLapid)
  • Dr. Cicero Adson de Souza Ferraz: Crypto-Jewish Presence in the Pajeú and Seridó Hinterlands: A Comparative Analysis of Incidence, Family Signatures, and Genetic Heritage with Emphasis on Floresta do Navio, Betânia, Itacuruba, Carnaubeira da Penha, Carqueja, and Airi
  • Manashe Khaimov: Chala Jews: The Untold Story of the Jews of Bukhara Who Converted Publicly and Kept Judaism Alive at Home
  • Joseph S. Berríos: Hidden in Plain Sight: Jíbaro Identity as Crypto-Jewish Concealment Strategy in Puerto Rico