Mosse/Weinstein Center for Jewish Studies lecture by Jordan Rebekah Katz, University of Massachusetts Amherst.
Zoom livestream also available – click here to register and receive the link
This talk examines the role of Jewish midwives in early modern Europe, focusing primarily on Amsterdam in the early to mid eighteenth century. Tracing the story of Roza Salomons—a Jewish midwife who commissioned a Yiddish translation of a Dutch midwifery treatise in 1709—the presentation investigates how Jewish midwives navigated between municipal medical regulations and Jewish communal standards, shaping the institutions with which they engaged in the process. Archival materials from communal logbooks, delivery registers, and municipal records demonstrate that while Jewish midwives were influenced by burgeoning civic norms, this process was selective and was often met with deep tensions.
Jordan Katz is an assistant professor in the Department of Judaic and Near Eastern Studies at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Her book-in-progress, Delivering Knowledge: Jewish Midwives and Hidden Healing in Early Modern Europe, explores the history of Jewish midwives within communal, intellectual, and medical frameworks in the early modern world. Katz received her PhD from Columbia University in 2020, and has held fellowships at Harvard Divinity School, Yale University, and the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute at Brandeis University.
