Christopher Silver

Christopher SilverDirector of Graduate Studies, Assistant Professor

Segal Family Assistant Professor in Jewish History and Culture

Areas of Interest:

Modern Jewish history; 20th century North Africa and Middle East; popular culture and music

Education:

Ph.D., University of California, Los Angeles, 2017.

C. Phil., University of California, Los Angeles, 2015.

M.A., University of California, Los Angeles, 2014.

B.A., University of California, Berkeley, 2005.

Publications:

Books

Recording History: Jews, Muslims, and Music across Twentieth-Century North Africa (Stanford University Press, 2022).

Articles

“I Sing and I Pray: Samy Elmaghribi’s Sonic Reflection on Music and Religion,” Canadian Jewish Studies/Études juives canadiennes, Vol. 33 (2022): Spring 2022, 178-190.

“Recording Jewish-Muslim Musical Encounters in Interwar North Africa,” catalogue de l’exposition Juifs et Musulmans en France. De l’Empire à l’Hexagone (1860 à nos jours), Benjamin Stora, Karima Dirèche, and Mathias Dreyfuss, eds (Seuil, 2022), 90-93.

“Nationalist Records: Jews, Muslims, and Music in Interwar North Africa,” in Dynamic Jewish-Muslim Interactions in Performance Art, 1920-2020, ed., Sami Everett and Rebekah Vince (Liverpool University Press, 2020), 59-78.

“The Sounds of Nationalism: Music, Moroccanism, and the Making of Samy Elmaghribi." International Journal of Middle East Studies 52, no. 1 (2020): 23–47.

“Listening to the Past: Music as a Source for the Study of North African Jews,” solicited contribution to “Jews of Morocco and the Maghreb: History and Historiography,” ed., Aomar Boum, Jessica Marglin, Khalid Ben-Srhir, and Mohammed Kenbib, special issue of Hespéris-Tamuda. vol. L1.

Reviews

The Holocaust and North Africa, edited by Aomar Boum and Sarah Abrevaya Stein, Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, published in association with the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum 2019, Arab Studies Journal, vol. 27, no. 2 (Fall 2019).

Popular Writing and General Audience

Amplifying Cheikh Pinhas,” AJS Perspectives: The Magazine of the Association for Jewish Studies, The Unfinished Issue (Fall 2020), 36-38.

Sonic Geniza: Finding Zohra El Fassia in Los Angeles.” In 100 Years of Sephardic Los Angeles, edited by Sarah Abrevaya Stein and Caroline Luce. Los Angeles: UCLA Leve Center for Jewish Studies, 2020.

Jews of the Maghreb on the Eve of the Second World War,” with Aomar Boum and Sarah Abrevaya Stein. Holocaust Encyclopedia, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, 2019.

The Life and Death of North Africa's First Superstar,” Miscellanies, History Today, April 2018.

For more information and to access publications, see: https://mcgill.academia.edu/ChrisSilver

Grants and Awards:

Internal Social Sciences and Humanities Development Grant, McGill University (2020)

Paper Presentation Grant, McGill University (2019)

Arts Student Employment Fund, McGill University (2019)

Posen Society of Fellows (2016-2017)

ACLS/Mellon Dissertation Completion Fellowship (2016, declined)

American Academy Jewish Research, Travel Grant (2016)

UCLA Center for Jewish Studies, Sady Kahn Fellow (2015)

Maurice Amado Summer Research Award (2015)

UCLA History Department, Graduate Student Research Travel Grant (2015)

American Institute for Maghrib Studies, Short-Term Grant (2014)

UCLA Graduate Student Research Mentorship Award (2014)

UCLA History Department, Graduate Student Research Travel Grant (2013)

UCLA Center for Jewish Studies, Roter Research Travel Grant (2013)

Maurice Amado Program Summer Research (2013)

Maurice Amado Program Summer Research (2012)

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