Alexander Samely

Prof

  • Religions and Theology, SALC
    The University of Manchester
    Samuel Alexander Building
    Oxford Road, Manchester, M13 9PL

Personal profile

Overview

Contact:
Religions and Theology, School of Arts, Languages and Cultures, Samuel Alexander Buliding
The University of Manchester, Oxford Road, Manchester M13 9PL
Email: [email protected]
Tel. (0)161-2753072

Further information

Office hours

Semester 2: Office Hours Wednesdays in person 1.15- 2.15pm; Thursdays by zoom  2.15–3.15 pm ; and by arrangement

 

Biography

MA in Philosophy Frankfurt 1985, MSt in Jewish Studies in the Graeco-Roman Period Oxford 1984, DPhil Oriental Studies (Targums) Oxford 1989. I led a major AHRC project on the "Typology of Pseudepigraphic and Anonymous Jewish Literature c.200 BCE to 700 CE" between 2007 and 2012. It produced a new approach to the description of ancient Jewish literature, the so-called Manchester-Durham Inventory (literarydatabase.humanities.manchester.ac.uk). In 2024, my interest in text meaning led to a phenomenological study of reading as a contemporary activity, in the monograph Reading and Experience. A Philosophical Investigation (Contributions to Hermeneutics 13, Springer). My research also includes intercultural philosophizing.

Research interests

  • Literary structures in ancient Jewish literature, including biblical and talmudic literature - narrative, law and hermeneutics
  • Pseudepigrapha and Apocrypha of the Hebrew Bible
  • The philosophical thought of Spinoza, Kant, Husserl, Rosenzweig, Levinas
  • The Phenomenology of Reading and Theories of Text Meaning
  • Hebrew Manuscripts

Further information

I am a co-editor of the monograph series Studia Judaica published by Walter de Gruyter/Brill (Berlin), together with Charlotte Fonrobert (Stanford), Elisabeth Hollender (Frankfurt), Matthias Lehmann (Cologne), Günter Stemberger (Vienna, retired) and Michael Zank (Boston).

I convene the Manchester Phenomenology Reading Group (by zoom). In 2024/25 we meet to discuss Deleuze's Difference and Reptition.

Research Beacons, Institutes and Platforms

  • Creative Manchester

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