Cara Rock-Singer
1225 Linden Drive, Room 227, Madison, WI 53706
Email: crocksinger@wisc.edu
PROFESSIONAL APPOINTMENTS
University of Wisconsin, Madison 2019-presenT
Assistant Professor of Religious Studies
Affiliated Faculty at the Center for Jewish Studies, Holtz Center for Science and Technology Studies, and Department of Gender and Women’s Studies
Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 2018-2020
Post-Doctoral Fellowship in Jewish Studies
Jewish Studies Program and Science and Technology Studies Department
Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 2017-2018
Visiting Lecturer
Jewish Studies Program and Science and Technology Studies Department
EDUCATION
Ph.D. Columbia University, New York, NY February 2018
Religion, North America Religions Subfield
Dissertation: “Prophetesses of the Body: American Jewish Feminism and The Politics of Embodied Knowledge”
The Conservative Yeshiva, Jerusalem, Israel 2013-2014
Primary Source Study of the Jewish Textual Tradition
Subjects: Tanakh, Mishnah, Talmud, Midrash, Halacha, Biblical Hebrew Grammar, Liturgy, Judaism and Gender
Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel Summer 2011, 2013
Summer Ulpan (Hebrew Language Course)
Levels: Aleph (2011), Dalet (2013)
Oxford University, Regent’s Park College, Oxford, England 2009-2010
M.St., Theology (Religion and Science)
Honors: Distinction
Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 2005-2009
Bachelor of Arts in Molecular Biology; Quantitative Computational Biology Certificate (Minor)
Cumulative GPA: 3.775; Major GPA: 4.07
Honors: Summa Cum Laude; Phi Beta Kappa; Sigma Xi (Science Research Society)
Thesis: Swi/Snf Chromatin Remodeling in Saccharomyces cerevisiae: Global Gene Expression and Nucleosome Positioning upon Glucose Starvation
ACADEMIC PUBLICATIONS
Refereed Journal Articles
“The Textual is Political: Regenerating the Midrashic Corpus East of Eden.” Under Review in Journal of Textual Reasoning
“Meeting Moses Mendelssohn at the Mikveh: An Ethnodrashy.” Submitted to Method and Theory in the Study of Religion, Special Issue on Judaism and Daoism
“Educating for the New Jerusalem to Deliver the Messianic Age: Imagining Friendship for Other Futures with Louis Finkelstein and James Baldwin.” With Leslie Ribovich. Forthcoming in Jewish Quarterly Review, Spring 2024
“Hadassah and the Gender of Modern Jewish Thought: The Affective, Embodied Messianism of Jessie Sampter, Irma Lindheim, and Nima Adlerblum.” American Jewish History 104, 2/3 (April/July 2020): 423-456.
“Milk Sisters: Forging Sisterhood at Kohenet’s Hebrew Priestess Institute.” Forthcoming, Nashim: A Journal of Jewish Women’s Studies
“A Prophetic Guide for a Perplexed World: Louis Finkelstein and the 1940 Conference on Science, Philosophy and Religion.” Religion and American Culture 29(2), May 2019
Amy A. Caudy, Yuanfang Guan…Cara Singer…Maitreya J. Dunham. (2013) “A New System for Comparative Functional Genomics of Saccharomyces Yeast.” Genetics, 195(1): 275-287
Denis Tolkunov, Karl A. Zawadzki, Cara Singer…James R. Broach. (2011) “Chromatin remodelers clear nucleosomes from intrinsically unfavorable sites to establish nucleosome-depleted regions at promoters.” Molecular Biology of the Cell, 22(12): 2106-2118
Book Chapters
“Immersion: The Jewish Ritual Bath in the Protestant Waters of Religion and Science,” Submitted to Science and Religion: approaches from Science and Technology Studies, Zara T. Kamwendo, ed., Palgrave Macmillan (peer reviewed).
“Simple Queer Mikveh Guide and MKV.” Jews Across the Americas: 1492-Present. Laura Arnold Leibman and Adriana M. Brodsky, ed.
“On the Altar of Shekhina: The Kohenet Hebrew Priestess Institute and the Revival of the Jewish Women’s Spiritual Leadership.” Submitted to Jewish Revival(s) Inside Out: Remaking Jewishness in a Post-Secular Age. Rachel Werczberger and Daniel Monterescu, ed.,
“Chicken Soup: Women and the Making of the Modern Jewish Home and Nation.” Beyond Chicken Soup: Jews and Medicine in America, Jewish Museum of Maryland, 2016
Book Reviews
“Review: Beyond the Synagogue: Jewish Nostalgia as Religious Practice by Rachel B. Gross.” American Religion 3, no. 2 (2022): 138-140.
“Review: Conceiving Agency: Reproductive Authority among Haredi Women by Michal S. Raucher.” The Journal of Jewish Identities 14, no. 2 (2021): 249-51.
“Review: Jewish Radical Feminism: Voices from the Women’s Liberation Movement by Joyce Antler.” AJS Review 44(1), 220-222
“Review: The Territories of Science and Religion by Peter Harrison.” The Revealer: A Review of Religion and Media, New York University, 19 February 2016
Essays
“The Bat Mitzvah Immersion: Rippling into Adulthood,” “Political Theology of Childhood Forum,” Forthcoming, Political Theology Network.
“Natality,” “Critical Theory for Political Theology Keywords,” Political Theology Network, January 31, 2023.
“Immersions in a Contagious Summer.” Contagion Symposium, Political Theology Network. September 17, 2020.
AWARDS AND HONORS
Paula Hyman Mentoring Program, Association for Jewish Studies, 2020
Second NA’AMAT USA Research Fellowship in Honor of Elizabeth J. Raider, 2017
AJS Women’s Caucus Innovative Scholarship in Gender and Jewish Studies Prize, 2017
Association for the Social Scientific Study of Jewry Travel Grant, 2016
Bernard and Muriel Bloom Fellowship, Institute for Israel and Jewish Studies, Columbia University, 2016
The Center for Science and Society Seed Grant, Columbia University, 2015-2016
Foreign Language Area Studies Summer Fellowship for Hebrew, 2012
Blair Senior Thesis Award, Molecular Biology, Princeton University, 2009
Highest Academic Achievement Prize, Quantitative Computational Biology, Princeton University, 2009
Best Senior Thesis Prize, Quantitative Computational Biology, Princeton University, 2009
INVITED TALKS (Selected)
Participant, “New Scholarly Directions in an Altered Healthcare Landscape” at Post-Dobbs America Through a Jewish Lens, Emory University November 9-10, 2023
“Making Mikveh Multiple: Amniotic Accounts of Science and Religion,” Keynote Lecture, Beyond Belief: MENA Perspectives on Science and Religion Conference, Hebrew University, June 26-29, 2023
“The Modern Mikveh Movement: The Ritual Bath and the Politics of Jewish Bodily Technology,” Gender and Women’s Studies, Villanova University, March 16, 2023
“The Politics of Ritual by Molly Farneth Book Launch,” Respondent, Villanova’s Center for Political Theology, March 16, 2023
“The Modern Mikveh Movement: The Ritual Bath and the Politics of Jewish Bodily Technology,” Department of Comparative Studies, The Ohio State University, January 23, 2023
“Where Science and Technology Intersect Religion and Spirituality,” Interview on Wisconsin Public Radio’s “Central Time,” July 28, 2022 (https://www.wpr.org/where-science-and-technology-intersect-religion-and-spirituality)
“Gendering Rupture and Reconstruction: Authority, Innovation, and the Body of Jewish Tradition,” New York Working Group on Jewish Orthodoxies, January 21, 2021
CONFERENCE/WORKSHOP ACTIVITY (Selected)
Participant and Presenter, Women and Jewish Thought Workshop, Bloomington Indiana, Indiana University, Forthcoming October 2023 (Zoom) and March 2024
Presenter, “Water Gatherings: Iyyun, Immersion, and the New Media of the Jewish Body Politic,” San Francisco, CA, Forthcoming December 20223
Organizer and Panelist, “How Reproduction is Generating New Directions in Jewish Studies: A Roundtable,” Forthcoming, San Francisco, CA, Forthcoming December 20223
Organizer and Panelist, “Women’s Health and Religion,” American Academy of Religion Annual Meeting; American Religions Unit; San Antonio, TX, Forthcoming November 2023
Panelist, “No Time for Tradition,” American Academy of Religion Annual Meeting; Religion, Affect, and Emotion Unit; San Antonio, TX, Forthcoming November 2023
Chair, “The Archive, the Novel, and Migration” Panel at Society for Novel Studies Biannual Conference, University of Wisconsin-Madison, May 19, 2023
Organizer and Panelist, “Ethnographic Approaches to Classic Categories in Jewish Studies,” The Association for Jewish Studies, Boston, MA, December 2022
Organizer and Panelist, “Gendering Jewish Tradition,” The Association for Jewish Studies, Boston, MA, December 2022
Panelist, “On Whose Terms?: Daoist Studies and the Study of Judaism, Collaborative Efforts to Redress Categories of Religion,” American Academy of Religion Annual Meeting; Daoist Studies Unit; Denver, CO, November 2022
“Jewish Thought and Women’s Lives,” Respondent, American Academy of Religion Annual Meeting; Study of Judaism Unit; Denver, CO, November 2022
Participant, “Online Workshop: STS Methods for Social Study of Science and Religion,” Hosted by Durham University, September 22, 2022
Participant, Judaism and Daoism Working Group and Conference at UW-Madison, May 26-7, 2022
Participant, “One of Us? Ethnography and Jewish Studies” Virtually “at” Syracuse University, May 23, 2022
TEACHING EXPERIENCE
Courses
Religion in Critical Perspective (UW-Madison, Fall 2020)
Religion, Science, and Medicine (UW-Madison, Spring 2020)
Women, Gender, and Religion (UW-Madison, Fall 2019, Fall 2020)
The Jewish Life of DNA (Cornell University, Spring 2019)
Scientific Controversies (Cornell University, Spring 2018)
Gendering Science, Technology, and Religion in America (Cornell University, Spring 2018)
Jewish Women and the Body of Tradition (Cornell University, Fall 2017)
Atoms and Eve: Science and Religion in America (Columbia University, Spring 2016 and Summer 2014)
Teaching Development and Service
Faculty Seminar in Writing Instruction, John S. Knight Institute (Cornell University, 2018)
Lead Teaching Fellow (Columbia University , 2015-2016)
Facilitator, “Crafting Syllabi” and “Teaching Assistant Orientation” Workshops
Organizer and Facilitator, Gender and Authority in the Classroom Panel, Columbia Center for Teaching and Learning, 25 March 2015
Academic Year Teaching Scholar (Columbia University, 2015-2016)
Teagle Teaching Fellow (Columbia University, 2014-2015)
Summer Teaching Scholar (Columbia University, 2014)
SERVICE TO THE PROFESSION
Steering Committee for Study of Judaism Unit, American Academy of Religion (Fall 2019-Present)
Association for Jewish Studies Women’s Caucus Board Member, 2017-2020
President, Columbia Religion Graduate Student Association, 2015-2016
Rapporteur, Religions in America University Seminar, Columbia University, 2014-2016
OTHER PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES (Selected)
Co-Convener with Lea Taragin-Zeller, Ben Kasstan, and Michal Raucher of Center for Jewish History Scholars Working Group on Jewish Reproduction
Signatory on Amici Curiae Brief “Certain Scholars of Jewish Studies and Religion”to Indiana Court of Appeals on Proposed Abortion Ban (Cause No. 22A-PL-2938)
Co-Organizer with Sunny Yudkoff of UW-Madison Seminar for American Jewish Studies, Summer 2022-Present
Jewish Feminist Lineages Working Group, November 2020-Present
Judaism and Daoism Working Group, UW-Madison, January 2021-Present
Social Science Postdoctoral Working Group, Cornell University, 2018-2019
Adjunct Fellow, Herbert D. Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies, University of Pennsylvania, 2016-2017
Co-Facilitator, Science, Technology, and Religion Reading Group, 2015-2016
Oral Historian, David Weiss Halivni and Women’s Ordination, 2014
Consultant, Jewish Museum of Maryland, Beyond Chicken Soup: Jews and Medicine in America, 2013-2016
Research Assistant, Social Science Research Council, New Directions in the Study of Prayer, 2012
TEACHING EXPERIENCE
Jewish Women and the Body of Tradition (UW-Madison, Spring 2023)
Religion and Technology (UW-Madison, Fall 2022, Fall 2023)
The American Jewish Life of DNA (UW-Madison, Spring 2021, Spring 2022, Spring 2023)
Religious Studies Capstone Seminar (UW-Madison, Spring 2021, Spring 2022)
Religion in Critical Perspective (UW-Madison, Fall 2020, Fall 2021)
Religion, Science, and Medicine (UW-Madison, Spring 2020)
Women, Gender, and Religion (UW-Madison, Fall 2019, Fall 2020, Fall 2021, Fall 2022, Fall 2023)
The Jewish Life of DNA (Cornell University, Spring 2019)
Scientific Controversies (Cornell University, Spring 2018)
Gendering Science, Technology, and Religion in America (Cornell University, Spring 2018)
Jewish Women and the Body of Tradition (Cornell University, Fall 2017)
Atoms and Eve: Science and Religion in America (Columbia University, Spring 2016 and Summer 2014
RESEARCH LANGUAGES
English: Native
Hebrew: Proficient in reading, conversational in speaking
French: Proficient in reading and speaking
German: Proficient in reading
PROFESSIONAL MEMBERSHIPS
American Academy of Religion
Association for Jewish Studies
American Jewish Historical Society
Association for the Social Scientific Study of Jewry
Society for Social Studies of Science
REFERENCES
Courtney Bender, Tremaine Professor of Religion, Department of Religion, Columbia University (Ph.D. Advisor)
80 Claremont Avenue, New York, NY 10027
Email: cb337@columbia.edu; Telephone: (212) 851-4134
Laura Levitt, Professor of Religion, Department of Religion, Temple University
641 Mazur Hall
1114 West Polett Walk, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19122
Email: llevitt@temple.edu; Telephone: (215) 204-4745
Jonathan A. Boyarin, Mann Professor of Modern Jewish Studies, Cornell University
McGraw Hall, Room 224, Ithaca, NY 14850
Email: jboyarin@cornell.edu
Suman Seth, Marie Underhill Noll Professor of the History of Science, Cornell University
321 Morrill Hall, Ithaca, NY 14850
Email: ss536@cornell.edu
Gil Anidjar, Professor, Department of Religion, Columbia University
80 Claremont Avenue, New York, NY 10027
Email: ga152@columbia.edu; Telephone: (212) 851-4130