Join us on Wednesday, April 2 at 7 pm for a panel discussion with Mark Firmani, Judith Frank, and Mary Renda on Our American Israel: The Story of an Entangled Alliance by the late Amy Kaplan. The panel will be moderated by Elizabeth Garland.

Amy Kaplan’s Our American Israel was first published in 2018; shortly after, the author, a member of Mount Holyoke’s English Department faculty from 1986 to 2002 and subsequently Professor of English at the University of Pennsylvania, was diagnosed with the brain cancer that would take her life in 2020. Our American Israel examines popular narratives in American news media, fiction, and film, and shows how they helped create a shared sense of identity between two nations that both had histories as settler societies.

Since that time, the events of October 7, 2023 and the subsequent destruction of Gaza have made Kaplan’s insights more urgent than ever. It is therefore our honor to celebrate the release of Our American Israel in paperback, so that its imperative message can reach more people and so it may continue to shape the conversation about the U.S.’s deeply embedded relationship with Israel.

Doors open at 6:30 pm. Please register.