Sunday, October 21, 2012
9:30 am - 5:00 pm
Featuring Rabbi Sharon Brous & Dr. Shaul Kelner

Sharon Brous is the founding rabbi of IKAR (www.ikar-la.org), a spiritual community dedicated to reanimating Jewish life through soulful religious practice that is rooted in a deep commitment to social justice.  She has been noted as one of the top five rabbis in the country in Newsweek/ Daily Beast, and has been listed among the Forward’s 50 most influential American Jews numerous times.  She was ordained by the Jewish Theological Seminary in 2001 and received a Master’s Degree in Human Rights from Columbia University, where she also received her Bachelor’s Degree.  She serves on the faculty of Wexner Heritage and REBOOT and sits on the board of Rabbis for Human Rights.  In 2012 she received the Lives of Commitment Award from Auburn Theological Seminary, and was the inaugural recipient of the Inspired Leadership Award from the Jewish Community Foundation of Los Angeles, where she lives with her husband and three children.

Shaul Kelner is Associate Professor of Sociology and Jewish Studies at Vanderbilt University and Director of Vanderbilt's Program in Jewish Studies. He studies the cultural politics of American Jewish identity. Shaul has been a Fellow of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem's Institute for Advanced Studies, and a visiting scholar at Tel Aviv University. He is the author of Tours That Bind: Diaspora, Pilgrimage and Israeli Birthright Tourism (NYU Press, 2010), which won awards from the Association for Jewish Studies and American Sociological Association. His current research project, entitled "Tinker, Tourist, Soldier, Spy," focuses on American Jews who traveled to meet refuseniks in the USSR. He lives in Nashville with his wife, Pam, and children, Boaz and Shoshana, and serves there as president of Akiva School, Nashville's Jewish community day school. An alumnus of Wexner Graduate Fellowship Class 8, Shaul chairs the Wexner Graduate Fellowship Selection Committee.