Horror and Literary Manifestations of Fear in Early Modern Judaism

• Applicant: Dr. Ilaria Briata
• Subject Area: Religious Studies and Jewish Studies
• Term: since 2023
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 528051161

While defying functional distinctions between pop and high culture, horror as a genre in literature and cinema has been an increasingly leading area of contemporary cultural production. In the last couple of decades, academia has become more and more involved in investigating horror not only as a cultural phenomenon in (popular) contemporary literatures and arts, but also as a trans-historical category applicable to the forerunners of the Gothic, the weird, and the pulp. Within this refreshing scholarly framework, which is expanding more and more from Western-centric premises towards post-colonial concerns, the field of Jewish studies seems to be underrepresented, despite providing fertile yet uncharted ground. Whereas experiencing a thriving revival in current cinema and literature, Jewish horror still lacks a thorough and systematic scrutiny accounting for its multifarious manifestations throughout the history of Jewish culture - manifestations whose variety gravitates around the representation and performance of the emotion of fear. The 3-year project intends to initiate an original investigation on literary renderings and enactments of the emotional state of fear in early modern Judaism. A short monograph will provide the groundwork for the establishment of 'Jewish horror' as an academic field, by introducing three case studies: (a) Idealizations of Fear in Religious Thought; (b) Narratives on the Demonic; © Verses on Death and the Otherworld. The enquiry will involve a selected pool of Hebrew texts produced between late-16th and mid-18th century, addressing horror motifs via different genres, i.e., musar (psychagogic literature), narrative, and poetry. In addition, the methodological inquiry on the introduction of the scholarly categorization of 'Jewish horror' will be explored during an international workshop expanding the cultural study of fear to further historical and literary phenomena of Judaism. Proceedings will be collected in an edited volume, whose introduction will offer a theoretical reflection on the establishment of 'Jewish horror' scholarship as a novel field of research in Jewish studies and beyond. Finally, the ongoing activities of the project will be showcased on an online platform including blog intercepting an extant and widespread curiosity on the Jewish side of horror in both academic networks and non-specialized audiences.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants