Sharon Oster Ph.D.
Professor; Faculty Co-Advisor, University of Redlands Hillel
English
Education
- Ph.D., English, University of California, Los Angeles
- M.A., English, University of California, Los Angeles
- M.A., comparative literature, University of California, Los Angeles
- B.A., English, University of Michigan
Professional Background
Sharon Oster is a professor of English at the University of Redlands. Prior to joining the faculty, she was a postdoctoral fellow at University of California, Irvine, and a visiting lecturer at University of California, Los Angeles. She has been a repeated fellow at the Mandel Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, where she has conducted research on Holocaust testimony and pedagogy, piloted the digital teaching resource Experiencing History, and participated in the research workshop “Photography of Atrocity.” In 2019, she was a fellow at the Holocaust Education Foundation Summer Institute on the Holocaust and Jewish Civilization at Northwestern University.
Research
Professor Oster’s research focuses on American literary realism, the novel, memory studies, American Jewish literature, and Holocaust studies. Her book No Place in Time: The Hebraic Myth in Late-Nineteenth-Century American Literature (Wayne State University Press, 2018) examines the philosemitic trope of the “Hebrew” in nineteenth-century American literature and its role in shaping narratives of modernity, nationalism, and Jewish identity. Her current book project, Living Death: Rethinking the Muselmann in Holocaust Literature and Visual Culture (under contract, Wayne State University Press), critically reexamines the concept of the Muselmann in survivor testimony, literature, photography, and visual culture, including sustained attention to the figure of the female Muselmann. She is also active in digital humanities and directs the GIS-based project Cartographies of Suffering: Mapping Holocaust Accounts, which uses ESRI StoryMaps to spatially map survivor testimonies.
Professional Experience
- Executive committee member, MLA Forum in Jewish American Languages, Literatures, and Cultures, 2017–2022
- Manuscript reviewer, SUNY Press; Northwestern University Press; Studies in American Jewish Literature; Shofar; Humanities; English Language Notes; Contemporary Literature; Literature Compass
- Co-convener, Southern California Americanist Group, 2007–2010
- Chair, Department of English, University of Redlands, July 2013–July 2016
- Faculty advisor, Hillel, University of Redlands, 2006–present
- Visiting lecturer, University of California, Los Angeles, 2004–2005; University of Southern California, Fall 2004
Areas of Expertise
- American Jewish literature and culture
- Ethnic studies
- Holocaust studies
- Literature and religion
- Nineteenth- and twentieth-century American literature
Publications
Books
- Living Death: Rethinking the Muselmann in Holocaust Literature and Visual Culture. Wayne State University Press, under contract.
- No Place in Time: The Hebraic Myth in Nineteenth-Century American Literature. Wayne State University Press, 2018.
Articles and Book Chapters
- “Cartographies of Suffering: Mapping Holocaust Memory.” In Handbook to New Approaches in Cultural Memory Studies, ed. Brett Ashley Kaplan. Bloomsbury, forthcoming.
- “Emma Lazarus’ Cosmopolitanism.” In American Literature in Transition, 1876–1910, ed. Lindsay Reckson. Cambridge University Press, forthcoming.
- “The Female Muselmann in Nazi Concentration Camp Discourse.” Journal of Holocaust Research 34, no. 3 (2020): 198–219.
- “The Muselmann Liberated: Impossible Metaphors in Holocaust Literature and Photography.” In Lessons and Legacies XIV, ed. Tim Cole and Simone Gigliotti. Northwestern University Press, 2021.
- “Holocaust Shoes: Metonymy, Matter, Memory.” In Palgrave Handbook of Holocaust Literature and Culture. Palgrave, 2020.
- “Impossible Metaphors of Holocaust Representation: The Muselmann.” Prooftexts 34, no. 3 (2014): 302–348.
- “The Pupil,” “Anti-Semitism,” and “The Dreyfus Affair.” In Critical Companion to Henry James: A Literary Reference to His Life and Work, edited by Eric Haralson and Kendall Johnson. Facts On File/Infobase, 2009.
- “The Shop of Curiosities: Henry James, ‘the Jew,’ and the Production of Value.” English Literary History 75, no. 4 (2008): 963–992.
- “‘The Erotics of Auschwitz’: Coming of Age in The Painted Bird and Sophie’s Choice.” In Witnessing the Disaster: Essays on Representation and the Holocaust, edited by Michael Bernard-Donals and Richard Glejzer, 90–124. University of Wisconsin Press, 2003.
Review Essays and Encyclopedia Entries
- “Emma Lazarus.” Oxford Bibliographies in American Literature. Oxford University Press.
- “Splintered Temporalities: On Cindy Weinstein’s A Question of Time.” Los Angeles Review of Books, Oct. 7, 2020.
- Review of Textual Silence: Unreadability and the Holocaust, by Jessica Lang. MELUS 45, no. 3 (2020): 209–212.
- Review of American Naturalism and the Jews, by Donald Pizer. American Jewish History 94, no. 4 (Winter 2009).
Presentations
Holocaust Literature, Memory, and Visual Culture
- Virtual book launch, Lessons and Legacies XIV, edited by Simone Gigliotti and Tim Cole. Northwestern University Press, 2021; invited discussion of “The Muselmann Liberated: Impossible Metaphors in Holocaust Literature and Photography.” Sponsored by the Holocaust Education Foundation of Northwestern University, Dec. 16, 2020.
- “The Secret Life of Holocaust Shoes,” MLA Annual Convention, Seattle, Jan. 9, 2020.
- Panel chair, “Visualizing Holocaust Narratives and Memory in Graphic Memoir, Film, and Photography,” Association for Jewish Studies, San Diego, Dec. 15, 2019.
- “Cartographies of Suffering: Mapping Holocaust Testimonies,” UCGIS Conference, Dupont Hotel, Washington, D.C., June 10–13, 2019.
- “Impossible Holocaust Metaphors: Shoes, Matter, Memory,” Lessons and Legacies Biannual Conference of the Holocaust Education Foundation, Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, Nov. 2, 2018.
- Panel chair and presenter, “Auschwitz Doubles: The Female Muselmann?” Western Jewish Studies Association, San Antonio, Texas, March 11, 2018.
- “Necropolitical Holocaust Metaphors: The Muselmann in Liberation Photography and Postwar Visual Culture,” Jewish American and Holocaust Literature Symposium, South Beach, Florida, Nov. 14, 2017.
- Panel author and presenter, “Impossible Holocaust Metaphors: The Muselmann,” MLA Annual Convention, Philadelphia, Jan. 5–8, 2017.
- “Impossible Holocaust Metaphors: The Muselmann,” Lessons and Legacies XIV Biannual Conference of the Holocaust Education Foundation, Claremont, California, Nov. 3–6, 2016.
- “Mapping Holocaust Memoirs: Technology, Ethics, and Pedagogy,” Center for Spatial Studies, University of Redlands, Nov. 17, 2014.
- “Impossible Holocaust Metaphors: The Muselmann,” Americanist Research Colloquium, University of California, Los Angeles, Oct. 16, 2014.
- “A Cartography of Suffering?: Mapping Holocaust Testimony,” American Comparative Literature Association Annual Meeting, New York University, March 20–23, 2014.
- “Mapping Holocaust Memoirs: Technology, Ethics, and Pedagogy,” Esri Educational GIS Conference, San Diego, July 6–9, 2013.
- Seminar author and co-chair, “Mapping Oppression: Translating Literary and Geographical Sites of Terror”; presenter, “Holocaust Memoirs: Reading, Writing, Mapping,” American Comparative Literature Association, Toronto, Canada, April 4–7, 2013.
- Invited lecture, “Figuring the Muselmann: The Object Matter of Holocaust Representation,” Aesthetics After the Holocaust, University of California, Los Angeles, Feb. 7–8, 2010.
- Seminar co-chair, “Difficult Journeys: Texts That Challenge”; presenter, “Why Teach Holocaust Texts?” American Comparative Literature Association, Long Beach, California, April 26, 2008.
Jewish American Literature, Religious Aesthetics, and Cultural Identity
- Panel chair, “Jewish Myths/Mythic Jews,” MLA Annual Convention, Washington, D.C., Jan. 9, 2022.
- Panel chair, “Yiddish and Hebrew in America,” Western Jewish Studies Association annual conference, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, March 14, 2021 (virtual).
- “Emma Lazarus’s Cosmopolitanism,” Jewish American and Holocaust Literature Symposium, South Beach, Florida, Nov. 12, 2019.
- “The Hebraic Myth and Christian Typology in American Literature,” Western Jewish Studies Association, California State University, San Bernardino, Palm Desert, California, May 5, 2019.
- “A Figure Out of Time: The Hebraic Myth and Christian Typology in American Literature,” Jewish American and Holocaust Literature Symposium, South Beach, Florida, Nov. 12, 2018.
- “A Figure Out of Time: The Hebraic Myth and Christian Typology in American Literature,” University of Redlands Faculty Forum, Jan. 25, 2018.
- “A Figure Out of Time: The Hebraic Myth and Christian Typology,” Southern California Americanist Group, Huntington Library, June 2, 2017.
- “The Melting Pot and Progressive Reform: Mary Antin, Anzia Yezierska, and the Jewish American Future,” Western Jewish Studies Association, Claremont, California, March 26–27, 2017.
- “The Melting Pot and Progressive Reform: Anzia Yezierska and the Jewish American Future,” ALA Symposium, The American Short Story: An Expansion of the Genre, Savannah, Georgia, Oct. 20–22, 2016.
- Roundtable chair, “Making Our Way in the World Today: Early-Career Scholars, Community, Publicity,” MLA Annual Convention, Austin, Texas, Jan. 9, 2016.
- Invited panel chair, respondent, and roundtable participant, “Thinking Beyond the Canon: New Themes and Approaches to Jewish Studies,” University of California, Los Angeles, Center for Jewish Studies, March 8–9, 2015.
- “Borrowed Time: Gambling, Chance, and Naturalist Fictions of Decline in The House of Mirth,” Southern California Americanist Group, Huntington Library, Oct. 3, 2014.
- Panel author and organizer, “The Aesthetics of Time in American Literary Realism,” MLA Annual Convention, Los Angeles, Jan. 6–9, 2011.
- Panel author and organizer, “Religious Aesthetics in Nineteenth-Century American Literature: A Comparative Approach”; presenter, “A Figure Out of Time: The Noble Hebrew and Christian Typology in American Literature,” MLA Annual Convention, Philadelphia, Dec. 27–30, 2009.
- Panel chair and presenter, “Race and Nation” and “Lost in Translation: Strands of Jewishness in ‘The Pupil,’” International Conference of the Henry James Society, Newport, Rhode Island, July 9–16, 2008
Awards and Service
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Holocaust Education Foundation of Northwestern University (HEFNU) Teaching Grant, 2021-22.
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University of Redlands, Faculty Research Grants, 2016-2022.
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Holocaust Education Foundation Fellowship, Summer Institute on the Holocaust and Jewish Civilization, Northwestern University, June 2019.
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United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM), Mandel Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies, Washington, D.C., Research Workshop Fellowship, “Photography of Atrocity,” June 2017.
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University of Redlands, Spatial Community of Practice Grant, 2015.
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University of Redlands, Faculty Research Grant, 2014-15.
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USHMM Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies, Washington, D.C., Fellowship, "Teaching the Holocaust Digitally: A Source Study Approach," 2014.
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University of Redlands, LENS Faculty Development Grant, 2014.
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University of Redlands, Faculty Research Grant, 2013.
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University of Redlands, W. M. Keck Foundation LENS Faculty Fellowship in Spatial Learning, 2012.
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University of Redlands, Nominated, Graves Award, 2011.
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USHMM Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies, Washington, D. C., Jack and Anita Hess Seminar for Faculty, Jan. 3-7, 2011.
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University of Redlands, Faculty Research Grant, 2007-08, 2009-10
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University of California, Irvine, Postdoctoral Fellowship, 2003-04
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UCLA, Alfred E. Longueil Dissertation Fellowship, 2002-03
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UCLA, Chancellor's Dissertation Fellowship, 2001-02
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UCLA, Philip and Ada Siff Educational Foundation Graduate Fellowship, (declined), 2002
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UCLA, College of Letters and Science Charles E. and Sue K. Young Graduate Student of the Year Award, 2001.
Affiliations
- American Comparative Literature Association
- Association of Jewish Studies
- Huntington Library, manuscript reader
- Modern Language Association
- Southern California Americanist Group
- Western Jewish Studies Association