Ilana Feldman

Ilana Feldman
Name	Ilana Feldman
Occupation	Anthropologist, Historian, Professor
Discipline	Anthropology, History, Political Science

Ilana Feldman is a scholar whose work intersects anthropology, history, and political studies with a focus on displacement, memory, and bureaucracy. She has contributed to debates about refugees, camps, archives, and urban life through ethnographic fieldwork, archival research, and comparative analysis. Feldman's scholarship engages with institutions, social movements, and international law, influencing scholars across anthropology, Middle Eastern studies, and human rights.

Early life and education

Feldman was raised in contexts that informed her interests in Israel, Palestine, United Kingdom, and United States debates about displacement and memory, and studied at institutions linked to research traditions from Harvard University to Oxford University and University of California, Berkeley. She completed undergraduate and graduate training that combined ethnography with archival methods associated with scholars from Cambridge University, London School of Economics, Princeton University, and Yale University. Her doctoral work drew on methodological conversations involving figures from Clifford Geertz-influenced circles and debates shaped by scholars connected to Max Weber and Michel Foucault traditions. Training included engagement with archives like those of United Nations Relief and Works Agency and national repositories such as Israel State Archives and Palestinian Archives.

Academic career

Feldman has held faculty and research positions at major universities associated with interdisciplinary centers such as those at Georgetown University, George Washington University, Brown University, and University of Michigan. She has been affiliated with research institutes that connect to the work of Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, International Committee of the Red Cross, and United Nations agencies. Feldman served on editorial boards and advisory committees alongside scholars from American Ethnological Society, American Anthropological Association, and Middle East Studies Association. Her institutional roles included collaborations with centers named after figures like Edward Said and organizations such as Institute for Palestine Studies, Center for Contemporary Arab Studies, and Scholars at Risk.

Research and major works

Feldman’s publications analyze displacement, memory, bureaucratic practice, and space, building on literatures connected to Hannah Arendt, Walter Benjamin, Antonio Gramsci, and Pierre Bourdieu. Her major books and articles engage case studies tied to Gaza Strip, West Bank, Yemen, Lebanon, Syria, and diasporic communities in London, New York City, and Berlin. She has examined institutional actors such as United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, International Criminal Court, Israeli Defense Forces, Palestinian Authority, and municipal bodies like the Jerusalem Municipality and Ramallah Municipality. Feldman’s analyses situate archives and memory practices in relation to events including the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, 1967 Six-Day War, First Intifada, and Second Intifada, while engaging legal frameworks such as 1949 Geneva Conventions and instruments discussed at United Nations General Assembly sessions. Her comparative approach dialogues with scholarship published by presses associated with Oxford University Press, Cambridge University Press, Princeton University Press, and journals like American Anthropologist and Comparative Studies in Society and History.

Awards and honors

Feldman has received fellowships and prizes granted by institutions such as MacArthur Foundation, National Endowment for the Humanities, American Council of Learned Societies, Social Science Research Council, and fellowships linked to Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study and Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. She has been awarded grants from foundations connected to Ford Foundation, Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and European funding bodies including European Research Council panels. Honors include prizes from associations like Middle East Studies Association and recognition at conferences sponsored by Association of American Geographers and American Historical Association.

Teaching and mentorship

Feldman has taught courses that intersect with programs at Department of Anthropology, Columbia University, Department of History, Johns Hopkins University, School of International Service, American University, and professional schools such as Harvard Kennedy School and Columbia Law School. Her pedagogy integrates seminars on archival methods, ethnographic fieldwork, and legal frameworks, training graduate students who have gone on to positions at institutions including SOAS University of London, Tel Aviv University, University of Toronto, University of Chicago, and Stanford University. She has supervised dissertations addressing topics tied to archives at National Archives (UK), migration studies at International Organization for Migration, and memory projects connected to museums like Museum of the History of Palestine and municipal memory initiatives in Haifa and Jaffa.

Public engagement and activism

Feldman has contributed public commentary and expert testimony in venues connected to United Nations bodies, European Parliament, and national legislatures, and has engaged with NGOs such as Physicians for Human Rights, B'Tselem, and Al-Haq. She has participated in public forums at venues like United States Institute of Peace, Brookings Institution, and Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, collaborating with journalists from outlets including The New York Times, The Guardian, and Al Jazeera. Her activist engagements have intersected with movements and campaigns associated with Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions debates, human rights advocacy coordinated with International Committee of the Red Cross interlocutors, and cultural memory projects with organizations like Human Rights Watch and local heritage NGOs in Ramallah and Jerusalem.

Category:Living people Category:Anthropologists Category:Historians