Paul Michael Kurtz
Marie Curie Fellow, Faculty of Divinity
Postdoctoral Research Associate, Queens' College
Paul Michael Kurtz is an intellectual and cultural historian with a focus on the history of the humanities – especially biblical, classical, and orientalist scholarship. His research centers on the history of the ancient world and its religions in the German-speaking lands of the 19th and 20th centuries. Examining the interpenetration of antiquity and modernity, he explores why people do what they do the way that they do.
Biography
Through generous external funding, Paul has been a Marie Curie Fellow at Cambridge, an FWO Postdoctoral Fellow at Ghent, and a Fulbright Scholar at Göttingen. He has also received support from the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) and American Schools of Oriental Research.
Paul completed a BA (Cerasiensis) in English literature, MDiv (Prin) in Hebrew Bible & Northwest Semitics, and Dr. phil. (Goett) in Modern History. During his doctoral work, he also held fellowships at the University of Chicago, Ghent University, Leibniz Institute of European History (Mainz), and Max Weber Center for Advanced Cultural & Social Studies (Erfurt). Paul then served as a postdoctoral research associate at Göttingen before coming to Cambridge.
Key publications
- Kaiser, Christ, and Canaan: The Religion of Israel in Protestant Germany, 1871–1918. Forschungen zum Alten Testament I/122. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2018.
- "How 19th-century German Classicists wrote the Jews out of ancient history," History & Theory, forthcoming.
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“The Silence on the Land: Ancient Israel versus Modern Palestine in Academic Theology at the Time of the German Empire.” In Negotiating the Religious and the Secular in the German Empire: Transnational Approaches, 56–96. Edited by Rebekka Habermas. New York: Berghahn Books, 2019.
- “Waiting at Nemi: Wellhausen, Gunkel, and the World Behind Their Work.” Harvard Theological Review 109, no. 4 (2016): 567–85.
Contact
Paul is best reached by email or by post at the Faculty of Divinity (West Road / Cambridge / CB3 9BS / UK).
