I am delighted to have this opportunity to pursue my research and writing, and very grateful to the colleagues who supported me in making this application.
Dr Ruth Sheldon, Lecturer in Religion and Social Science
01 May 2024
Leverhulme Fellowship awarded to Dr Ruth Sheldon
Dr Sheldon has received the fellowship from the Leverhulme Trust for her research on marginalised Jewish women.
Dr Ruth Sheldon at King's Department of Theology & Religious Studies,has been awarded a Leverhulme Research Fellowship to write a book entitled Following Ruth: Orthodox Jewish Women and the Ethics of Neighbouring.
The book will investigate the vital, yet little explored question of how marginalised Jewish women negotiate coexistence in the ‘super-diverse’ European city. Drawing on completed fieldwork with Haredi women in cosmopolitan areas of London, the research will analyse high-profile conflicts focused on female Jewish neighbours and reveal the ongoing significance of Holocaust histories, antisemitism, and questions of Jewish belonging in European diversity politics. Developing an original methodology that bridges ethnography, theology and political philosophy, Following Ruth will draw on women's diasporic religious traditions to transform secular ideas of what it means to live well with neighbours in contemporary urban life.
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Lecturer in Religion and Social Science