Born in Amsterdam in 1946 to German Jewish Holocaust survivors, Shulamit Reinharz is the Brandeis University Jacob Potofsky Professor Emerita of Sociology and a Research Fellow in International Studies at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford University.

She is the former director of the Brandeis University Women’s Studies Program, founder of the Women’s Studies Research Center, the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute for the Study of Jews and Gender, and Kniznick Gallery of Feminist Art.

The author of 17 books, her topics have ranged from On Becoming a Social Scientist (1979) and Feminist Methods in Social Research (1992) to American Jewish Women and the Zionist Enterprise (2005), Jewish Intermarriage around the World (2009), and One Hundred Years of Kibbutz Life: A Century of Crises and Reinvention (2011), and 100 Jewish Brides: Stories from Around the World (co-edited with Barbara Vinick) (2024).

Prof. Reinharz received the 2024 Leo Baeck Medal for “contributions to scholarship and community leadership,” the highest honor bestowed by the Leo Baeck Institute for the study of German Jewish history and culture.