Gustavo Perednik
Encyclopedia
Gustavo Daniel Perednik is a Jewish
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...

 author and educator residing in Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

.

Perednik graduated from the Universities of Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires is the capital and largest city of Argentina, and the second-largest metropolitan area in South America, after São Paulo. It is located on the western shore of the estuary of the Río de la Plata, on the southeastern coast of the South American continent...

 and Jerusalem (cum laude
Latin honors
Latin honors are Latin phrases used to indicate the level of academic distinction with which an academic degree was earned. This system is primarily used in the United States, Canada, and in many countries of continental Europe, though some institutions also use the English translation of these...

) and he completed doctoral studies in Philosophy
Philosophy
Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...

 in New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...

 and took courses at the Sorbonne
Sorbonne
The Sorbonne is an edifice of the Latin Quarter, in Paris, France, which has been the historical house of the former University of Paris...

 (France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

), San Marcos
San Marcos, Cajamarca
San Marcos is a town in Northern Peru, capital of the province San Marcos in the region Cajamarca....

 (Peru) and Uppsala
Uppsala
- Economy :Today Uppsala is well established in medical research and recognized for its leading position in biotechnology.*Abbott Medical Optics *GE Healthcare*Pfizer *Phadia, an offshoot of Pharmacia*Fresenius*Q-Med...

 (Sweden). He was distinguished as outstanding lecturer at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Hebrew University of Jerusalem
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem ; ; abbreviated HUJI) is Israel's second-oldest university, after the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology. The Hebrew University has three campuses in Jerusalem and one in Rehovot. The world's largest Jewish studies library is located on its Edmond J...

, where he ran the Four-Year, Preparatory and Freshman Programs. In Jerusalem he was also director of the Institute for Jewish Leaders from Abroad and the Sephardic Educational Centre. He ran the Ai Tian Program for Jewish Understanding in China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...

, and the Program for Education on the Jewish Role in Civilization. He resides with his family in the outskirts of Jerusalem.

He was guest lecturer at more than one hundred towns in fifty countries and published fifteen books and more than one thousand articles on Judaism
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...

 and modernity.

Biography

Perednik was born in Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires is the capital and largest city of Argentina, and the second-largest metropolitan area in South America, after São Paulo. It is located on the western shore of the estuary of the Río de la Plata, on the southeastern coast of the South American continent...

, Argentina
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...

, on October 21, 1956, the only child of Marta (1925–2001) and Samuel (1923–1994), first generation of Argentineans born to Jewish immigrants from the Ukraine.

He studied at the Buenos Aires English High School, and the Escuela Superior de Comercio Carlos Pellegrini
Escuela Superior de Comercio Carlos Pellegrini
The Escuela Superior de Comercio Carlos Pellegrini is a public high school in Buenos Aires, and it is one of the most prestigious in Argentina and Latin America....

.

Community Work

He taught in dozens of Jewish institutions throughout Latin America and founded the Centro Hebreo Yonah of Argentina, which he led into a youth movement of two thousand members.

A member of the Sino-Judaic Institute, in 2001 he established in China the Ai Tian Program of Jewish Understanding through which he lectured in many Chinese universities and high schools. His published several essays on the relation between the Jews and the Chinese.

In June 2006, after a successful lecturing tour in several towns of Galicia, Spain, he took the initiative to found the Association of Gallegan Friends of Israel (AGAI).

First Books

In 1980 his novella There at the Santanders was awarded the Victoria Ocampo Literary Prize, and it was published in English in the Stories magazine of Boston
Boston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...

 in 1985.

In 1982 he obtained The Jerusalem Fellows scholarship to study in Jerusalem for a three-year period, during which he completed his MA in Education at the Hebrew University (cum laude) and his doctoral studies at The Jewish Theological Seminary of New York. Perednik pursued Talmudic studies first under Rabbi Theodore Friedmann, and then under Rabbi Baruch Horovitz at the Dvar Yerushalayim Yeshiva
Dvar Yerushalayim
Yeshivat Dvar Yerushalayim, also called the Jerusalem Academy of Jewish Studies, is a yeshiva for baalei teshuva currently located in the Har Nof neighborhood of Jerusalem, Israel. The yeshiva was founded in 1970 by Rabbi Baruch Horovitz, formerly of Manchester, England.-Link:*...

. Rabbi Horovitz performed his wedding in 1985 to Ruth Kestenbaum, an educational psychologist from London, with whom he had five children.

Perednik’s novel Achitophel, a fantasy on suicide, was published in 1988 with a prologue by Bernardo Ezequiel Koremblit, and it received the Literary International Prize Fernando Jeno of Mexico
Mexico
The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...

. That year he was invited to lecture for one month to Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...

 by the Sephardic Educational Center, and since then he lectured in one hundred towns of more than fifty countries.

In 1989 the Argentine Jewish Community published his two-volume book I am a Hebrew, prologued by Prof. Michael Rosenak of the Hebrew University. The following year the Hebrew University appointed him as head of the Four-Year, Freshman and Preparatory Programs, where he lectured for many years and was distinguished as outstanding lecturer.

During the 1990s he was director of the Institute Youth Leaders from Abroad.

His essay on Judaism and Ecology
Ecology
Ecology is the scientific study of the relations that living organisms have with respect to each other and their natural environment. Variables of interest to ecologists include the composition, distribution, amount , number, and changing states of organisms within and among ecosystems...

 was published in 1990 and received the Keren Kayemet Prize, and in 1992 his novel Lemech was published in Tel Aviv
Tel Aviv
Tel Aviv , officially Tel Aviv-Yafo , is the second most populous city in Israel, with a population of 404,400 on a land area of . The city is located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline in west-central Israel. It is the largest and most populous city in the metropolitan area of Gush Dan, with...

, a fictional history of WWII with Freud, Bertha Pappenheim
Bertha Pappenheim
Bertha Pappenheim was an Austrian-Jewish feminist, a social pioneer, and the founder of the Jüdischer Frauenbund .- Youth :...

 and Eduard Hanslick
Eduard Hanslick
Eduard Hanslick was a Bohemian-Austrian music critic.-Biography:Hanslick was born in Prague, the son of Joseph Adolph Hanslick, a bibliographer and music teacher from a German-speaking family, and one of his piano pupils, the daughter of a Jewish merchant from Vienna...

 as main protagonists.

Judeophobia and Other Books

At the Institute for Youth Leaders Perednik created a course on Judeophobia, which he taught in several languages and was published as a book in many editions. He gave the full course on Judeophobia at several universities in Israel, Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...

 and Latin America.

In 2004 he published in Barcelona
Barcelona
Barcelona is the second largest city in Spain after Madrid, and the capital of Catalonia, with a population of 1,621,537 within its administrative limits on a land area of...

 Spain Derailed, with a prologue by Pilar Rahola
Pilar Rahola
Pilar Rahola i Martínez is a Catalan journalist, writer, and former politician and MP.Rahola studied Spanish and Catalan Philology at the Universitat de Barcelona. She has published several books in Spanish and Catalan, and she is a columnist at La Vanguardia in Spain; La Nación in Argentina; ...

, about Islamic terrorism
Terrorism
Terrorism is the systematic use of terror, especially as a means of coercion. In the international community, however, terrorism has no universally agreed, legally binding, criminal law definition...

 and the inadequate response of the West.

Since 2004 Perednik gives courses at the ORT Uruguay University on the Jewish contribution to civilization, about which he published three books. In 2008 Perednik created an exhibition on the subject, which was presented in main venues in Argentina.

His novel Darwin’s silence was published in 2007, and it was analyzed in a doctoral thesis for the University of Stockholm, Sweden
Sweden
Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....

.

In 2009, his book To Kill Without a Trace was published, about the Iranian terror attacks in Argentina. The book was presented in many towns in Israel, Argentina, and Latin America. That year, Pablo Besaron published La conspiración, on Argentine literature, which includes a chapter on Perednik’s novels.
In 2010, a course on Perednik's novels was given at the Asociacion Argentina de Cultura Inglesa.

Work


Essays in Anthologies:
  • Naïve Spanish Judeophobia, in the Jewish Political Studies Review 15:3-4, Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Fall 2003, pages 87–110.
  • L’Espagne en Les habits neufs de l’antisemitisme en Europe, Collection Dissidence, Éditions Café Noir, Paris, 2004, pages 133-153.
  • The Chinese of Jewish Descent at Kaifeng, in Alternative Orientalisms, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, UK, 2007

External links

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