Lunch Talk with Professor Andrea J. Martin: The Lawyer’s Role in Recognizing and Resisting Antisemitism

Join the Jewish Law Students Association for a conversation with Professor Andrea J. Martin, Co-Founder and Director of the Center for Jewish Legal Studies and Assistant Professor of Law at Penn State Dickinson Law.
Professor Martin will examine how antisemitic ideas, stereotypes, and accusations can move from the realm of social prejudice into legal rules, judicial processes, and institutional decision-making. Drawing on historical and contemporary examples, she will explore how law has been used to define Jews as outsiders, attach legal consequences to Jewish identity, and give official force to false accusations and stereotypes. The discussion will also consider how similar dynamics can arise in contemporary legal disputes involving Jews, Zionism, and Israel—and the role lawyers can play in recognizing and resisting those processes.

Professor Martin teaches The Law and the Holocaust, and her scholarship focuses on constitutional law, antidiscrimination law, civil-rights enforcement, Jewish identity, and contemporary antisemitism. She is also a Commissioner of the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission, appointed by Governor Josh Shapiro, and previously practiced appellate law and worked as a strategic legal advisor in the corporate sector.