Appointment period: 1/3/2025 – 28/2/2028

Dr. Joshua Schmidt is an Israeli-American sociocultural anthropologist and a research fellow in The Leon Recanati Institute for Maritime Studies at the University of Haifa.

Schmidt applies primary ethnographic fieldwork methodologies to assemble and analyze socio-cultural and linguistic data sets. His research interests pertain to a diverse range of topics including the intergenerational cultural geographies of arid land viticulture in Israel and the southern Levant, heritage preservation and community empowerment, multidimensional environmental conservation and tourism management, Negev Bedouin marginality, the politics of inclusiveness among peripheral communities, the cultural complexities of Israeli home-front crisis preparation, response and recovery.

Currently, Schmidt’s research centers on relic cultivars with a specific focus on traditional fruit orchards (Bustanim) and the grapes, olives and date trees they once contained. This undertaking includes compiling an ampelography (comparative taxonomy) of native grapes from the Holy Land. For more information on these research projects, please visit the Negev Wine Revival, BOSTAN TREE websites and Schmidt’s personal page.

E-mail: jschmidt@staff.haifa.ac.il3