Journalism History
My work on 19th century journals focuses on two main themes:
- The spatial evolution of journalistic networks, both in the international Hebrew press and the national US press.
- The social and educational impact of 19th century journals.
Current projects and grants:
- “Periodicals in Motion: The Hebrew Journalistic Networks in the second half of the 19th century” – The Open University Research Authority Grant 511669 (2020-2022).
Scope: A spatial and network analysis of patterns of textual reuse in 19th century Hebrew Journals. - “Uniformity and Diversity in the US Press, 1841-1884: A Computational Analysis of Space, Time and Content” – Israel Science Foundation 1790/22 (2023-2026).
Scope: A spatial and network analysis of the US press based on patterns of topic modeling and textual reuse.
Books
(in chronological order)
– Zef Segal, Culture in the Age of the Enlightenment: Reshaping the Private Sphere (Raanana: The Open University of Israel, 2023) (Hebrew).
Books Edited
(in chronological order)
Scientific Editor Of Hebrew Translation
– Dorinda Outram, The Enlightment (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2019). Published by The Open University of Israel, 2021.
Open University Books
(in chronological order)
– Zef Segal (ed.), Mobility, Communication, and Space in the 19th century: “Classic” and “Digital” Approaches to History (Raanana: The Open University of Israel, 2019) (Hebrew).
– Zef Segal, Culture in the Age of the Enlightenment, Introductory unit (Raanana: The Open University of Israel, 2017) (Hebrew).
Chapters In Collections
(in chronological order)
Printed:
– Zef Segal, “Constructing the Modern Jewish ‘Present’: Time and Time Cycles in ‘HaTzfira’”, in Gerben Zaagsma (ed.), Jewish Studies in the Digital Age (Berlin: Degruyter, 2022), 245-268. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110744828-012
– Zef Segal, “Introduction to the Israeli edition,” in Dorinda Outram, The Enlightenment (Raanana: The Open University of Israel, 2021), 19-27 (Hebrew).
Articles
(in chronological order)
– Zef Segal, “‘From One End of the Earth to the Other End of the Earth’: Changing Perceptions of the World in Late-Nineteenth-Century Hebrew Journalism,” Jewish Studies Quarterly 29.4 (2022), 389-411. https://doi.org/10.1628/jsq-2022-0023.
-Zef Segal, “From a Local Periodical to a Global Enterprise: Ha-Me’asef, 1896- 1914”, Journal of Historical Network Research 6.1 (2021), 192-219. https://doi.org/10.25517/jhnr.v6i1.89.
– Zef Segal & Oren Soffer, “One Journal, One Decade, 3,797,592 Words: Computational Analysis of HaTzfira’s Discourse (1874–1883),” Journal of Jewish Studies 72.2 (2021), 369-396. https://doi.org/10.18647/3508/jjs-2021
– Zef Segal & Oren Soffer, “From Weekly to Daily: Computational Analysis of Periodical Time Cycles,” Journalism Studies 21.14 (2020), 1952-1972. https://doi.org/10.1080/1461670X.2020.1807394. .
– Zef Segal, Oren Soffer, Nurit Greidinger, Sinai Rusinek, & Vered Silber-Varod, “Computational Analysis of Historical Hebrew Newspapers: Proof of Concept,” Zutot – Perspectives on Jewish Culture 17 (2020), 97-110. https://doi.org/10.1163/18750214-12171087.
– Zef Segal, “‘A Letter to our Authors: The Problem of False News in Hatsfira, 1874,” Kesher 52 (2019), 15-20. (Hebrew) https://www.jstor.org/stable/26948858.
– Zef Segal & Menahem Blondheim, “The Evolution of an International Social Network: Ha-Me’asef Periodical in the years 1896-1904”, Kesher 50 (2017), 150-156. (Hebrew) https://www.jstor.org/stable/26936864.
Other Publications
(in chronological order)
– Zef Segal, “Textual Reuse in Journalism: Exploring the Early History of Hebrew Journalism with a Computer”, The Digital Channel of Zefat Academic College, 19 May 2022, https://youtu.be/0RDzEfEMYWY
– Zef Segal, “An Analog Language in a Digital World”, Askola 6 (2021), 28-31 (Hebrew). https://www.openu.ac.il/publications/ascola/pages/ascola6.aspx
Conferences
(in chronological order)
– “Views from the East after 1881: The First References to Antisemitism in the Hebrew Press”, the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, Jerusalem, January 2023 (invited talk).
– “Periodicals in Motion: Textual Reuse and the Hebrew Journalistic Networks in the Second Half of the 19th Century”, in The 18th World Congress of Jewish Studies, Jerusalem, August 2022 (lecture).
– “From Cultural Heritage to Digital Collections: The Affordances of Computational Research”, in The National Forum of Academic Libraries, Tel Aviv, March 2022 (invited talk).
– “Periodicals in Motion: Textual Reuse and the Network of Hebrew Journals in the Second Half of the 19th Century”, in the 2022 Research Day of Tel Aviv Jaffa College, Tel Aviv, February 2022 (lecture).
– “Periodicals in Motion: Textual Reuse and the Hebrew Journalistic Networks in the Second Half of the 19th Century” in EADH 202: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Data, Krasnoyarsk, September 2021 (lecture).
– “The Significance and Uniqueness of Passover in Jewish Culture – A Computational Analysis of Nineteenth Century Hebrew Journalism”, in Everyone’s Holidays in The Media, Ra’anana, April 2021 (invited talk)
– “From a Local Periodical to a Global Enterprise: Ha-Me’asef, 1896-1914” in ESSHC 2021, Leiden, March 2021 (lecture).
– “Constructing the Modern Jewish “Present”: Computational Analysis of Periodical Time Cycles in HaTzfira” in #DHJewish – Jewish Studies in the Digital Age, Luxemburg, January 2021 (lecture).
– “Constructing the Modern Jewish “Present”: Computational Analysis of Periodical Time Cycles in HaTzfira” in Software for the Past (SfP): Digital Technologies to Study the Past and Present, Kinneret, December 2020 (lecture).
– “The Periodical as a Geographical Space: the 19th century Hebrew ‘HaZefirah’ as a Case Study” in DH2019, Utrecht, July 2019 (lecture).
– “Putting the World on Paper: Maps and Enlightenment in Early Hebrew Journals” in ICHC 2019, Amsterdam, July 2019 (lecture).
– “The Periodical as a Geographical Space,” Info 2018, The 34nd Annual Conference, Tel Aviv, May 2019 (invited talk).
– “Computational Analysis of Historical Hebrew Newspapers: Affordances and Restrictions” in JJCHC2019, New York, March 2019 (lecture) (with Vered Silber-Varod, Nurit Greidinger, Oren Soffer)
– “”From one end of the Earth […] unto the other end of the Earth”: Changing Perceptions of the World in Late-Nineteenth-Century Jewish Journalism” in the 50th AJS Annual Conference, Boston, December 2018 (lecture).
– “From a local periodical to a global enterprise: Ha-Me’asef, 1896-1914” in the 3rd Transnational Journalism History Conference, Montreal, June 2018 (lecture).
– “The Evolution of a Transnational Rabinnical Network: The Periodical “Ha-Me`asef”, 1896-1914” in The 17th World Congress of Jewish Studies, Jerusalem, August 2017 (lecture).
– “The Evolution of an international Network: Ha-Me’asef 1896-1904”, in Info 2017, The 32nd Annual Conference, Tel Aviv, May 2017 (invited talk).
– “The Evolution of an International Social Network: Ha-Me’asef Periodical, 1896-1904” in EVA/MINERVA Conference on advanced Technologies of Culture, Jerusalem, November 2016 (lecture).