Kalman P. Bland (Center Fellow/Clergy Associate; 2008-2010) is a native of Chicago.  For higher education, he earned degrees from Columbia University (B.S.), Jewish Theological Seminary (B.R.E., M.H. L., and rabbi), and Brandeis University (Ph.D. in Near Eastern and Jewish Studies).  His professional career began at Indiana University (Bloomington) and continued at Duke University where he has served since 1973, including stints as Chair of the Department of Religion and Director of the Duke Center for Jewish Studies.  Among his publications are The Epistle on the Possibility of Conjunction with the Active Intellect by Ibn Rushd with the Commentary of Moses Narboni, "A Jewish Theory of Jewish Visual Culture: Leon Modena's Concepts of Images and Their Effect on Locative Memory," and The Artless Jew: Medieval and Modern Affirmations and Denials of the Visual.  Currently, he is working on a monograph that explores medieval Jewish and Islamic concepts of the human-animal boundary.  In domains extra-curricular, he plays the viola in orchestral and chamber music groups.