Danny B. Admasu

Assistant Professor

Danny B. Admasu is an assistant research professor in the Department of Philosophy and the Center for Judaic Studies at the University of Connecticut (UConn) for the 2026–2027 academic year. His research lies at the intersection of philosophy, Jewish studies, African studies, and Global South epistemologies. At UConn, he is pursuing his Afro-Levantine Studies project, “Israel in an Afro-Levantine Space: Global South Epistemology, Creolization, and Liminal Modernity.”

Admasu earned his Ph.D. in 2023 from the Interdisciplinary Program in Hermeneutics and Cultural Studies at Bar-Ilan University. His doctoral research critically examined the historical relationship between Western and Israeli Jews and Ethiopian Jewry from the mid-nineteenth century to the present. Focusing on the lived experience of being both Black and Jewish, the study explored the intersections of antisemitism, anti-Blackness, racialization, and white supremacy. It also examined how color, faith, and social negotiations of whiteness and Blackness mediated the boundaries of Jewish belonging. Drawing on Ethiopian Jewry as a case study, the dissertation developed broader insights into global minority dynamics and laid the theoretical foundation for his monograph, Blackness and Jewishness: Ethiopian Jewry’s Durability: Diasporic, Zionist, and Israeli Discourses on Identity (1855-2019) (De Gruyter, 2025). He also holds an M.A. in Hermeneutics and Cultural Studies from Bar-Ilan University and is the author of A Picture (Tmuna), a Hebrew poetry book (Gama Publishing, 2023).

Before joining UConn, he held postdoctoral and research fellowships in the Department of History, Philosophy, and Judaic Studies at the Open University of Israel and at the Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. At Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, he serves as a research fellow at the Azrieli Center for Israel Studies within the Ben-Gurion Research Institute for the Study of Israel and Zionism and teaches in the Inter-University Program for African Studies – the M.A. Program in African Sustainable Communities. His teaching bridges political philosophy, critical race theory, and Jewish studies, as reflected in courses such as “Black Critical Theory,” “African Political and Social Thought,” and “Africa in Israel.

Beyond academia, Admasu’s work encompasses public philosophy, institution-building, and civic leadership. As a former executive director of the Israeli Association for Ethiopian Jews, he initiated and advanced legislation that established Sigd as an official state holiday in Israel. As a former executive director of HILA, a Jewish-Arab grassroots organization, he advocated for educational equality by empowering parents within the public education system. He is the founder of the Ethiopian Jewry Heritage Center. The center is a public institution under the Israeli Ministry of Culture, dedicated to promoting academic research on Ethiopian Jewish culture, history, and contemporary life in Israel .