Professor Dan Levene
Professor of Semitics and the History of Religion, Ethics Officer
Professor Dan Levene is Professor of Semitics and the History of Religion at the University of Southampton.
As a Semitist who specialises in Aramaic dialects and Hebrew my interests are focused on primary sources of a textual nature and specifically on editing manuscripts from late antiquity and the middle ages.
In recent years I have been focusing also on Ethiopia. This is a country that adopted Christianity in the 4th century, has a very rich and ancient literary history and manuscript tradition written in Ge‘ez and Amharic.
The biggest focus of my work over the years has been on literature that expresses the belief in the power of the word to heal and harm. The fact that Ethiopia’s early traditions still have such an overwhelming presence within living traditions has offered me the chance of extending my research to working with communities where such beliefs are part of the fabric of life.
Short Film Productions:
Shinkuru Michael Holy Water, Yafet's Experience