Public Programs Staff

Karen Mittelman

Karen S. Mittelman is the Director of the Division of Public Programs. She holds a Ph.D. in American history from the University of Pennsylvania. Before coming to NEH in 1998, Karen spent eleven years in the museum field —first at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History, and later as curator of the National Museum of American Jewish History in Philadelphia. She has also taught U.S. and women’s history at American University and the University of Pennsylvania and is the editor of Creating American Jews: Historical Conversations About Identity (University Press of New England, 1998).