When he joined the Brandeis faculty, the university announced that it was creating a chair in Israel Studies in order "to develop an accurate historical understanding of the origin and development of the State of Israel and its place in the world."[1]
Troen believes that Israel's secular culture "has drawn from two important traditions: the prophetic tradition within Judaism and universal values generated by an enlightenment society."[2]
Troen's grandmother was killed in a pogrom on March 14, 1919, in her village, Derazhne, then part of the Second Polish Republic.[4] His daughter Deborah Matias and her husband were killed in their home during the Holit massacre on 7 October 2023.[5][6]
Troen, Selwyn K. and Jacob Lassner. Jews and Muslims in the Arab World; Haunted by Pasts Real and Imagined. 2007 ed. Lanham and New York: Rowman and Littlefield, 2007.
Troen, Selwyn K. "Israel Studies." Israel Studies12. 3 issues annually (2007): 600 pages.
Troen, Selwyn K. Imagining Zion: Dreams, Designs, and Realities in a Century of Jewish Settlement. Yale University Press, 2003.
Troen, Selwyn K. and D.D. Moore. Divergent Jewish Cultures: America and Israel. Yale University Press, 2001.
Troen, Selwyn K., ed. Jewish Centers and Peripheries; Europe between America and Israel Fifty Years After World War II. Transaction: New Brunswick and London, 1999.
Troen, Selwyn K. and Noah Lucas, ed. Israel: The First Decade of Independence. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1995.
Troen, S. Ilan and Klaus Bade, ed. Zuwanderung und Eingliederung von Deutschen und Juden aus der fruheren Sowjetunion in Deutschland und Israel. Bonn: Bundeszentrale dur politische Bildung, 1993.
Troen, Selwyn K. and Moshe Shemesh, ed. The Suez-Sinai Crisis 1956; Retrospective and Reappraisal. London and New York: Frank Cass and Columbia University Press, 1990.
Troen, Selwyn K. and Benjamin Pinkus, ed. Organizing Rescue: National Jewish Solidarity in the Modern Period. London: Frank Cass, 1988.
Troen, Selwyn K. and Glenn Holt, S. Thernstrom and T. Hareven. St. Louis. New York: Franklin Watts - New Viewpoints, 1977.
Troen, Selwyn K. The Public and the Schools: Shaping the Saint Louis System 1838-1920. University of Missouri Press, 1975.