Tulane offers the following courses: Modern Jewish History, Modern Jewish Politics, and Building Jewish Identity. Previous courses offered include Power in Jewish History and Gender and Judaism.
Modern Jewish History Professor Michael R. Cohen Course Schedule: 1.Course Introduction 2.The Beginning of the Modern Period in Jewish History
Shmuel Ettinger, “Introduction: The Modern Period,” in HH Ben Sasson, A History of the Jewish People, 727-732.
Jacob Katz, “The Turning Point of Modern Jewish History: The Eighteenth Century,” 40-52.
Todd Endelman, The Jews of Georgian England, Preface, ix-xiv
David Biale, Cultures of the Jews, Introduction to Part III, “Modern Encounters,” 725-731. Michael A. Meyer, “Where Does the Modern Period of Jewish History Begin?” 329-338
Select a book or collection of syllabi that comprehensively examines the modern Jewish experience, and prepare a presentation that analyzes its perspective.How does the author understand the beginnings of the modern period, and how does this govern his/ her selection of what to include?How does this shape the narrative he/ she presents?
Writing: Analytic Questions 3.Archives
Peruse the catalogues and guides to major American Jewish archival institutions in the US (esp. the catalogue of American Jewish Archives, YIVO, the Leo Baeck Institute, and the guide to the New Orleans Jewish Archives).Select an archive of your choice and prepare a presentation on its holdings, access policies, and potential areas of interest for your own work. Writing: Create a compelling argument 4.Israel’s War of Independence
“Discussion” between Benny Morris and Ephraim Karsh in 1994-5 journal articles in The Journal of Palestinian Studies.Writing: Well-structured, strong evidence 5.Mid-Term Paper I Due
Newspapers
Newspapers as a source for Jewish history – which are available? What are their strengths and what are their weaknesses?Arthur A. Goren, "The Jewish Press" in Sally Miller (ed.) The Ethnic Press in the United States(1987)Robert Singerman, "The American Jewish Press, 1823-1983: A Bibliographic Survey of Research and Studies," American Jewish History 73 (June 1984), pp.422-444.Find 3 historical newspapers that illuminate the modern Jewish experience and prepare a presentation on their importance, strengths, and weaknesses.At least one newspaper should be available in either microfilm or hard copy only. Writing: Strong, coherent paragraphs
6.A Century of American Migration?
Hasia Diner, The Jews of the United States, Part II, “A Pivotal Century,” 71-204
(We will be comparing this with the material we learned in American Judaism)
Writing: Style 7.Yearbooks and Proceedings Jonathan D. Sarna & Jonathan J. Golden, “The Twentieth Century Through American Jewish Eyes: A History of the American Jewish Year Book, 1899-1999,” American Jewish Year Book 100 (2000), 3-102.Examine and be prepared to discuss the American Jewish Year Book and prepare a presentation on at least two other kinds of published primary sources.Be sure to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of each source. Writing: Style 8.Collective Memory I Yerushalmi, Zachor: Jewish History and Jewish Memory
9.Mid-Term Paper II Draft Due Collective Memory II
Hayden White, “The Politics of Historical Interpretation,” in The Content of the Form, 58-82.
Saul Friedlander, “Introduction,” in Probing the Limits of Representation, 1-22.
Georgio Agamben, Remnants of Auschwitz: The Witness and the Archive Antony Polonsky, “The Shtetl: Myth and Reality,” Polin volume 17, 3-24
Yael Zerubavel, Recovered Roots
10.Writing Workshop
Read each of your peers’ papers and offer comments.Prepare for discussion on the historians who are the focus of each paper.
11.Mid-Term Paper II Due Family Letters
History, forms and characteristics of family letters; value as an historical source; major collections of Jewish family letters.Jacob R. Marcus, "Letters as a Source of Biography," in Marcus, Studies in American Jewish History, pp.23-30 [orig in M.Davis & I.S. Meyer, eds., The Writing of American Jewish History (1957)] “Letters”, Encyclopaedia JudaicaFind a collection of letters and be prepared to discuss in class.Some possible ideas: Edith Gelles, Lettters of Abigaill Levy Franks (2004) Franz Kobler, Letters of Jews Through the Ages (1952) (esp. introduction) Walter D. Kamphoefner,News from the Land of Freedom: German Americans Write Home (1991), with an excellent bibliography.W. Kula, Writing Home: Immigrants in Brazil and the United States 1890-1891 (1986)I.Metzker, A Bintel Brief (1971)Published letters of Franks Family, Rebecca Gratz, Henrietta Szold, Cyrus Adler etc.
12.Civil War and Slavery
Mendelsohn, Adam, “A Struggle Which Has Ended So Beneficently”: A Centuryof Jewish Historical Writing About the American Civil War,” American Jewish History,” 437-454.Bertram Korn, “Jews and Negro Slavery in the Old South, 1789-1865” American Jewish HistoryJason Silverman “‘THE LAW OF THE LAND IS THE LAW’ Antebellum Jews, Slavery, and the Old South,”
13.Autobiography
Autobiographies:their history, their spread, and their value as historical sources.J.H. Chajes, “Accounting for the Self: Primary Generic-Historical Reflections on Early Modern Jewish Egodocuments,” Yochanan Petrovsky-Shtern, “The Literary and the Historical: Reflections on a Jewish Memoir,” (Plus others from Jewish Quarterly Review 95:1, special issue on memoirs)Read a memoir of your choice, and be prepared to situate that person’s life in the larger historiography.You should choose a memoir in an area with which you are familiar, so you don’t need to do much background reading.For many other books on the nature of autobiography and how to read autobiographies, see the library classification CT25. 14.Major Texts in Modern Jewish History
Readings TBA
Final Paper due
Modern Jewish Politics Professor Brian Horowitz Professor Adi Gordon
This course will explore various political traditions, and key political concepts in Jewish history in the modern age. It will elucidate the place of ‘The Jew’ in many modern political processes and ideologies. Though it can relate to the inner politics of Jewish life, modern Jewish politics can also refer to the roles played by Jews in larger political systems. It is on this context that the course will focus, and explore how modern Jews – as individuals and as a collective – acted in the evolving European polities: in the centralized nation states, and in modern multinational empires.
We are treating secular Jews almost exclusively, although we understand that religious Jews began their involvement in party politics at the end of the nineteenth century. Some of the patterns and practices of Jewish politics in the modern world were a continuation of much older Jewish political traditions. Others, however, were entirely new. Also central to this course are secular ideologies, the ways in which modern Jews translated their understanding of the Jewish past, present, and future into an incredibly wide and dynamic spectrum. We will thus explore a number of secular ideologies such as Bundism, Autonomism, Territorialism, Jewish Socialism, Canaanism, and multiple variations of Zionism.
The chronological focus of the course is the 19th and 20th centuries, though, like all Jewish history, its roots lie in antiquity and its legacies surround us in the early 21st century. One of the purposes of examining the history of modern Jewish politics is to become more aware of this dimension of contemporary debates, and indeed to understand the present also from this context.
Program Outcomes:
This course aims to teach students about significant historical moments and cultural developments in Jewish history and cultures.
It will prepare students to employ knowledge of Jewish culture, history, religion, and social structure, to critically consider, interpret, and explicate relevant cultural artifacts, and past, present, and future developments in the Jewish world and their relationship to broader geo-temporal trends and issues.
It will help students to acquire knowledge of important approaches to the study of Jewish civilization and the presuppositions underlying them; various analytical techniques employed in the humanities and the social sciences for the study of Jewish civilization, the Jews, and their representation.
This course will also prepare students for further courses in Jewish Studies.
Learning Outcomes:
1.Students will understand the history and culture of the Jewish people through the destruction of the second Temple.
2.Students will understand the challenge of Diaspora in Jewish history.
3.Students will be familiar with the processes of integration and emancipation in Europe.
4.Students will learn about the new Jewish politics that arose after the failure of integration in Eastern Europe.
5.Students will understand the Holocaust in its historical context.
6.After finishing the course, students will understand the restructured Jewish map of the twenty-first century, and know the place of America and Israel of world Jewry.
Books:
·Fred Skolnik and Michael Berenbaum (eds.), Encyclopaedia Judaica [electronic resource], Detroit, 2007.
·Brian Horowitz, Jewish Philanthropy and Enlightenment in Late Tsarist Russia, Seattle, 2008.
·Brian Horowitz, Empire Jews: Jewish Nationalism and Acculturation in 19th- and Early 20th-Century Russia, Bloomington, IN, 2009.
·Additional class readings assigned are available electronically on tulane.blackboard.com unless indicated otherwise:If you have any questions or trouble accessing these readings, please come see Professor Gordon during his office hours.
Schedule:
1. Introduction
2. Jewish Politics, and Jewish Polity: Some Biblical Foundations
Read for Class: the relevant passages in the Encyclopaedia Judaica entries on ‘Prophets’ (first few pages), ‘Kings’, and ‘Elders’ (available on Blackboard and as a searchable e-book at the university library website)
3. On Old Jewish Politics: Political Traditions
Read for Class: Jacob Katz, ‘The Attitude toward the Environment’ (Chapter V), Tradition and Crisis, pp. 35-42 (available on Blackboard and as e-book at the university library website).
4.On Old Jewish Politics: New Crises
Read for Class: Jacob Katz, ‘The Emergence of the Neutral Society’ (Chapter XXIII), Tradition and Crisis, pp. 245-259 (available on Blackboard and as e-book at the university library website).
5. Struggle for Jewish Emancipation: The Central European Case
Read for Class: Jacob Katz, ‘Profile of Emancipated Jewry’ (Chapter XII), Out of the ghetto the social background of Jewish emancipation, 1770-1870, pp. 191-219 (available on Blackboard and as e-book at the university library website).
6. Damascus Affair (1840): Between Montefiore and Crémieux
Read for Class: Encyclopaedia Judaica entry on ‘The Damascus Affair’. (available on Blackboard and as e-book at the university library website).
Read for Class: Jonathan Frankel, ‘Introduction: Crisis as a Factor in Nineteenth-Century Jewish History’, The Damascus Affair: ‘Ritual Murder’, Politics, and the Jews in 1840, New York, 1997, pp. 1-16.
7. Jewish Banking: Philanthropy and Enlightenment
Read for Class: Horowitz, Jewish Philanthropy and Enlightenment, pp. 17-28.
8. Maskilim in Russia
Read for Class: Horowitz, Jewish Philanthropy and Enlightenment, pp. 29-52
9. Moses Hess: Jewish Question in the Wake of the Revolutions of 1848
Read for Class: Shlomo Avineri, ‘Moses Hess: Socialism and Nationalism as a Critique of Bourgeois Society’ (Chapter IV), The Making of Modern Zionism: Intellectual Origins of the Jewish State, pp. 36-46.
10. The May Laws (1881) and Leo Pinsker’s Auto-Emancipation
Read for Class: Horowitz, Empire Jews, pp. 65-85.
11. Jewish Schools – An OPE School Network
Read for Class: Horowitz, Jewish Philanthropy and Enlightenment, pp. 95-158.
12. Herzl, New Politics and New Antisemitism
Read for Class: Carl E. Schorske, ‘Politics in a New Key: An Austrian Trio’ (Chapter III), Fin-de-Siècle Vienna: Politics and Culture, pp. 116-180.
13.Herzl between the Dreifuss Affair and the Jewish State
Read for Class: Amos Elon, Herzl, ‘Fin de Siècle’ (Chapter 6), pp. 97-130.
14.Ahad Haam and the vision of a Jewish SpiritualCenter
Read for Class: Steven Zipperstein, ‘Ahad Ha’am and the Politics of Assimilation’, Jonathan Frankel and Steven J. Zipperstein (eds.), Assimilation and Community: the Jews in Nineteenth-Century Europe, pp. 344-365.
15.Martin Buber and the vision of a Jewish National Renaissance
Read for Class: Paul Mendes-Flohr, ‘Zarathustra’s Apostle: Martin Buber and the Jewish Renaissance’, Jacob Golomb (ed.), Nietzsche and Jewish Culture, pp. 233-243 (available on Blackboard and as e-book at the university library website).
16. Israel Zangwill and the Jewish Territorialist Organization
Read for Class: Stuart A. Cohen, ‘Israel Zangwill’s Project for Jewish Colonization in Mesopotamia: Its Context and Character’, Middle Eastern Studies 16/3 (1980), pp. 200-208.
Read for Class: Israel Zangwill, ‘Territorialism as Practical Politics’, Speeches, Articles and Letters, pp. 310-311.
17.The Society for the Promotion of Enlightenment among the Jews of Russia
Read for Class: Horowitz, Empire Jews, pp. 116-138
18.The Evolving Politics of Orthodox Judaism
Read for Class: Gershon Bacon, The Politics of Tradition, pp. 22-46.
19. Henry Sliozberg: a Political Portrait
Read for Class: Horowitz, Empire Jews, pp. 139-152
20. The End of a Friendship: the Russian-Jewish Rift in Twentieth-CenturyRussian Philosophy: N. A. Berdiaev and M. O. Gershenzon.
Read for Class: Horowitz, Empire Jews, pp 197-216.
SUBMIT MIDTERM PAPERS AT THE BEGINNING OF CLASS!!
21. Spiritual and Physical Strength in Ansky¹s Literary Imagination
Read for Class: Horowitz, Empire Jews, pp. 36-50
22. Nathan Birnbaum: Clash of Ideologies in Jewish Vienna
Read for Class: Robert Wistrich, ‘The Clash of Ideologies in Jewish Vienna (1880-1918). The Strange Odyssey of Nathan Birnbaum’, Leo Baeck Institute Yearbook 33 (1988), pp. 201-230.
23. Autonomism: Shimon Dubnov¹s Dialogue with Graetz and Harkavy
Read for Class: Horowitz, Empire Jews, pp. 99-115
24. The Bund and Jewish Socialism: Prophecy and Politics
Read for Class: Encyclopaedia Judaica entry (by Ezra Mendelson) on ‘Jewish Socialism’.
Read for Class: selections from Jonathan Frankel, ‘The Bund: Between Nation and Class’ [Chapter 4], Prophecy and Politics: Socialism, Nationalism, and the Russian Jews, 1862-1917, pp. 171-257.
25. 1914 and 1917: WWI as Revolutionary Moment of Jewish Politics
Read for Class: Jonathan Frankel, ‘The Paradoxical Politics of Marginality: Thoughts on the Jewish Situation during the Years 1914-21’, Studies in Contemporary Jewry, IV (1988, The Jews and the European Crisis 1914-21), pp. 3-21.
26. The Russian Revolution in Jewish History
Read for Class: Zvi Gitelman, ‘Revolution and the Ambiguities of Liberation’ (Chapter II), A Century of Ambivalence: The Jews of Russia and the Soviet Union, 1881 to the Present (2nd, expanded edition), pp. 59-87.
27. National Minority Rights: Jewish delegation at the peace conference in Paris 1919
Read for Class: Encyclopaedia Judaica entry on ‘Minority Rights’.
Read for Class: Oskar Janowsky, ‘The Problem of Jewish National Rights at the Paris Peace Conference’, The Jews and Minority Rights (1898-1919), pp. 253-270.
28. The Kibbutz Movement: A New Community of New Jews
Read for Class: Henry Near, ‘Introduction’ and ‘Background and Beginnings’, The Kibbutz Movement: A History.
29. Dilemmas of Jewish Politics in the holocaust: Jewish Councils and ‘Jewish Police’
Read for Class: Steven Katz, ‘Introduction’, Isaiah Trunk, Judenrat: the Jewish councils in Eastern Europe under Nazi Occupation (Bison Books Edition), pp. i-xvii.
Read for Class: Raul Hilberg, ‘The Ghetto as a Form of Government’, Annals of the AmericanAcademy of Political and Social Science, vol. 450, (Jul., 1980), pp. 98-112.
30. Dilemmas of Jewish Politics in the holocaust: Jewish Forms of Resistance
Read for Class: Michael R. Marrus, ‘Jewish Resistance to the Holocaust’, Journal of Contemporary History, Vol. 30, No. 1 (Jan., 1995), pp. 83-110.
31. Dilemmas of Jewish Politics in the holocaust: American Jewry and the Yishuv
Read for Class: Dina Porat, The Blue and the Yellow Stars of David: The Zionist Leadership in Palestine and the Holocaust, 1939-1945, Cambridge, Mass, 1990.
32. A Jewish State: The establishment of the State of Israel and its First Decades
Read for Class: Eliezer Don-Yehiya, ‘Political Religion in a New State’, Ilan Troen and Noah Lucas (eds.), Israel: The First Decade of Independence, AlbanyNY, 1995.
33. Jewish Cold War Liberals
Read for Class: Malachi H. Hacohen. ‘ “The Strange Fact That the State of Israel Exists”: The Cold War Liberals Between Cosmopolitanism and Nationalism’, Jewish Social Studies 15:2 (2009),pp. 37-81.
34.Arguing the World: The New York Intellectuals
Read for Class: Ruth Wisse, “The Jewishness of Commentary”
Read for Class: Nathan Abrams, “America is Home”
35.Ilya Ehrenburg’s Tangled Loyalties
Read for Class: Joshua Rubenstein, ‘Ilya Ehrenburg and the Jewish Question’, Tangled Loyalties: The Life and Times of Ilya Ehrenburg, pp. 312-326.
36.The Canaanite Movement and the New Hebrew Nation
Read for Class: Jakob Shavit, ‘The Emergence of Cnaanism from Hebraism’, The New Hebrew Nation: A Study in Israeli Heresy and Fantasy, pp. 1-20; idem. ‘The Fate of a Heresy and a Fantasy’, ibid., pp. 160-162.
37.Maztpen: Israeli Anti-Zionists
Read for Class: August Grabski, ‘ “Matzpen” and the State of Israel (1962-1973)’, Kwartalnik Historii Żydów [Jewish History Quarterly] 219 (03 / 2006), pp. 354-365.
38.‘Lords of the Land’: Settler Ideology
Read for Class: Gideon Aran, “From Religious Zionism to Zionist Religion”, Studies in Contemporary Jewry 2 (1986), pp. 116-143.
39.Post-Zionism: Politics and Historiography
Read for Class: Lawrence Silberstein, The Post-Zionism Debates: Knowledge and Power in Israeli Culture
40. Summary
* THE FINAL PAPER’S QUESTION WILL BE DISTRIBUTED IN CLASS.
* MUST BE HANDED-IN TO PROFESSOR GORDON IN HIS OFFICE BETWEEN 1-2PM
Building Jewish Identity: Secular Judaism in Historical Perspective Professor Brian Horowitz Professor Ilan Fuchs
Purpose: The starting point for our investigation of a distinctively secular Jewish conception of the world will be the fact that roughly one half of the American Jewish population possesses a secular non-religious orientation (American Jewish Identity Survey, 2001). How did this non-religious orientation arise amongst what many people consider to be a religious community? We will explore how certain non-religious features, such as shared culture, language, customs, dress, and education played an integral role in the definition of Jews and Judaism from their inception, and the role played by these features in the constitution of variant secular forms of Judaism and secular Jewish orientations in the modern period.
This knowledge is connected with service learning in that we study how Jewish communities form themselves, how they deal with issues of service and communal welfare, and how they respond to tensions within and from the non-Jewish world. We will emphasize the way Jews have participated in service activities at other times in history.
SACS: Program Outcomes: 1. This course aims to teach students about significant historical moments and cultural developments in Jewish history and cultures. 2. It will prepare students to employ knowledge of Jewish culture, history, religion, and social structure, to critically consider, interpret, and explicate relevant cultural artifacts, and past, present, and future developments in the Jewish world and their relationship to broader geo-temporal trends and issues. 3. It will help students to acquire knowledge of important approaches to the study of Jewish civilization and the presuppositions underlying them; various analytical techniques employed in the humanities and the social sciences for the study of Jewish civilization, the Jews, and their representation. 4. This course will also prepare students for further courses in Jewish Studies.
Learning Outcomes: 1. Students will understand the history and culture of the Jewish people through the destruction of the second Temple. 2. Students will understand the challenge of Diaspora in Jewish history. 3. Students will be familiar with the processes of integration and emancipation in Europe. 4. Students will learn about the new Jewish politics that arose after the failure of integration in Eastern Europe. 5. Students will understand the Holocaust in its historical context. 6. After finishing the course, students will understand the restructured Jewish map of the twenty-first century, and know the place of America and Israel of world Jewry.
Books and Readings: Jewish Philanthropy and Enlightenment in Late-Tsarist Russia
For every class please expect to read the articles assigned on the syllabus and prepare the assigned chapters in the book.
Introduction
Bible, Origins of the Jews *Genesis 12-25; Exodus, 32-33 Nathan Gottwald, The Hebrew Bible, 93-97.
Jewish State Hebrew Bible, Shmuel 1: 8-11; Kings 1: 11-12.
Bible: Disintegration Hallo, 39-51. Barbara Tuchman, “Pursuit of Policy Contrary to Self-Interest” in The March of Folly, 4-33.
Discussion of Jewish Philanthropy and Enlightenment Kimmy Caplan, “God’s Voice : Audiotaped Sermons in Israeli ‘Haredi’ society,” Modern Judaism 17,3 (1997) 253-279.
Macabees and Jewish Wars Hebert May, The New Oxford Annotated Bible, 221-227. *Hallo, 54-65. *Holy Bible, “Matthew,” 2-38.
Talmud and Exile Hebert Danby, Mishnah, 172-177. “The Destruction of the Second Temple,” in Rabbinical Stories, 38-48, 80-85, 186-191. Text and Traditions, 735-741. The Talmud, 3-55; 84-97.
Jewish Life in Muslim Lands Isadore Twersky, A Maimonides Reader, 42-50. Hallo, “The Koran and the ‘Children of Israel’” 82-89. *Reuven Firestone, “Jewish Culture in the Formative Period of Islam, in Cultures of the Jews, 267-310. Raymond Scheindlin, Merchants and Intellectuals, Rabbis and Poets: Judeo-Arabic Culture in the Golden Age of Islam, in Cultures of the Jews, 313-388.
Discussion of Jewish Philanthropy and Enlightenment Kimmy Caplan, “The Holocaust in Contemporary Israeli Haredi Popular Religion,” Modern Judaism 22,2 (2002): 142-168.
Medieval Jewish Life Jacob Marcus, The Jew in the Medieval World, 121-150. Hallo, 90-93, 124-127. In The Koran and the ‘Children of Israel.” Raymond Sheindlin, Wine, Women, and Death. *Kenneth Stow, Alienated Minority: the Jews of Medieval Latin Europe, 89-100; 158-199. Alan Mintz, “Medieval Consumations,” in Hurban, 85-103.
Kabbalah: Lawrence Fine, “Kabbalah” in Back to the Sources, 305-354. Gershom Sholom, “The Messianic Idea in Kabbalism,” in the Messianic Idea in Judaism, 37-48.
Amsterdam and Early Modern Jewish Life Yosef Kaplan, “Bom Judesmo: the Western Sephardic Diaspora” in Cultures of the Jews, 639-669.
Discussion of Jewish Philanthropy and Enlightenment Kimmy Caplan, “In God We Trust : Salaries and Income of American Orthodox Rabbis, 1881-1924,” American Jewish History 86,1 (1998): 77-106.
Shabatai Zvi Gershom Sholem, “Shabbatai Sevi: The Mystical Messiah” in Essential Papers on Messianic Movements and Personalities, 289-329. Gershom Hundert, Jews in Poland-Lithuania in the Eighteenth Century, 1-56. *Hallo: A Christian Eye-Witness Account of Shabbatai Zevi, 185-206.
Emancipation Hallo, 213-219. * Jew in the Modern World, “The Process of Political Emancipation in Western Europe, 1789-1891,” in The Jew in the Modern World, 100-125 Michael Meyer, The Origins of the Modern Jew, 8-56, 62-99.
Hasidism and Haskalah Hallo, “Ba’al Shem Tov and Early Hasidism,” 190-194. Lucy Dawidowicz, The Golden Tradition, 113-135. Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav, in No Star Too Beautiful, 121-137. Gershom Sholem, “Hasidism: the Latest Phase,” in Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism, 325-250. Open the Tanya, pps. Xiii-10; Tanya, Chapter 32 in ERES.
Discussion of Jewish Philanthropy and Enlightenment “The Life and Sermons of Rabbi Israel Herbert Levinthal (1888-1982),” American Jewish History 87,1 (1999) 1-27 1999.
MIDERM EXAMINATION
Colonial America Jacob Marcus, “The American Colonial Jew: A Study in Acculturation” in The American Jewish Experience, chapter 2 and 5. *Hallo, 241-257.
Religious Reform Joseph Blau, “The Initial Response: Religious Reform in Europe and America” in Modern Varieties of Judaism, 28-74. Michael Meyer, Response to Modernity (B), *“Emerging Patterns of Religious Adjustment” in Jew in the Modern World, 140-180.
Mizrachi Jews
Yiddish *I. Peretz, “Bontshe Shvag” in I. L. Peretz Reader, 146-181. Howard Sachar, “The Growth of Jewish Socialism” in the Course of Modern Jewish History, 332-358. I. Bartal, The Jews of Eastern Europe, 1772-1881 (A,B,C), 14-57, 90-123, 130-156.
Dreyfus to Beilis *Hannah Arent, “Dreyfus Affair,” in Origins of Totalitarianism, 89-120.
Palestine www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org Moshe Maor, “History of Zionism Yoav Gelber, “The Israeli-Arab War of 1948”
USA *Deborah Dwork, “Immigrant Jews On the Lower East Side of New York,” in 120-135, 201-216.
Power in Jewish History
Dr. Brian Horowitz and Dr. Moshe Naor
In this course we are engaged in an investigation of the theme of Jewish power in Jewish history. Of particular interest to us is the perception and projection of power from the perspective of Israel and the Jewish diaspora today. We will also investigate the creation of a Jewish identity based on secular aspects of Jewish life, such as community institutions, political engagements, and intellectual endeavors.
Required Bibliography:
David Biale, Power and Powerlessness in Jewish History, New York: Shocken Books, 1986.
Anita Shapira, Land and Power: The Zionist Resort to Force, 1881-1948, New York: Oxford University Press, 1992.
Ruth R. Wisse, Jews and Power, New York: Schocken Books, 2007
Course Topics and Readings:
Week 1- History and Memory; Macabim, the Great Revolt, and Zionism David Biale, Power and Powerlessness in Jewish History,10-33.
Nachman Ben-Yehuda, "The Masada Myth: Collective Memory and Myth Making in Israel, University of Wisconsin Press, 1995, pp.
Yael Zerubavel, Recovered Roots, University of Chicago Press, 1997, Chapters 4-5.
Week 2- Exile and Redemption: Between the Crusades and Martyrdom Ruth R. Wisse, Jews and Power, 4-77
David Biale, Power and Powerlessness in Jewish History, 34-86.
Jeremy Cohen, "Between Martyrdom and Apostasy: Doubt and Self-Definition in Twelfth Century Ashkenaz, Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies, 29 (1999), pp. 431-471.
Week 3-Shtadlanut, Shabbatai Zvi and Hasidism—Religious Mass Movements
Gershom Sholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism, 325-350.
Gershom Hundert, Essential Papers on Hasidism, 86-208.
Yosef Yerushalmi, “On Shtadlanut.”
“The Society for the Promotion of Enlightenment among the Jews of Russia, and the Evolution of the St. Petersburg Russian-Jewish Intelligentsia, 1893-1905” Jews and the State: Dangerous Alliances and the Perils of Privilege, Studies in Contemporary Jewry 19, ed. Ezra Mendelsohn, 2004, 195-213.
Week 4–Jews and the Modern National Army J.L. Keep, Soldiers of the Tsar, Oxford, 1985, pp.323-350
David Biale, Power and Powerlessness in Jewish History,87-117..
Michael Silber, "From Tolerated Aliens to Citizen Soldiers", Constructing Nationalities in East Central Europe, (2004), pp.43-58.
Week 5–Modern Anti-Semitism and Jewish Self Defense Ruth R. Wisse, Jews and Power, 79-96.
Jonathan Frankel, Prophesy and Politics, 49-132.
Simon Dbnov, Nationalism and History, 131-142.
Benjamin Nathans, Beyond the Pale, 1-22.
Week 6- Sport and Nationalism Jack Kugelmass, "Why Sports", in Ibid (ed.), Jews, Sports and the Rites of Citizenship, Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2007, pp. 3-30.
Moshe Zimmermann, "Muscle Jews versus Nervous Jews", in: Michael Brenner and Gideon Reuveni (eds.), Emancipation through Muscles, University of Nebraska Press, 2006, pp.13-26
Gideon Reuveny, "Sports and Militarization of Jewish Society", Emancipation through Muscles, pp.44-61
Week 7: War and Patriotism; the First World War Glenda Abramson, "This Terrible Radiance: Hebrew Poetry of the First World War, Journal of Jewish Studies, 1 (1999), pp.284-297.
Mark Levine, "Against the Grain: Two Jewish Diaries of War and anti-War, 1914-1918", in: Michael Berkowitz (ed.), Forging Modern Jewish Identities, 2003, pp.81-114.
Shlomit Keren and Michael Keren, "Chaplain with a Star of David: Reverend Leib Isacc Falk and the Jewish Legions", Israel Affairs, 14 (2008), pp.184-201.
Week 8 - Jews and the Russian Revolution Theodor Friedgut, "Jews, Violence and the Russian Revolutionary Movement", Studies in Contemporary Jewry, 18 (2002), pp.43-58
Efraim Sicher, Jews in Russian Literature after the October Revolution, 40-71.
Yury Slezkine, The Jewish Century, 105-203.
Week 9: Jews, Responses to the Radical Right and the European Fascism : Bundism David Biale, Power and Powerlessness in Jewish History, 118-144.
R. De Felice, The Jews in Fascist Italy: A History, New York 2001 Eran Kaplan, The Jewish Radical Right, Wisconsin University Press, 2004.
Zvi Gitelman, “A Century of Jewish Politics in Eastern Europe,” in The Emergence of Modern Jewish Politics, pp. 3-20.
Samuel Kassow, “The Left Poalei Tsiyon in Interwar Poland, “ in The Emergence of Modern Jewish Politics, pp. 71-84
Week 10- The Holocaust and Jewish Resistance Israel Gutman, Resistance: The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, Mariner Books, 1998
Raya Cohen, "Against the Current: HaShomer Hatzair in the Warsaw Ghetto", Jewish Social Studies, 7 (2000), pp.63-80
Hanna Yablonka, " The Deveopment of Holocaust Consciousness in Israel", Israel Studies, 8 (2003), pp.1-24
Week 11 –Between America and Zion David Biale, Power and Powerlessness in Jewish History, 177-205
Melvin I. Urofsky, “Zionism, An American Experience, “ in Jonathan Sarna, ed., The American Jewish Experience, pp. 245-258.
Deborah Dash Moore, “Jewish Migration in Postwar America,” in The American Jewish Experience, pp. 314-330.
Week 12 – Zionism and the use of Power Ruth R. Wisse, Jews and Power, 97-169.
Anita Shapira, Land and Power, 3-126.
Week 13- War, Army and Society in Israel Anita Shapira, Land and Power, 353-370 David Biale, Power and Powerlessness in Jewish History, 145-176.
Moshe Naor, "Israel's 1948 War of Independence as a Total War", Journal of Contemporary History, 43 (April 2008), pp.
Baruch Kimmerling, The Invention and Decline of Israeliness, University of California Press, 2005, pp. 208-228.
Week 14 – Jewish Fundamentalism Ehud Sprinzak, "The Emergence of the Israeli Radical Right", Comparative Politics, 21 (1989), pp.171-192
Chaim Waxman, "Messianism, Zionism and the State of Israel", Modern Judaism, 7 (1987), pp.175-192
Stuart Cohen, "The Re-Discovery of Orthodox Jewish Laws Relating to the Military and War in Contemporary Israel; Trends and Implications, Israel Studies, 12 (Summer 2007), pp.1-28.
Gender and Judaism
Professor Brenda Brasher
This course utilizes a sociological approach to analyze the complex interplay of gender and Judaism. The course opens with an introduction to critical gender theory, and then investigates whether and to what extent it can clarify a number of key institutions of Jewish life including the family, education, work, and military service.
Books:
Handbook of the Sociology of Gender by Chafetz
Jews and Gender by Frankle
Israeli Women’s Studies: A Reader by Esther Fuchs, editor. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2005.
Course Outline:
1. Introduction to the course Martin, “Gender as a social institution” Rosenfeld, “What do we learn about difference..”; Stacey, “Toward Kinder, Gentler Uses..” [all on blackboard] 2. Gender and Judaism: An Introduction Hyman, “Gender and the Shaping of Modern Jewish Identities”, Heschel, “Gender and Agency in Feminist Historiography of Jewish Identity” [all on blackboard] 3. Bodies, Gender and Judaism Sered in Fuchs ‘The Ritualized Body”; “Religious Circumcision: A Jewish View” by Glass; “From Ritual to Science” by Stearns 4. Women, Judaism and Work Essay 1 due Landam, “Jewish Women as Providers..” Friedenrich, “Joining the Faculty Club, Blumen “The Gendered Display of work” [blackboard] 5. Traditionalism and Men Benor, “Masculinity Among Orthodox Jews” Stadler, “Ethnography of Exclusion”; Greenberg, “Social Phobia” 6. Traditionalism and Women Legge, Misra, “Gender Role Ideology” ; Davidman, chs.4, 7 7. Israeli Military and Men Sasson-Levy, “Constructing Identities at the Margins”; Rapoport, “Jugging Models of Masculinity” ] 8. Israeli Military and Women Essay 2 due Herzog in Fuchs, “Homefront and Battlefront:”, Sasson-Levy, “Gender Performance in a changing Military 9. Women and Men in Israeli history Fogiel Bijaoui “Women in the Kibbutz”; Mayer “From Zero to Hero 10. Age, Gender and Judaism “Women, Religion and Modernization” by Sered [blackboard] 11. Gender, Ethnicity and Education El-Or in Fuchs “Paradoxes and Social Boundaries”; Herzog “Trisection of Forces” [blackboard]; Sztokman “To be an Arab Jewish Girl in a State Religious School…” [blackboard] 12. Gender and the Family Tenenbaum “Good or Bad for the Jews” 13. Feminism, Judaism and Gender Ross, Plaskow, “Gendered Theory Gendered Realities” 14. Film 15. Course Overview Final Paper due
