Miami University (Ohio)

&Miami University in Ohio is offering the following courses in the Posen Project: Secular Jewish Culture from the Enlightenment to Zionism as the core course, with the following peripheral courses: Jewish-American Fiction: 1945 to the Present, Tradition and Identity: Jews and Judaism in the Persian and Greco-Roman Periods: 539 BCE-200 CE, and Contemporary and Israeli Society: Psychological and Social Challenges.

Secular Jewish Culture from the Enlightenment to Zionism

Constructed around a dynamic series of lectures by internationally renowned Jewish studies scholars, this course surveys topics, questions, and debates that academics working in the field of modern secular Jewish culture and history engage with today. We will explore aspects of Jewish culture, identity and politics in an array of historical contexts including 17th-century Holland; Revolutionary France; 18th-, 19th-, and 20th-century Germany; early 20th-century Eastern Europe; 20th-century America, as well as Palestine/Israel at different moments, both real and imagined. Students should leave this course with a sense of the richness and variety of modern Jewish culture(s), and with a first-hand knowledge of how some of the most exciting practitioners of modern Jewish studies are changing and widening the field.

Course plan:

1. Course Introduction and Overview
2. Benedict Spinoza (1632-1677) and the Radical Enlightenment.
Read: Spinoza, Theologico-Political Treatise: Preface; ch 5-6; selections from ch 7 & 8 (hand out)
3. Read: Spinoza, Theologico-Political Treatise: ch 16 and 20; Appendix to Ethics 1; Preface to Ethics 3 (hand out)
Lecture of Interest: Sven-Erik Rose, “Patrick Modiano’s Dora Bruder, Surrealism, and the Postmemorial Archive,” 135 Kreger Hall, 4 PM
4. Lecture 1: Julie Klein, "Spinoza and Us: The Question of Radical Enlightenment"
5. Discussion of lecture by Julie Klein

Jews and the French Revolution.
Read: Documents concerning Jewish civil and political rights in the context of the French Revolution: Lynn Hunt, ed., The French Revolution and Human Rights: A Brief Documentary History, pp. 48-51; 77-79; 86-88; 93-101; (CR) Berr Isaac Berr, “Letter of a Citizen to His Fellow Jews” (1791) (CR)
6.Read: Ronald Schechter, Obstinate Hebrews, Chapter 5, “Constituting Differences: The French Revolution and the Jews” (CR)
7. Lecture 2: Ronald Schechter, “The French Revolution and the Jews”
8. Discussion of lecture by Ronald Schechter

Over the Rhine… Jews, German Philosophy, and the French Revolution: The Possibilities and Dangers of Universalism. Read: Sven-Erik Rose, “Lazarus Bendavid’s and J. G. Fichte’s Kantian Fantasies of Jewish Decapitation in 1793” (hand out)
9. First paper due.
Imagining Palestine.
Theodor Herzl, Old-New Land 3-50

10. Herzl, Old-New Land 53-181
11. Herzl, Old-New Land 185-296
12. Read: Russel Jacoby, Picture Imperfect: Utopian Thought for an Anti-Utopian Age, ch 3 “To Shake the World Off Its Hinges” (CR)

Lecture 3: Eran Kaplan, “New Old Land: Herzl and the Zionist Utopia in Historical Perspective”
13. Discussion of reading by Russel Jacoby and lecture by Eran Kaplan

Revisiting Germany’s “Jewish Question”
Read: Sander Gilman, “The Child Convert: Karl Marx” (CR)
14. Read: Karl Marx, “On the Jewish Question” (CR)
15. Lecture 4: Sven-Erik Rose, “Marx’s ‘Real Jews’ and the Invention of the Proletariat”
16. Discussion of lecture by Sven-Erik Rose

East European Jewish Culture in Transformation.
Read: David Biale, “East European Jewish Culture from the Partitions of Poland to the Holocaust” in Cultures of the Jews (CR)
17. Read: S. Ansky, The Dybbuk; and screen: Michal Waszynski’s film, The Dybbuk (1937) [can be streamed via the ILRC]
18. Read: Sholem Asch, God of Vengeance (hand out)

Lecture 5: Naomi Seidman, “Secularization, Sexuality, and the Rise of Modern Jewish Literature”
19. Read: Naomi Seidman, “The Ghost of Queer Loves Past: Ansky's ‘Dybbuk’ and the Sexual Transformation of Ashkenaz” (CR), and “Staging Tradition: Piety and Scandal in God of Vengeance” (hand out)

Discussion of Ansky, Asch, and lecture and readings by Naomi Seidman
20. Second paper due.
Autonomism vs. Cultural Zionism.
Read: selections from Simon Dubnov and Ahad Ha-Am (CR)

Extra-credit opportunity: Katie Johnson, "Excitable Speech: Sexuality and Performativity in Sholom Asch’s The God of Vengeance," Irvin 40, 4 p.m.
21. Secular Jewish Movements in the US.
Yiddishism and Zionism in America.
Read: Chaim Jitlowsky, “What is Secular Jewish Culture?” and “The Jewish Factor in My Socialism” (CR);
Chaim Greenberg, “A Glance into the Future” (CR);
Jacob Glatstein, “Chaim Greenberg” (CR)
22. Read: Hayim Greenberg, “Our Stand,” “Church and State - Seven Theses,” and “Dispersion and Concentration” (CR); Mark Raider, The Emergence of American Zionism, Chapter 5, “Harbingers of American Zionism” (CR)

Lecture 6: Mark Raider, “Hayim Greenberg and American Zionism”
23. Discussion of readings by Greenberg, and reading and lecture by Mark Raider

Read: Hannah Arendt, selected articles from Aufbau, 1941-1945 (hand out)

Event of Interest: Aine Zimmerman, “German-Jewish Love Stories After the Holocaust,” Alumni 1, 5 PM
24. Excursus: On the (non-) Jewishness of Charlie Chaplin (in-class screening and discussion).
Read: David Bathrick, “Cinematic Remaskings of Hitler: From Riefenstahl to Chaplin” (hand out)
25. Hannah Arendt, “The Jew as Pariah: A Hidden Tradition” (1944) (CR)
26. Lecture 7: Liliane Weissberg, “Hannah Arendt at the Movies: Charlie Chaplin and the Hidden Tradition of Jewish Culture”
27. Third paper due.
Discussion lecture by Liliane Weissberg

28. Synthesis and Review


Required Texts:

Ansky, S. A Dybbuk and Other Writings, Ed. David Roskies. Trans. Golda Werman. New York: Schocken Books, 1992
Herzl, Theodor, Old New Land, Trans. Lotta Levensohn. Princeton, N.J.: M Wiener, 2004
Course Reader

Bibliography:

Ahad Ha-Am. “Past and Future,” Selected Essays, tr. Leaon Simon (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1912), 80-90.

_________. Nationalism and the Jewish Ethic: Basic Writings of Ahad Ha'am. Ed. Hans Kohn. New York: Schocken Books, 1962.

Arendt, Hannah. “The Jew as Pariah: A Hidden Tradition.” Hannah Arendt: The Jewish Writings. Ed. Jerome Kohn and Ron H. Feldman. New York: Schocken, 2007, 275-297.

Asch, Scholem. God of Vengeance. In Three Great Jewish Plays Ed. and Trans. Joseph C. Landis. New York: Applause, 1986, 73-113.

Berr, Berr Isaac. “Letter of a Citizen to His Fellow Jews” (1791). In Paul Mendes-Flohr and Jehuda Reinharz, eds., The Jew in the Modern World: A Documentary History. Second Ed. New York: Oxford UP, 1995, p. 118-121.

Biale, David. “A Journey Between Worlds: East European Jewish Culture from the Partitions of Poland to the Holocaust” in David Biale, ed., Cultures of the Jews: A New History. New York: Schocken, 2002, p. 799-860.

Dubnow, Simon. Nationalism and History: Essays on Old and New Judaism. Ed. Koppel S. Pinson. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1958.

Gilman, Sander L. Jewish Self-Hatred: Antisemitism and the Hidden Language of the Jews. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 1986.

Hunt, Lynn, ed. The French Revolution and Human Rights: A Brief Documentary History. Ed. and Trans. Lynn Hunt. New York: St. Martin’s, 1996.

Marx, Karl. “On the Jewish Question.”

Raider, Mark. The Emergence of American Zionism. New York: New York UP, 1998.

Seidman, Naomi. “Staging Tradition: Piety and Scandal in God of Vengeance.” Nanette Stahl, ed., Sholem Asch Reconsidered. New Haven, CT: The Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, 2004, 51-62.

--. “The Ghost of Queer Loves Past: Ansky's "Dybbuk" and the Sexual Transformation of Ashkenaz.” Daniel Boyarin, Daniel Itzkovitz, and Ann Pellegrini, eds. Queer Theory and the Jewish Question. New York: Columbia UP, 2003, 228-245.

Steinlauf, Michael C. “‘Fardibekt!’: An-sky’s Polish Legacy.” In Gabriella Safran and Steven J. Zipperstein, eds., The Worlds of S. An-sky: A Russian Jewish Intellectual at the Turn of the Century. Stanford: Stanford UP, 2006, p. 232-251

de Spinoza, Benedict. Theological-Political Treatise. Ed. Jonathan Israel. Trans. Michael Silverthorne and Jonathan Israel. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2007.

Zhitlowsky, Chaim. “What is Secular Jewish Culture?” In Joseph Leftwich, ed., Great Yiddish Writers of the Twentieth Century. New York: Jason Aronson, 1987, 91-98.

--. “The Jewish Factor in My Socialism.” In Lucy S. Dawidowicz, ed., The Golden Tradition: Jewish Life and Thought in Eastern Europe. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1967, 411-422.


Jewish American Fiction: 1945 to the Present

The course will examine the contributions of Jewish American writers to American fiction since the Second World War. In addition to issues of identity and assimilation, the course will explore the writers' treatment of, or response to the Holocaust and the changing patterns of life in post-war America.

Texts:

Bernard Malamud, The Assistant
J.D. Salinger, Franny and Zooey
Philip Roth, Goodbye, Columbus
Saul Bellow, Henderson the Rain King
Edward Lewis Wallant, The Pawnbroker
E.L. Doctorow, Ragtime
Grace Paley, Enormous Changes at the Last Minute
Cynthia Ozick, The Shawl
Art Spegelman, Maus I: A Survivor's Tale: My Father Bleeds History
Jonathan Safran Foer, Everything Is Iluminated
Nathan Englander, For the Relief of Unbearable Urges

Reading and Class Schedule:

1. introduction
2. Salinger, "Franny"
3. Salinger, "Zooey"
4. Malamud, The Assistant
5. Roth, Goodbye, Columbus
6. Roth, Goodbye, Columbus, "The Defender of the Faith"
7. Bellow, Henderson the Rain King
8. Wallant, The Pawnbroker
9. Paley, Enormous Changes at the Last Minute
10. Doctorow, Ragtime
11. Ozick, The Shawl
12. Spiegelman, Maus
13. Englander, For Relief of Unbearable Urges
14. Foer, Everything Is Illuminated
15. Review


Tradition and Identity: Jews and Judaism in the Persian and Greco-Roman Periods (539 BCE-200 CE)

What does it mean to be Jewish in the ancient world? Where, and under what social conditions, did Judaism come into being? This course deals with the ancient history of the Jewish people from the Persian through the Greco-Roman periods (539 BCE-200 CE), during which Judaism – the “way of life” of the Jewish people – first emerged within the broader sociopolitical and cultural context of the ancient Near East. This is a story of how the Jewish people began to define their identity, as Jews, and find their place in a world as politically and culturally complex as our own. In this course we will study how Jews preserved their communal traditions and Israelite legacy through a variety of approaches to foreign cultures and rulers, such as the Persians, Greeks and Romans. Jews survived and flourished in a majority non-Jewish world through a process of “creative communal reinvention” revealed in the architecture, coins, inscriptions and literature of the period, which we will study throughout this course. In sum, this course provides a basic knowledge of ancient Jewish history, essential for understanding both the origins of Judaism and the great significance of the ancient Jewish cultural legacy for later Judaism, Christianity, Islam and western society as a whole.

Required Texts:

Elias J. Bickerman, The Jews in the Greek Age (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1990).
Shaye J. D. Cohen, From the Maccabees to the Mishnah, Second Edition (Philadelphia: Westminster, John Knox Press, 2006).
HC = The HarperCollins Study Bible, NRSV (New Revised Standard Version), with the Apocryphal/Deuterocanonical books (New York: HarperSanFrancisco, 2006).
Josephus, The Jewish War (Penguin Classics), G. A. Williamson trans., revised with a new introduction, notes and appendices by E. Mary Smallwood (London: Penguin Books, 1984).
Peter Schäfer, The History of the Jews in the Greco-Roman World (London: Routledge, 2003).
Geza Vermes, The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls in English (New York: The Penguin Press, 1997).


Class Schedule:

1. Welcome, Review of Syllabus, Class Expectations: Introduction, Overview of the History of the Ancient Near East

2. Prehistory of “Second Temple” Judaism: Ancient Israel and Judah down to the Babylonian Exile
Readings: - 2 Kings, 15-25 (HC, 541-559);
- Psalm 137 (HC, 840-841);
- Shaye J. D. Cohen, From the Maccabees to the Mishnah, 1-17.

3. Exile in Babylon: The Rise of Persia & Cyrus as “Messiah”
Readings: - Isaiah, 40-47 (HC 961-973);
- John Bright, “Exile and Restoration,” (CP #1, 1-15);
- “The Babylonian Chronicle,” (CP #2, 17-18);
- “The Decree of Cyrus,” (CP #3, 19-20).

4. Return from Exile: Authority and the Rebuilt Community
Reading: - Ezra (HC, 646-662);
- Nehemiah (HC, 663-679);
- Haggai (HC, 1265-1268);
- II Chronicles, 30 (HC 635-636);
- Bright, “The Jewish Community in the 5th Century,” (CP #4, 21-30)

5. Complexities of Identity; Aramaic Literature & the Diaspora
Readings: - Jonah (HC, 1233-1237);
- Ruth (HC, 382-388);
- Daniel, 1-6 (HC 1168-1182);
- “Letters of the Jews in Elephantine,” (CP #5, 31-33);
- Elias J. Bickerman, The Jews in the Greek Age, 26-65.
* Map/ID Quiz # 1

6. The Hellenistic Age: Alexander the Great & the Samaritans
Readings: - Josephus, Jewish Antiquities (=AJ) 9.288-91 (CP #6, 35-36); - Josephus, AJ 11.297-347 (CP #7, 37-50);
- Bickerman, Jews in the Greek Age, 3-12;
- Peter Schäfer, History of the Jews, 1-12.

7. Judea under Ptolemaic Egypt; & The Eastern Diaspora
Readings: - “Zenon Papyri,” #s 4-6 (CP #8, 51-56);
- Josephus, AJ 12.119-130 (CP #9, 57-60) - Josephus, Against Apion (=Ag Ap) 2.33-48 (CP #10, 61-65);
- Josephus, AJ 12.147-53 (CP # 11, 67-68);
- Schäfer, History of the Jews, 13-25;
- Bickerman, Jews in the Greek Age, 69-100.

8. Encounters between Jews and Greeks & The Septuagint
Readings: - Clearchus of Soli, On Sleep (CP #12, 69-71);
- Hecataeus of Abdera, On The Jews (CP #s 13-14, 71-82);
- “Letter of Aristeas,” (CP # 15, 83-105); - Josephus, “Tobiad Romance,” AJ 12.154-236 (CP #16, 107-127);
- Bickerman, Jews in the Greek Age, 13-25, 101-16.

9. Judea under Seleucid Rule: Hellenism & Hellenization
Readings: - Josephus, AJ 12.129-146 (CP # 17, 129-135);
- II Maccabees, 3 (HC 1523-1525);
- Schäfer, History of the Jews, 27-44;
- Bickerman, Jews in the Greek Age, 117-29;
- Cohen, From the Maccabees to the Mishnah, 19-37.

10. Judean Communal Institutions: The Temple and its Staff - Priests & Levites; The Scribe: Wisdom Literature and Apocalyptic
Readings: - Proverbs, 7-9 (HC 860-863);
- Ben Sira, Prologue-1, 24, 34, 38-39, 42.15-50.29 (HC 1378-1382, 1409-1411, 1423-1425, 1428-1432, 1436-1449);
- I Enoch, 1-36 “The Book of the Watchers” (CP # 18, 137-153);
- Daniel, 7-12 (HC 1182-1192);
- Bickerman, Jews in the Greek Age, 132-76.
* Take Home Exam # 1: Assigned

11. The Anti-Judaism Decrees & The Maccabean Revolt
Readings: - I Maccabees 1-7 (HC 1477-1498); - II Maccabees 1-15 (HC 1519-1547);
- Daniel, 9-12 (HC 1186-1192);
- Schäfer, History of the Jews, 44-63.
* Take Home Exam # 1: Due at Beginning of Class

12. Jews and Judaism as Hellenistic Ethnos-Politeia:
Judea Reborn in the Image of Rome
Readings: - I Maccabees, 8-16 (HC 1498-1518);
- II Maccabees, 1-2.18, 4, 6-7, 10-15.39 (HC 1520-1523, 1525- 1528, 1529-1533, 1536-1547);
- Josephus, AJ 13.228-287 (CP # 20, 167-181);
- Josephus, AJ 14.145-155 (CP # 21, 183-186);
- Josephus, AJ 14.247-255 (CP # 22, 187-189);
- Schäfer, History of the Jews, 49-80;
- Cohen, From the Maccabees to the Mishnah, 99-103.

13. Contested Legacy I: The Hasmoneans & Their Detractors
Readings: - I Maccabees, 1-2, 7.1-25, 9, 16 (1648-54, 1665-73, 1689-90);
- II Maccabees, 14.1-36 (1718-20);
- Josephus, AJ 13.62-73 (CP # 23, 191-194);
- Josephus, AJ 13.288-432 (CP # 24, 195-232);
- Josephus, The Jewish War (=BJ) “The District of Onias,” 406-07;
- Psalms of Solomon, 1-2, 8, 17 (CP # 25, 233-244).

14. Contested Legacy II: Qumran the Dead Sea Scrolls
Readings: - Vermes, Dead Sea Scrolls in English, 1-90;
- “The Community Rule,” Vermes, Dead Sea Scrolls, 97-117;
- “The Damascus Document,” Vermes, Dead Sea Scrolls, 127-145.

15. Midrash - Modes of Rewriting the Jewish/Israelite Past
Readings: - Nahum 1-3 (HC 1249-1253); - “Commentary on Nahum,” Vermes, Dead Sea Scrolls, 504-508; - Habakkuk 1-3 (HC 1254-1258)
- “Commentary on Habakkuk” Vermes, Dead Sea Scrolls, 509-516;
- Genesis 1-20 (HC 3-32) - Jubilees, 1-15 (CP # 26, 245-280);
- Bickerman, Jews in the Greek Age, 177-91, 201-36.
* Map/ID Quiz # 2

16. Judea under Rome and the Rise of the Herodian House
Readings: - Josephus, BJ, 27-119;
- Schäfer, History of the Jews, 81-100.

17. From Herod to the Great Revolt: Co-opting and Augmenting the Hasmonean Legacy
Readings: - Josephus, BJ, 120-222;
- Schäfer, History of the Jews, 101-120.
* Assignment of Take-Home Midterm

18. Jewish Sects in Palestine
Readings: - Josephus, BJ, 133-38;
- Josephus, AJ, 13.171-173 (CP # 27, 281-282); - Josephus, AJ 13.288-298 (CP # 28, 283-285);
- Josephus, AJ 18.1-25 (CP # 29, 287-297);
- Gospel of Matthew, 22.23-33, 23.1-36 (HC 1706-1709);
- Acts, 5.17-42, 21.27-23.11 (HC 1864-1865, 1896-1899);
- Letter to the Philippians, 3.2-6 (HC 1995);
- Cohen, From the Maccabees to the Mishnah, 119-166.
* Take Home Midterm Due at Beginning of Class

19. Jewish Religion: Second Temple Period Practice & Belief
Readings: - Josephus, BJ 223-306; - Bickerman, Jews in the Greek Age, 257-97;
- Cohen, From the Maccabees to the Mishnah, 51-98.

20. Jewish Identity in the Diaspora
Readings: - Ezekiel the Tragedian, “Exagoge” (CP # 30, 299-310);
- Artapanus (CP # 31, 311-317);
- III Maccabees (HC 1573-1587);
- Josephus, Ag Ap, 2.33-124 (CP # 32, 319-338);
- Josephus, AJ 12.147-153 (CP # 33, 339-340);
- Cohen, , 37-50, 103-118;
- Bickerman, Jews in the Greek Age, 237-56.
* Map/ID Quiz # 3

21. The Great Revolt and the Destruction of the Temple
Readings: - Josephus, BJ 307-408; - IV Ezra, 3-14 (CP # 34, 341-368); - Schäfer, History of the Jews, 121-43.
* Assignment of Term Paper Topics

22. The Jewish Jesus Movement
Readings: - Gospel of Matthew (HC 1665-1721);
- Gospel of Mark, 1-7 (HC 1722-1738);
- Letter to the Galatians (HC 1972-1981).

23. The Bar Kokhba Revolt
Readings: - Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History, 4.6.1-4 (CP # 35, 369-370);
- Cassius Dio, Historiae Romanae, 49.12-14 (CP # 36, 371);
- Bar-Kokhba Letters (CP # 37, 372-377);
- Jerusalem Talmud, Ta‘anit, 4.5-6 (CP # 38, 379-384);
- Schäfer, History of the Jews, 145-61.

24. The Mishnah and the Mobile Cult-The Rabbi and Authority
Readings: - Mishnah, Avot, 1.1-18 (CP # 39, 385)
- Mishnah, Yoma, (CP # 40, 386-391);
- Marriage Contract of Salome Komaïse (CP # 41, 393-396);
- Schäfer, History of the Jews, 163-75;
- Cohen, From the Maccabees to the Mishnah, 205-23.
* Map/ID Quiz # 4

25. The Legacy of Ancient Israel: Jews, Gentile Christianity & The “Closing” of the Biblical Canon
Readings: - “Benediction against the Minim,” Babylonian Talmud, Berakhot 28b-29a (CP # 42, 397-400) - “Benediction against the Minim,” Jerusalem Talmud, Berakhot 4.3 8a (CP # 43, 401-403);
- Gospel of John, 8.12-9.34, 12.12-50, 15.18-16.4 (HC 1831-1834, 1838-1840, 1844);
- Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho 1, 16-17, 25, 38-40, 47-48, 64, 67-68, 71-73, 96, 122-25 (CP # 44, 405-429);
- Schäfer, History of the Jews, 176-97;
- Cohen, From the Maccabees to the Mishnah, 167-204.
26. From Mishnah to Talmud: Literary and Material Remains of Rabbinic Period Galilee; & Summing Up Ancient Jewish History
Readings: - Josephus, AJ 14.19-28, “Honi ha-Me‘agel” (CP # 45, 431-433);
- Mishnah, Ta‘anit 3.8 (CP # 46, 434);
- Jerusalem Talmud, Ta‘anit 3.9-10 (CP # 47, 435-440);
- Babylonian Talmud, Ta‘anit 23a-23b (# 48, 441-444);
- Bickerman, Jews in the Greek Age, 298-305.


* TERM PAPER: DUE MONDAY, MAY 5, AT 12 NOON – HISTORY OFFICE
254 UPHAM HALL


Contemporary Israeli Society: Psychological and Social Changes

This course is proposed for juniors and seniors in the Psychology Department and the Jewish Studies Program who are interested in learning about the unique challenges facing the Israeli society at the present.

Modern Israel is a vibrant and complex multi-ethnic, multi-racial, and multi-religious society. After the state was established in 1948, it was flooded with Jewish immigrants from around the world, primarily Holocaust survivors from Europe and refugees from Arab lands. Since then and until today, the Israeli society has faced challenges of integration of its Israeli-born, European, Middle Eastern, and other countries of origin residents. It also faces the need to integrate religious differences amongst the Jews (from ultra-Orthodox to Secular), the need to heal the tragic past of the Holocaust, and to establish a secure existence amongst hostile Arab countries and terrorism. Arab citizens make up close to 20% of the population in Israel and there is a need to identify a way of living with them side by side. Finally, there is a need to reconcile the political tensions between the extreme right parties that believe in maintaining power over the Palestinians, and the left parties that believe in giving up lands as the price of peace. The “new Israeli” is a brave, future- and action-oriented person, while at the same time constant losses and fear makes it important to do the almost daily mourning process.

The contemporary Israeli society is a rich laboratory for all of these challenges. In spite of these issues, Israel survives and flourishes. We will study the different aspects of the complexity of the Israeli Society and the attempts made to bring this society to integration. It is expected that students will also gain a deeper understanding of psychological processes involved in addressing diversity of people living under conditions of stress.

Schedule of Topics:

Weeks 1-3: The history of the establishment of the state of Israel, including the trauma of the Holocaust
Read Introduction in text

Weeks 4+5: Immigration Society: European, Middle-Eastern, Spanish, Americans, others, and Israel-born natives. Economic & Social Gaps
Read chapters 5+7 in textbook

Weeks 6+7: Religious tensions:
Chapter 4 in textbook

Weeks 8+9: Political tensions (left and right parties)
Students declare their choice of project topics

Weeks 10+11: The Palestinians’ crisis (“Intefada”)
Read chapter 6+9 in textbook

Weeks 12+13: Psychological problems: Stress, Mourning and Lost, holocaust survivors
Student presentations of projects

Weeks 14+15: Integration.
Read chapter 11 in textbook
Student presentations of projects


Textbook:

Dowty, A. (Ed.), Critical Issues in israeli Society, Westport: Fraeger

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