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University of TorontoThe core course at the University of Toronto is Secularism and Strife: The Cultural History of Modern Jews with the other courses being The Spinozist Challenge: Secularization in Modern Jewish Thought, Outsiders Inside: Jews and American Popular Culture, Canadian Jewish Culture, and Culture and Society of Modern Israel.
Secularism and Strife: The Cultural History of Modern Jews
Modern Jewish culture is the product of a dynamic interaction between two sets of
opposed elements: religion versus secularism and the individual versus the collective.
This course will analyze the historical roots and development of the four possible
combinations of these elements: the religious collective, the secular individual, the
secular collective, and the religious individual. Our starting point will be the invention of
the modern Jewish self in the late 18th and 19th-century Jewish Enlightenment. We will
see how Jews reacted to new promises of personal freedom by reforming, reframing, and
abandoning Judaism. We will trace the connection between these developments and the
creation in the late 19th and 20th centuries of new forms of secular, collective Jewish
identity through movements such as communism, diaspora nationalism, and Zionism.
Books for purchase:
Abraham Cahan, Yekl and the Imported Bridegroom
Albert Memmi, PIllar of Salt
Ezra Mendelsohn, On Modern Jewish Politics
Amos Oz, A Tale of Love and Darkness
Philip Roth, Goodbye Columbus
Michael Stanislawski, Autobiographical Jews
A course reader will consist of selections from:
Robert Alter, Modern Hebrew Literature
Hannah Arendt, Rahel Varnhagen
Amos Elon, The Pity of it All
Jonathan Frankel, Prophecy and Politics
Benjamin Harshav, Language in Time of Revolution
Heinrich Heine, The Rabbi of Bacharach and Other Stories
Deborah Hertz, Jewish High Society in Old-Regime Berlin
Andrew Heinze, Jews and the American Soul
Eli Lederhendler, The Road to Modern Jewish Politics
Solmon Maimon, Autobiography
Deborah Dash Moore and Ilan Troen, eds., Divergent Jewish Cultures
Tony Michels, A Fire in Their Hearts
Marcus Mosley, Being For Myself Alone
Derek Penslar, Israel in History
Derek Penslar, Shylock’s Children
Philip Roth, Operation Shylock
Nancy Sinkoff, Out of the Shtetl
Yuri Slezkine, The Jewish Century
Sarah Abrevaya Stein, Making Jews Modern
Michael Stanislawski, Autobiograpical Jews
Michael Stanislawski, Zionism and the Fin de Siecle
Yosef Haim Yerushalmi, Zakhor
Yael Zerubavel, Recovered Roots
Steven Zipperstein, The Jews of Odessa
Course Outline:
Week One: Modernity, Secularization and Selfhood
Reading: (CR) David Sorkin, “Into the Modern World,” in Nicholas de Lange, The Illustrated History of the Jewish People, 199-233; Stanislawski, Autobiographical Jews, Introduction
Week Two: Haskalah and the Invention of the Modern Jewish Self
Reading: Maimon, Autobiography; Stanislawski, Autobiographical Jews, 32-68
Week Three: Reframing Judaism: From Reform to Orthodoxy
Reading: (CR) Reinharz/Mendes-Flohr, The Jew in the Modern World, 161-85, 194-205
Week Four: Gender and Selfhood in 19th-Century Jewish Culture
(CR) Hannah Arendt, Rahel Varnhagen, 103-13, 219-59; (STL) Pauline Wengeroff, Rememberings, 96-213
Document analysis handed out
Week Five: Self-Fulfillment: Narratives of Jewish Success
(CR) Sorkin, “Into the Modern World,” in De Lange, 234-53; (CR) Derek Penslar, Shylock’s Children: Economics and Jewish Identity in Modern Europe, 124-38, 144-58; Cahan, “Yekl”
Document analysis due
Week Six: Self-Abasement: Crises of Jewish Identity at the fin de siecle
Reading: Stanislawski, Autobiographical Jews, Chapter 4; (CR) Yfatt Weiss, “Identity and Essentialism: Race, Racism and the Jews at the Fin de Siecle,” in Neil Gregor et al., eds., German History From the Margins 49-69; (CR) Mendes-Flohr, The Jew in the Modern World, 261-82
First essay assignment handed out
Week Seven: Collective Solutions: Modern Jewish Politics
Reading: Mendelsohn, On Modern Jewish Politics, 1-125
Week Eight: Language as a Tool of Revolution: Yiddish and Hebrew
Reading: (STL) Harshav, The Meaning of Yiddish, 119-60, (STL) Abramovitch, “The Brief Travels of Benjamin the Third;” Assorted documents on Zionist Hebrew culture to be posted on course web site.
First essay due
Week Nine: The Colonized Self: Sephardic and Middle Eastern Jewry
Reading: Memmi, Pillar of Salt
Week Ten: Individualist Secularism in a Collectivist Society: The Soviet Union
Reading: (CR) Anna Shternshis, “Soviet Yiddish Songs as a Mirror of Jewish Identity,” (STL) Moshe Kulbak, “Zelmenyaner,” (CR), Isaac Babel, “Gedali,” “The Rabbi,” “The Rabbi’s Son”
Week Eleven: Collectivism, Secular and Religious: The Zionist Project
Oz, A Tale of Love and Darkness, chapters 1-19, 27, 30-44
Week Twelve: Parricide in Israel: The End of Hegemony and the Rise of Ethnic Selfhood
Reading: Oz, A Tale of Love and Darkness, chapter 45-end; (CR) Ella Shohat, “Zionism From the Standpoint of its Jewish Victims;” (CR) Shimon Ballas, interview and “Iya;| Sami Shalom Chetrit, selected poems, in Keys to the Garden, Ammiel Alcalay, ed., 61-99, 357-63; Etgar Keret, “The Nimrod Flipout.”
Week Thirteen: Individualism, Secular and Religious: Contemporary North America
Second essay assignment handed out.
Reading: (CR) Whitfield, “Declarations of Independence,” Roth, Goodbye, Columbus
The Spinozist Challenge: Secularization in Modern Jewish Thought
This course addresses the particular role of Spinoza in modern Jewish thought. Viewed
by many as a threat to traditional Judaism, he also represents the single most important
philosopher in modernity for Jewish thought. Whether admired or rejected, adored or
reviled, examination of his thought and its central role in Mendelssohn and Heine
provides the foundation for a critical understanding of how modern secular Jewish
thought develops and how it represents a formidable contribution to the European project
of Enlightenment and Modernity.
Books for purchase:
Spinoza, Ethics
-----, Theological-Political Treatise
Mendelssohn, Jerusalem or on Religious Power and Judaism
Course reader with selections from:
Heinrich Heine, Rabbi of Bacherach, Bath of Lucca, City of Lucca, Hebrew Melodies
Mendelssohn, Preface Manasse ben Israel, Vindication of the Jews
Lessing, The Jews, Nathan the Wise
Etienne Balibar, Spinoza’s political phil
Willi Goetschel, Spinoza’s Modernity: Mendelssohn, Lessing, and Heine
Willi Goetschel, “Lessing’s ‘Jewish Questions’”
Jonathan Israel, Radical Enlightenment
Emmanuel Levinas, Difficult Liberty
S.S.Prawer, Heine’s Jewish Comedy
Georg Simmel, Social Aesthetics
Leo Strauss, Persecution and the Art of Writing
Course Outline:
Introduction
Spinoza as contemporary critical thinker
Spinoza as fatal thinker of the past
Spinoza’s Heremeneutics: TTP 1-7
Secularization and Democracy, TTP 8-15
Spinoza’s Politics: TTP 16-20, TP
Reading Week
Spinoza’s secular Ethics of Self-Empowerment, E
Lessing’s plays The Jews and Nathan the Wise
Mendelssohn, Preface to Manaseh Ben Israel’s Vindication of the Jews; Jerusalem, part 1
Mendelssohn, Jerusalem part 2
Maimon and post-Kantian Spinozism
Heine, Rabbi of Bacherach, On the History of Religion and Philosophy in Germany
Heine, “Hebrew Melodies”, “Bath of Lucca”, “City of Lucca”
Outsiders Inside: Jews and American Popular Culture
Dr. Erica Simmons, Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of History
From the Jazz Age till today, Jews helped to shape twentieth century American popular culture in all its forms from radio, movies, and television to literature, graphic arts, music, art, humor, and theatre. This course will examine how American Jewish cultural expression was influenced by the historical experience of Jewish immigrants and their descendents’ struggles to become American. We will assess the effect of antisemitism and racism, the impact of the Second World War and the Holocaust, and the establishment of the State of Israel, on the Jewish self-image, and on representations of Jews in popular culture. We will also explore popular culture representations of Jewish women, and of Jewish masculinity, as well as changing images of Jews as villains and victims, radicals and subversives, as transgressors, social outcasts, and arrivistes. Grounding our analysis in historical scholarship, we will use the artifacts of popular culture, including fiction, music, movies, television, comics, and graphic novels, to analyse the complex interrelationship between Jewish history, Jewish identity, and the role of Jews as both creators and subjects of American popular culture.
Required Texts:
Diner, Hasia. A New Promised Land: A History of Jews in America. Oxford University Press, 2003.
Merwin, Ted. In their Own Image: New York Jews in Jazz Age Popular Culture. Rutgers University Press, 2006.
Course Reader
Course Outline:
1. Introduction and overview
2. New Immigrants in the Promised Land
• Diner, Hasia.“Transplanted People: 1880-1924” (Chapter 3) in The New Promised Land [required text]
• Goldstein, Eric. “The Unstable Other: Locating the Jew in Progressive-Era American Racial Discourse,” American Jewish History 89.4 (Dec. 2001): 383-409 [online]
• Riis, Jacob. “The Jews of New York” 1896. Available online from website: On the Lower East Side: Observations of Life in Lower Manhattan at the Turn of the Century [www2.arts.gla.ac.uk/www/ctich/eastside/contents.html]
• Warnke, Nina. “Immigrant Popular Culture as Contested Sphere: Yiddish Music Halls, the Yiddish Press, and the Processes of Americanization, 1900-1910.” Theatre Journal 48.3 (1996): 321-335 [online]
3. Performing Jews: Vaudeville
**Film: Vaudeville (4:00- 6:00 pm)—this film is available on course reserve to watch in-library, ask for it at Robarts Library Media Commons
• Lavitt, Pamela Brown. “Vaudeville, pp. 15-35 in Jews and American Popular Culture, vol. 2, ed. Buhle. [course reader]
• Merwin, Ted. “Introduction,” pp. 1-16, and “Jews on the Vaudeville Stage,” pp. 17-60 in In their Own Image: New York Jews in Jazz Age Popular Culture. [required text]
• Mintz, Lawrence E. “Humor and Ethnic Stereotypes in Vaudeville and Burlesque.” MELUS, Vol. 21, (1996): 14-28. [online]
4. Musical Jews: Tin Pan Alley and Broadway
Film: From Shtetl to Swing (in-class)
• Ford, Henry. “Jewish Jazz Becomes Our National Music,” Dearborn Independent, 13 August 1921.[www.biblebelievers.org.au/ij_ch11.htm]
• Howe, Irving. “Tevye on Broadway,” Commentary 38 (Nov. 1964), 73-75. [online]
• Merwin, Ted. “Jews on Broadway,: pp. 61-111 in In their Own Image: New York Jews in Jazz Age Popular Culture. [required text]
• Most, Andrea. “Jews and the Broadway Musical,” pp. 37-48 in Jews and American Popular Culture, vol. 2, ed. Buhle. [course reader]
• Seidman, Derek. “Jews, Tin Pan Alley, and the Rise of American Popular Music,” pp. 99-111 in Jews and American Popular Culture, vol. 2, ed. Buhle. [course reader]
• Listen to online radio documentary by Michael Goldfarb “Jews and Blues” []
5. The Jazz Singer
**Film: The Jazz Singer (1927) (4:00-6:00 pm)
• Diner, Hasia. “Trading Faces” (review of Rogin). Common Quest (Summer 1997): 40-4. [course reader]
• Merwin, Ted. “Jews in Silent Film,” pp. 112-59 in In their Own Image: New York Jews in Jazz Age Popular Culture. [required text]
• Rogin, Michael. “Making America Home: Racial Masquerade and Ethnic Assimilation in the Transition to Talking Pictures,” The Journal of American History 79.3 (Dec. 1992): 1050-1077. [online]
• Rosenberg, Joel. “Rogin’s Nose: The Alleged Historical Crimes of The Jazz Singer.” Prooftexts 22.1 + 2 (winter/spring 2002): 221-39. [online]
6. Jews on Film
**Film: Hollywoodism (4:00-6:00 pm)
• Diner, Hasia. “Becoming Americans: 1924-1945,” (Chapter 4) A New Promised Land: A History of Jews in America [required text]
• Holberg, Amelia. “Betty Boop: Yiddish Film Star,” American Jewish History 87:4 (Dec. 1999): 219-312 [online].
• Klein, Dennis B. “The Movies: Notes on the Ethnic Origins of an American Obsession,” pp. 1-11 in Jews and American Popular Culture, Vol. 1, ed. Buhle. [course reader]
• Thissen, Judith. “National and Local Movie Moguls: Two Patterns of Jewish Showmanship in Film Exhibition,” pp. 13-23.in Jews and American Popular Culture, Vol. 1, ed. Buhle. [course reader]
7. Antisemitism
**Film: Gentleman’s Agreement (4:00-6:00 pm.)
• Brackman, Harold “The Attack on Jewish Holly 20 (2000): 1-19. [online]
• Gerber, David A. “Anti-Semitism and Jewish-Gentile Relations in American Historiography and the American Past,” pp. 3-54 in Anti-Semitism in American History, ed. David A. Gerber [course reader]
• Sarna, Jonathan D. “American Anti-Semitism,” pp. 115-128 in History and Hate: The Dimensions of Anti-Semitism, ed. David Berger [course reader]
• Weber, Donald. “The Limits of Empathy: Hollywood’s Imaging of Jews circa 1947,” pp. 91-104 in Key Texts in American Jewish Culture, ed. Kugelmass. [course reader]
8. Holocaust
**Film: Imaginary Witness: Hollywood and the Holocaust (4:00-6:00 pm)
• Baron, Lawrence. “The Holocaust and American Public Memory, 1945-1960,” Holocaust and Genocide Studies 17.1 (Spring 2003): 62-88. [online]
• Diner, Hasia. “Post-World-War-II American Jewry and the Confrontation With Catastrophe,” American Jewish History 91.3-4 (2003): 439-67. [online]
• Steir, Oren Baruch. “Holocaust, American Style,” Prooftexts 22:3 (Fall 2002): 354-91. [online]
9. The Impact of Israel
• Diner, Hasia. “On the Move: 1945-1967” (Chapter 5, pp. 93-116) and “At the Crossroads: Since 1967 ( Chapter 6, pp. 117-138) in A New Promised Land: A History of Jews in America [course text]
• Gonshak, Henry. “ ‘Rambowitz’ versus the ‘Schlemiel’ in Leon Uris’s Exodus.” Journal of American Culture. 22.1 (March 1999): 9-16. [online]
• Mart, Michelle. “Constructing a Universal Ideal: Anti-Semitism, American Jews, and the Founding of Israel,” Modern Judaism 20 (2000): 181-208. [online]
• Mart, Michelle. “Tough Guys and American Cold War Policy: Images of Israel, 1948-1960.” Diplomatic History 20.3 (Summer 1996): 357-380. [online]
10. Gendering Jews
• Antler, Joyce. “Yesterday’s Woman,” Today’s Moral Guide: Molly Goldberg as Jewish Mother,” pp. 129-146 in Key Texts in American Jewish Culture, ed. Jack Kugelmass. [course reader].
• Brod, Harry. “Of Mice and Supermen: Images of Jewish Masculinity,” pp. 145-55 in Redeeming Men: Religion and Masculinities, ed. Boyd. [course reader]
• Desser, David. “Jews in Space: The Ordeal of Masculinity in Contemporary American Film and Television,” pp. 267-281 in Ladies and Gentlemen, Boys and Girls: Gender in Film at the End of the Twentieth Century, ed. Murray Pomerance. State University of New York Press [course reader]
• Rivo, Sharon Pucker. “Projected Images: Portraits of Jewish Women in Early American Film” pp. 30-49 Talking Back: Images of Jewish Women in American Popular Culture, ed. Joyce Antler. [course reader]
11. Jewish Humor and Comedy
**Film: Rise and Fall of the Borscht Belt (4:00-6:00 pm.)
• Levenson, Sam.“The Dialect Comedian Should Vanish.” Commentary 14 (Aug. 1952): [online]
• Lieberfeld, D. and J. Sanders, “Here Under False Pretenses: The Marx Brothers Crash the Gates,” in American Scholar 64: 1 (1995): 103-8. [online]
• Rosenthal, Philip Lahn. “My Uncle Mendel and Eddie Cantor.” The Modern Language Journal 35:3 (Mar. 1951): 199-203. [online]
• Saposnik, Irv. “These Serious Jests: American Jews and Jewish Comedy,” Judaism 47.3 (1998): 311-320 [online]
• Schack, William and Sarah. “And Now—Yinglish on Broadway.” Commentary 12 (1951): 586-589. [online]
12. Jews on the Page
• Roth, Philip, “Eli the Fanatic,” pp. 918-945 in Jewish American Literature: A Norton Anthology [course reader]
• Spiegelman, Art. “And Here My Troubles Began,” Excerpt from Maus II, A Survivor’s Tale, pp. 1095-1104 in Jewish American Literature: A Norton Anthology [course reader]
• Schwartz, Delmore. “In Dreams Begin Responsibilities,” pp. 540-545 in Jewish American Literature: A Norton Anthology [course reader]
• Paley, Grace. “The Loudest Voice,” pp. 795-799 in Jewish American Literature: A Norton Anthology [course reader]
13. Post-War Jews
• Brooks, Vincent, “Bring in the Klowns: Jewish Television Comedy Since the 1960s,” 237-259 in Jews and American Popular Culture, ed. Buhle, vol. 1 [course reader]
• Kraus, Joe. “The Jewish Gangster: A Conversation Across Generations,” The American Scholar 64:1 (Winter 1995): 53-65. [online]
• Merwin, Ted. Conclusion, pp. 160-74, In their Own Image
• Popkin, Henry. “The Vanishing Jew of American Culture.” Commentary 14.1 (July 1952): 46-55. [online]
Canadian Jewish Culture
This course examines the contributions made by Canadian Jews to Canadian culture. We use culture in the broad perspective, as the sense of place and identity of residents in a nation-state. This does not limit the student to the study of the arts, but rather looks at how the literature, journalism, scholarship, the plastic arts, music, drama, film, broadcasting, sport and other cultural markers have framed Canadian identity. This course concentrates on the literature. We will examine the writing of Canadian Jews, from the turn of the twentieth century until the present, within the context of time and space. The emphasis will be on how the writers were influenced by the events of their time, their physical and human environment, and how their work reflected their reality. One dynamic that we will investigate is the degree of “Jewishness” that influences their work. In other words, are we looking at the artist as Canadian Jew, or as a Canadian who happens to be Jewish. This dialectic will frame some of our discussions. We are not focusing on syntax, style or literary criticism, but rather on how literature sheds a light on the conditions of Jews in Canada in a particular time and place.
Course Texts:
Menkis, Richard and Ravvin, Norman, eds. The Canadian Jewish Studies Reader
Michaels, Anne, Fugitive Pieces
Richler, Mordechai, The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz
Course kit
Course Outline:
1. Overview; Historical Background
Reading: Reader: Menkis, Tulchinsky, Brown, 13 – 89
2. Yiddish Montreal
Reading: Reader: Robinson, Margolis, 126-163
Course Kit: An Everyday Miracle: Yiddish Culture in Montreal. Butovsky, Anctil, Robinson, eds., 11-52; 115-157
Course Kit: Melech Ravitch (1893-1976) in Parchment, Contemporary Jewish Writing, Vol. 2, 1993-4, 19-23.
3. The World of A. M. Klein
Readings: Reader: Anctil, 350 – 372
Course Kit: Greenstein, ed., Contemporary Jewish Writing in Canada, xi-xx; Geddes, ed., Canadian Poets x 3, 36-49; Kaplan, Like One That Dreamed, 16 - 66, 105-121, 165-177; Greenstein, Third Solitudes, 18-34.
4. The Three Greats of post-war Montreal – Layton, Cohen, Richler
Readings: Course Kit: Greenstein, ed., Contemporary Jewish Writing in Canada, xxi-xxix, 3-26; Layton, Selected Poems, xv-xxvii, 100, 108, 117-118, 146-150, 191-196, 277-8; Sherman in Parchment, Vol. 10, 2001-2, 13-22; Cohen, Selected Poems, 69-77, 122; Ravvin, A House of Words – Jewish Writing, Identity and Memory, on Cohen, Richler, 22-47.
5. Richler’s Montreal
Reading: The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz
6. The Sephardic Experience
Readings: Reader: Rosen, 108-125
Course Kit: Greenstein, ed., Contemporary Jewish Writing in Canada xxix-xxxi, 59-95 on Kattan, Bosco, Robin; Bosco in Parchment, Vol. 2, 89-91; Kattan in Parchment, Vol. 10 – 60-68.
READING WEEK
7. Jewish Life in the Frontier: The Prairie Experience
Readings: Reader: Waddington, 216-223; Ravvin, 266-282
Course Kit: Greenstein, ed., Contemporary Jewish Writing in Canada, xxxi-xxxix; Greenstein, Triptych of Prairie Past in Parchment, Vol. 2, 9; Geddes, ed. Canadian Poets x 3, 81-91 (Waddington), 187-198 (Mandel); Greenstein, Third Solitudes, 102-118; Ravvin, Hidden Canada, 123-142
8. The Holocaust: Its Impact on Canadian Jewish Identity
Readings: Reader: Bialystok, 283-331; Schober, 332-347; Troper and Weinfeld, 373-422 (Optional)
Course Kit: “Sefer Otwock”, “Little Streets” by Sam (Simcha) Simchowitch in Parchment #3, 35-8; “The Matmid in Canada”, “Rozia of Klimentow” by Donia Blumenfeld Clenman, “ in Parchment #10, 130-7; “The Apostate’s Tatoo”, “Fifty Bullets”, “The Coinciding of Sosnowiec, Upper Silesia, Poland, 1942, and Banff, Alberta, Canada” by J.J. Steinfeld in Dancing At The Club Holocaust – Stories New and Selected; “How To Tell Your Children about the Holocaust” by Ruth Mandel in Parchment #3, 77-79.
9. Anne Michaels: From Poland to Greece to Toronto
Reading: Fugitive Pieces
10. What about Ontario?
Readings: Reader: Diamond, 186-215; Ravvin, 474-484
Course Kit: Greenstein, ed, xxix-xxli, Norman Levine, “By a Frozen River; Matt Cohen, “The Sins of Thomas Benares” in Greenstein, ed., Contemporary Jewish Writing in Canada, 141-177.
11. Contemporary Writers
Readings: Course Kit: “Tapka”, “Natasha” by David Bezmogis, Natasha and other stories, 1-18, 79-110; “Namesake” by J. J. Steinfeld in Parchment #3, 24-34; “A Jew’s House” by Norman Ravvin, in Parchment #2, 56-62; “Creeping” by Sharon Abron Drache, 173-185, and “Three Poems From the March of the Living April 2000” by Lisa Lidor, 36-39 in Parchment #10;
12. Presentations and Discussion
Culture and Society of Modern Israel
This course focuses on major social and cultural aspects of modern Israel in the past sixty years since the establishment of the state. In this course you will get the feeling of contemporary Israeli society, encompassing its diversity and complexity. Main social divisions within Israeli society will be discussed: Ashkenazi and Mizrahi Jews, Jews and Arabs, religion and secularism, newcomers and veteran immigrants, right and left politics as well as major discrepancies regarding issues of orthodoxy, military service, holocaust commemoration, civil rights in a Jewish state, and gender inequality. The Israeli changing cultural politics will be analyzed dynamically, introducing national melting- pot institutionalization processes “from above” on the one hand (for example: national literature, folk dance creation, and food consumption policies); grassroots’ processes of privatization and multiculturalism on the other hand (for example: homosexual activism, private bereavement commemoration); and finally the impacts of Americanization and globalization that challenge Israeli Zionist ideology.
General suggested reading:
Goldscheider, Calvin. 2002. Israel’s changing society: Population, ethnicity and development. Colorado: West View.
Kimmerling, Baruch. 2001. The invention and decline of Israeliness: State, society, and the military. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.
Penslar, Derek. 2007. Israel in history: The Jewish state in contemporary perspective. London and NY: Routledge.
Course Outline:
Week 1. Introduction
Topics: Working definitions for ‘society’ and ‘culture’, culture in a broader perspective, what is modern Israel? Is Israel one?
* Rebhun, Uzi. 2004. Major trends in the development of Israeli Jews: A synthesis of the last century. Pp.3-19 in Uzi Rebhun and Chaim Waxman (eds.) Jews in Israel: Contemporary social and cultural patterns. Hanover: Brandies University Press. READER
* Ben-Rafael, Eliezer and Peres Yochanan. 2005. The social and cultural landscape of Israel. Ch. 2, Pp. 27-58 in Is Israel one? Religion, nationalism and multiculturalism confounded. Leiden, Boston: Brill. READER
Week 2. In the beginning – Israel’s emergence I
Topics: The State of Israel emerges during the 1948 War of Independence, the mass immigration (aliyah) in the 1950’s; new and old immigrants (olim), the kibbutz, the transit camp (maabara), state and society after war, austerity in Israel (tzena).
* Gat, Moshe. 2002. The IDF and the mass immigration of the early 1950s: Aid to the immigrant camps. Israel Affairs 8, (1): 191-210. READER
* Rozin, Orit. 2006. Food, identity, nationalism and nation building in Israeli formation years. Israel Studies Forum 21, (1): 52-80. READER
Week 3. In the beginning – Israel emerges II
Topics: the film “Sallah Shabbati” (starring Chaim Topol). The outstanding Israeli satirist Ephraim Kishon, a holocaust survivor from Hungary, created this classic in 1963. The film ironically describes the Israeli melting-pot policy and the social relationships between European and Oriental Jewish immigrants in the early years of Israeli statehood.
* Film: Sallah Shabbati (Ephraim Kishon, Israel 1963, 105 min)
* Shohat Ella. 1989. Introduction. Pp. 1-13; Sallah Shabbati. Pp. 138-155 in Israeli Cinema: East/West and the politics of representation. Austin: University of Texas Press. READER
# Almog, Oz. 2000. The Sabra: The creation of the new Jew. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Week 4. Institutionalizing Israeli national culture
Topics: Civil religion in Israel and the creation of national holidays and ceremonies.
* Zerubavel, Yael. 2005. Transhistorical encounters in the land of Israel: On symbolic bridges, national memory, and the literary imagination. Jewish Social Studies 11, (3): 115-140. ONLINE
* Brog, Mooli. 2003. Victims and victors: Holocaust and military commemoration in Israel’s collective memory. Israel Studies 8, (3): 65-99. ONLINE
# Zerubavel, Yael. 1995. Recovered roots: Collective Memory and the making of Israeli national tradition. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
# Handelman, Don. 2004. Nationalism and the Israeli state: Bureaucratic logic in public events. New York: Berg.
Week 5. Israeli culture and its “others”
Topics: Major splits in Israel - Ashkenazi Jews vs. Mizrahi Jews; Jews vs. Arabs. Different sub-groups of “others” negotiate their positions and challenge Israeli culture.
* Regev, Motti. 2000. To have a culture of our own: On Israeliness and its variants. Ethnic and Racial Studies. 23, (2): 223-247. ONLINE
* Roginsky, Dina. 2006. Nationalism and ambivalence: Ethnicity, gender and folklore as categories of otherness. Patterns of Prejudice 40, (3): 237-258. ONLINE
# Shenhav, Yehouda. 2006. The Arab Jews: A postcolonial reading of nationalism, religion and ethnicity. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
Week 6. A state in war, a state of war I
Topics: State in a constant war, and a constant “state of war” within Israeli society. The Israeli reserve system as a “nation in uniform”.
* Film: Have you ever shot someone? (Michal Aviad, documentary, Israel 1995, 57 min)
* Helman, Sara. 2002. Militarism and the construction of the life-world of Israeli males: The case of the reserves system. Pp. 191-221 in Lomsky-Feder, Edna and Ben-Ari Eyal (eds.) The military and militarism in Israeli society. Albany: SUNY. READER
Week 7. A state in war, a state of war II
Topics: different groups in Israeli society challenge the armed forces – Haredim and left wing Refuseniks.
* Dloomy, Ariel. 2005. The Israeli Refuseniks: 1983-2003. Israel Affairs 11, (4): 695-716. ONLINE
* Stadler, Nurit and Ben-Ari, Eyal. 2003. Other-worldly soldiers? Ultra-orthodox views of military service in contemporary Israel. Israel Affairs 9, (4):17-48.
ONLINE
# Ben-Eliezer, Uri. 1998. The making of Israeli militarism. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press.
Week 8. Gender and family
Gender and family relations in Israel, women’s status in contemporary Israel, and the ideology of equality.
* Herzog, Hanna. 2004. Women in Israeli society. Pp. 195-220 in Uzi Rebhun and Chaim Waxman (eds.) Jews in Israel: Contemporary social and cultural patterns. Hanover: Brandeis University Press. READER
* Swirsky, Barbara and Safir, Marilyn. 1991. Women of the dream. Pp. 251-269 in theirs: Calling the equality bluff: Women in Israel. New York: Pergamon Press. READER
# Naveh, Hannah (ed). 2003. Gender and Israeli Society: Women's Time. London: Vallentine Mitchell.
Week 9. Jewish state and civil rights I
Topics: a democratic and Jewish state – can they live together? The split between religion and secularism in Israel, the case of homosexuality.
* Film: Pride (documentary, Igal Hecht and Lior Cohen, Israel 2006, 45 min)
* Liebman, Charles. 1997. Reconceptualizing the culture conflict among Israeli Jews. Israel Studies 2, (2): 172-189. ONLINE
* Kama, Amit. 2000. From terra incognita to terra firma: The logbook of the voyage of gay men's community into the Israeli public sphere. Journal of Homosexuality 38, (4): 133-162. ONLINE
# Urian, Dan and Karsh, Efraim (eds). 1999. In Search for Identity: Jewish Aspects in Israeli Culture. London and Portland: Frank Cass.
Week 10. A Jewish state and civil rights II
Topics: a democratic and Jewish state – can they live together? The split between Jews and Arabs in Israel.
* Smooha, Sammy. 2004. Arab-Jewish relations in Israel: A deeply divided society. Pp. 31-68 in: Shapira Anita (ed.) Israeli identity in transition. London: Praeger. READER
* Dowty, Alan. 1999. Is Israel democratic? Substance and semantics in the ethnic democracy debate. Israel Studies 4, (2): 1-15. ONLINE
# Rouhanna, Nadim. 1997. Palestinian citizens in an ethnic Jewish state: Identities in conflict. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Week 11. Immigrants or olim? multiculturalism in contemporary Israel I
Topics: Russian and Ethiopian immigrants in Israel, multiculturalism in Israel.
* Horowitz, Tamar. 2005. The integration of immigrants from the Former Soviet Union. Israel Affairs 11, (1): 117-136. ONLINE
* Kaplan, Steven. 1999. Can the Ethiopian change his skin? The Beta Israel (Ethiopian Jews) and racial discourse. African Affairs 98, (393): 535-550. ONLINE
Week 12. Immigrants or olim? multiculturalism in contemporary Israel II
Topics: Latest immigrant groups to Israel change Israeli demography and challenge the concept of aliyah.
* Hacohen, Dvora. 2002. Mass immigration and the demographic revolution in Israel. Israel Affairs 8, (1): 177-190. ONLINE
* Ben-Rafael, Eliezer and Peres Yochanan. 2005. The configuration of multiculturalism. Ch. 10, Pp. 203-221 in Is Israel one? Religion, nationalism and multiculturalism confounded. Leiden, Boston: Brill. READER
Week 13. Americanization, globalization and contested Zionism
Israel is changed and challenged: processes of Americanization and globalization in contemporary Israel, contesting the Zionist ideology.
* Almog, Oz. 2004. The Globalization of Israel. Pp. 233-256 in: Shapira Anita (ed.) Israeli Identity in Transition. Lodon: Praeger. READER
* First, Anat and Avraham, Eli. 2007. Globalization / Americanization and negotiating national dreams. Israel Studies Forum 22, (1): 54-74. ONLINE
* Ram, Uri. 2004. The state of nation: Contemporary challenges to Zionism in Israel. Pp. 305-320 in: Kemp, A. Newman, D. Ram, U. and Yiftachel, O. (eds.) Israelis in Conflict: Hegemonies, Identities, and Challenges. Sussex Academic Press. READER
# Hazan, Haim. 2001. Simulated dreams: Israeli youth and virtual Zionism. New York: Berghahn Books.
* Required Reading
# Recommended Reading
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