HBRJD-UA 1 | 4 Credits
ELEMENTARY HEBREW I
T, R, F 11:00 AM – 12:15 PM, Rosalie Kamelhar
T, R, F 12:30 PM – 1:45 PM, Rosalie Kamelhar
Active introduction to modern Hebrew as it is spoken and written in Israel today. Presents the essentials of Hebrew grammar, combining the oral-aural approach with formal grammatical concepts. Reinforces learning by reading of graded texts. Emphasizes the acquisition of idiomatic conversational vocabulary and language patterns.
HBRJD-UA 10 | 4 Credits
HEBREW LANGUAGE THROUGH FILM: CULTURAL ENCOUNTERS WIT ISRAELI SOCIETY
T, R 3:30 PM – 4:45 PM, Ilona Ben-Moshe
Aspects of Israeli society as portrayed in primarily 21st century Israeli films and television: immigration and immigrants, ethnic groups within Israeli society, religious communities and their relationship to the secular world, the kibbutz, periphery vs. center, the Israeli-Arab conflict, and military service. Focus on the Hebrew language’s various registers and their manifestation in different social contexts and genres.
HBRJD-UA 144 | 4 credits
YIDDISH IN AMERICA
M, W 9:30 AM – 10:45 AM, Gennady Estraikh
Examines the Yiddish press, theatre, cinema, scholarship, and literature from the age of mass migration at the turn of the twentieth century to our days. Discusses the role of Yiddish in education, religion, and other domains of American Jewish life, both historically and in contemporary times.
HBRJD-UA 177 | 4 credits
TOPICS IN JUDAIC STUDIES: EROS AND SEXUALITY IN MODERN JEWISH LITERATURE
T, R 3:30 PM – 4:45 PM, Roni Henig
What’s love got to do with it? This question has been debated by Jewish writers since the inception of modern Jewish literature. For decades, Jewish authors, artists, and intellectuals have negotiated the status of romantic and sexual love within Judaism, often as a troubling, at times alien, subject matter in the context of Jewishness and the Jewish tradition. With the rise of modern Yiddish and Hebrew literatures in particular, writers articulated new modes of conceiving desire, love, sex, and gender, especially as they related to Jewish society and politics, and these issues continue to be debated within the different avenues of Jewish culture today. This course is devoted to exploring the transforming status of eros and sexuality in Jewish culture by focusing on a diverse selection of literary works, alongside drama, film, and academic essays. Building on feminist and queer theory, our discussion will revolve around issues such as sexual politics and nationalism, love and religion, border-crossing, constructions of femininity and masculinity, and queer love. All materials are available in English translation.
HBRJD-UA 185 | 4 Credits
JEWISH WOMEN IN MODERN TIMES: GENDER AND SEXUALITY
M, W 12:30 PM 1:45PM, Sandra Fox
This course explores the social, cultural and political histories of Jewish women in modern Europe and the United States from the French Revolution through World War II, focusing on the era of Emancipation, the bourgeois 19th century, both World Wars, and the Holocaust. We will examine the options women had, the boundaries against which they pushed, and the roles they created for themselves in public and in private. Students will read secondary sources as well as memoirs, diaries, and letters.
HBRJD-UA 2 | 4 Credits
ELEMENTARY HEBREW II
W 11:00 AM – 12:15 PM, Ganit Mayer
Continuation of HBRJD-UA 1. Open to students who have completed HBRJD-UA 1 or who have been placed at this level through the placement examination.
HBRJD-UA 3 | 4 Credits
INTERMEDIATE HEBREW I
M,W 3:30 PM - 5:30 PM, Ganit Mayer
T, R, F 12:30 PM - 1:45 PM, Ilona Ben-Moshe
Open to students who have completed HBRJD-UA 2 or HBRJD-UA 5, or those who have been placed at this level through the placement examination. Builds on skills acquired in Elementary Hebrew I and II and develops a deepening command of all linguistic skills. Modern literary and expository texts are read to expand vocabulary and grammatical knowledge, with conversation and composition exercises built around the texts. Introduces selections from Israeli media. Addresses the relationship between classical and modern Hebrew.
HBRJD-UA 4 | 4 Credits
INTERMEDIATE HEBREW II
M, W, F 9:30 AM – 10:45 AM, Ganit Mayer
T, R, F 11:00 AM – 12:15 PM, Ilona Ben-Moshe
Continuation of HBRJD-UA 3. Open to students who have completed HBRJD-UA 3 or who have been placed at this level through the placement examination.
HBRJD-UA 422 | 4 Credits
LIVING A GOOD LIFE: GREEK AND JEWISH PERSPECTIVES
M, W 11:00 AM - 12:15 PM, Michah Gottlieb
What makes a life well-lived? Central questions to be explored include: Does living well require acquiring knowledge and wisdom? What is the place of moral responsibility in the good life? Is the good life a happy life or does it require sacrificing happiness? Does religion lead to living well or does it hinder it? What is friendship and how does it contribute to the good life? Thinkers to be studied may include: Aristotle, Seneca, Maimonides, Glikl, Spinoza, and Levinas.
HBRJD-UA 710 | 4 Credits
ISRAELI POLITICS AND SOCIETY
T, R 2:00 PM - 3:15 PM, Benjamin Gladstone
Examines the power structure and mechanisms of contemporary Israeli politics beginning with the emergence of the provisional government in 1948. Traces how Israel's national institutions, key basic bills and the legislation mechanism, and electoral system developed. The course also examines key fault lines in Israeli social, political, and economic life, including Jewish-Arab relations; the balance between the welfare state and economic liberalism; Union workers and gender relations.
HBRJD-UA 784 | 2 Credits
READINGS IN TALMUD (IN HEBREW): GITTIN CHAPTER 2
T 6:45 PM - 8:25 PM, Lawrence H Schiffman
Studies a selected section of the Hebrew and Aramaic text of the Babylonian Talmud, utilizing both traditional and academic methods of study. Emphasis is on mastering the themes and concepts while studying the text and its commentaries in depth.
HBRJD-UA 949 | 4 Credits
J TOPICS IN THE BIBLE AND ANCIENT NEAR EAST: THE HISTORY, POLITICS, AND POETICS OF BIBLE TRANSLASION
T, R 9:30 AM - 10:45 AM, Instructor TBD
Topics in the Bible and the Ancient Near East offers a range of particular subjects. These vary by term. This course engages the reality that the Bible pervades public media and discourse even where it is not named or acknowledged. The ultimate interest of the course is the Bible itself, how it is read (or not read, but still used) today in relation to the purposes and contexts of its writing in ancient time.