JUDAIC STUDIES COURSE OFFERINGS
Fall 2001

The following list includes courses offered by faculty associated with the Center for Judaic Studies, as well as other courses of interest to Judaic Studies students. We try to make this list as accurate and comprehensive as possible. If you have questions about offerings or times, check with the department in which the course is listed for the latest information.

English 317 Religious Dimensions of Modern Jewish Literature.
Section 003 LEC
Class number: 19357
Meets with JS 317.003.
T Th 2:30-4 pm
Levinson, Julian
3 Credits
What is the relationship between the imaginative and the Judaic? Do modern Jewish writers represent a definitive break with the religious traditions? Or do they recover and reinvigorate these traditions? Is it possible to look to literature to continue the traditional Jewish practice of interpreting the Written and Oral Law? What resources does the religous tradition offer to make sense of Holocaust and other events of the 20th century? Considering a variety of genres including parables, poetry, novels, and autobiographical essays, this course explores the religious dimension of modern Jewish literature. Writers include I.L. Peretz, Franz Kafka, Elie Wiesel, S.Y. Agnon, Milton Steinberg, Joseph Soloveichik, Cynthia Ozick, Leon Wieseltier, and Marge Piercy. We will consider these writers in relation to Jewish forms such as Midrash, liturgical poetry, and Hasidic storytelling. Requirements include one short paper (3-5 pages), one longer paper (6-8 pages), and a final.

English 383 Jewish-American Literature.
Section 001 LEC
Class number: 4847
Meets with JS 317.001.
T Th 11:30-1 pm
Levinson, Julian
3 Credits
This course provides an introduction to the literature written by Jews in America, from the period of immigration to the present. The questions we will address will include the following: How do Jewish writers in America straddle the divide between Jewish culture and modern American life? How do they interpret the collective past and create a collective memory? What features, if any, define the Jewish-American literary canon? What recurring metaphors, images, and characters animate this literature? To respond to these questions, this course explores a range of texts from the immigrant writings of Mary Antin to the post-Holocaust writings of Cynthia Ozick. Other authors include Morris Rosenfeld, Anna Margolin, Jacob Glatstein, Saul Bellow, Bernard Malamud, Grace Paley, Philip Roth and Isaac Bashevis Singer. While some of these authors wrote in Yiddish, all of their works will be read in translation. Two papers (4-6 pages), midterm, and final.

History 381 History of the Jews from the Muslim Conquests to the Spanish Expulsion.
Section 001 LEC
Class number: 18699
T Th 4-5:30 pm
Siegmund, Stefanie
3 Credits
This course will survey major historic developments in medieval Jewish society under both Islam and western Christendom. Broadly, the course will look at the divergence of Judaism and Christianity, the rise of the Babylonian geonim, the social and cultural history of Jews in the Arab Mediterranean world, the emergence of Jewish communities in Medieval Ashkenaz, and the impact on Jewish society of the Crusades, the Reconquista, the emergence of the mendicant orders, and the Black Death. The course will examine the interaction of Jews with the majority culture, political structure, and economy, as well as changing cultural trends within Jewish society. The distinctive religious climate of the medieval period will serve as a unifying theme throughout. We will study primary sources as well as recent historical scholarship, and our focus will include the history of women as well as that of men. Class is conducted as lecture and discussion of texts with an occasional film or slide lecture. Requirements for the course: several short written and oral assignments, tests, and final examination. Prerequisites: None. History 110 and some familiarity with Judaism or Jewish civilization (Religion 201, Judaic Studies 379/HJCS 379, or similar) is recommended background.

History 383 Modern Jewish History to 1880.
Section 001 LEC
Class number: 18837
MWF 11-12 pm
Endelman, Todd
3 Credits
This course surveys Jewish history in Europe, America, and the Middle East from the mid-seventeenth century to the 1870s. It begins with the emergence of West European Jews from cultural and social isolation, discusses their political emancipation, and traces their efforts to modernize Jewish ritual and belief. The focus then shifts to Eastern Europe, where the world of tradition persisted much longer. The lectures on Eastern Europe will focus on the religious and social character of Jewish life in Poland and Russia, the development of Hasidism, and the first glimmerings of enlightenment in the mid-nineteenth century. The course will conclude with a look at the Jewish communities of North Africa and the Middle East. There will be an essay-type midterm, a 10-12 page paper, and a comprehensive final.

JS 101 Elementary Yiddish I.
Section 001 REC
Class number: 5939
MWF 12-1PM
Szabo, Vera
3 Credits
This is the first of a two-term sequence designed to develop basic skills in speaking, understanding, reading, and writing Yiddish. Active class participation is required as are periodic quizzes, exams, a midterm, and a final. There are no prerequisites.

JS 201 Intermediate Yiddish I.
Section 001 REC
Class number: 5941
MWF 2-3 PM
Szabo, Vera
3 Credits
This is the third term of a language sequence in Yiddish. The course is designed to develop fluency in oral and written comprehension, and to offer a further understanding of the culture within which Yiddish has developed. Special emphasis will be devoted to reading material. Course grade will be based on exams, quizzes, written work, and oral class participation.

JS 205 Introduction to Jewish Civilizations and Culture.
Section 001 LEC
Class number: 5942
HJCS 276
MW 2:30-4 PM
Boccaccini, Gabrielle
4 Credits
An overview of 3,000 years of Jewish Civilization, from its Near Eastern roots to contemporary times, from the rabbis to the uncertainties of the year 2000. A social and intellectual history of Judaism with emphasis on the interaction between Jewish and non-Jewish cultures and civilizations. An interactive and interdisciplinary experience for the student, with the instructor providing the general framework in introductory presentations, U-M specialists in Judaic Studies offering guest lectures on the major topics of Jewish history and religion, and discussion sessions giving the opportunity for direct contact with primary sources. No prerequisites. Grades are based on attendance, daily readings of primary sources, midterm, final and a term paper.

JS 270 Introduction to Rabbinic Literature.
Section 001 LEC
Class number: 19294
HJCS 270
MWF 11-12 PM
Eliav, Yaron
3 Credits
In this course, we will explore the history and substance of rabbinic writing on three levels. First, we will talk about the rabbinic literary enterprise within the broad cultural, historical and religious context of the Roman and Byzantine eras. Second, we will examine the many genres of rabbinic literature and consider the sages—the elite group of Jewish intellectuals who created this corpus. Finally, we will trace the way in which subsequent generations have gradually shaped these texts to their current format and endowed them with their exalted status.

JS 317 Topics Judaic Studies/Jewish Literature/ Jewish Culture in America: 1945 to the Present.
Section 001 REC
Class number: 18948
T Th 11:30-1PM
Levinson, Julian
Meets with English 383.001 – Topics in Jewish Literature/Jewish Literature.
See English 383 for description.
3 Credits

JS 317 Topics Judaic Studies/Religious Dimension of Modern Jewish Literature.
Section 003 REC
Class number: 19773
T Th 2:30-4 PM
Levinson, Julian
Meets with English 317.003 Literature and Culture
3 Credits

JS 468 Jewish Mysticism.
Section 001 LEC
HJCS 478/Religion 469
T Th 10-11:30 AM
Ginsburg, Elliot
3 Credits
A study of the historical development of Jewish mysticism, its symbolic universe, meditational practices, and social ramifications. While we will survey mystical traditions from the late second Temple period through modernity, the central focus will be on the rich medieval stream known as kabbalah. Among the issues to be explored are: the nature of mystical experience; images of God, world, and Person; sexual and gender symbolism (images of the male and female); the problem of evil; mysticism, language, and silence; mysticism and the law; mysticism and community; meditative and ecstatic practices (ranging from visualization to chant, letter combination, and modulated breathing); kabbalistic myth and ritual innovation; and kabbalistic interpretations of history. Modern interpretations of mysticism will also be considered. Readings for the course consist of secondary sources from the history of Judaism and comparative religion, and selected primary texts (in translation). Requirements include two exams and a research paper. Class lectures will be supplemented by discussion, contemplative exercises, and on occasion, music and other media.

JS 505 Introduction to Jewish Civilizations and Culture.
Section 001 LEC
Class number: 5963
MW 2:30-4PM
Boccaccini, Gabrielle
See JS 205 for description.
4 Credits

Law 642 Jewish Law.
Th 3:40-5:40PM, 132 Hutchins Hall
Glogower, Rod
2 Credits
This course will focus on the dynamic tension of immutability vs. change, permanence vs. adaptation, constancy vs. evolution, as it pertains to the drama of Jewish law. Topics include an introduction to the basic legal sources of Jewish law; alternate approaches to Jewish law is formulated by the Conservative and Reform movements; the relationship between Jewish law and mortality; the potential conflicts between the demands of Jewish law and the demands of the civil government; and how a legal system can function in the absence of sanctions of enforcement and legal remedies.

ACABS 201 Intermediate Biblical Hebrew.
Section 001 REC
Class number: 2546
T Th 1-2:30PM
Schmidt, Brian
3 Credits
This course is an introduction to the literature of the Hebrew Bible. Texts representing different literary genres, and dating from different periods, will be read in the original. Students will be introduced to the history of the text of the Hebrew Bible and the problems of its translation and interpretation. Special emphasis will be placed on refining the student's knowledge of Biblical Hebrew through the study of Hebrew syntax. Required books are (1) a copy of the Biblica Hebraica, and (2) a proper dictionary of classical Hebrew.

HJCS 101 Elementary Modern Hebrew I.
Section 001 REC
Class number: 5388
MWF 9-11AM
Weizman, Pauli

HJCS 101 Elementary Modern Hebrew I.
Section 003 REC
Class number: 5390
MWF 11-1PM
Eliav, Milka

HJCS 101 Elementary Modern Hebrew I.
Section 004 REC
Class number: 5391
MWF 1-3 PM
Eliav, Milka
5 Credits
The focus of instruction is on the development of basic communication skills in standard modern Hebrew. Speaking, writing, reading, and listening comprehension are emphasized in classroom activities in an appropriate cultural context. This course is taught in small sections. The final grade is based on class activities, students’ presentations, written assignments and unit tests: midterm and final. Class discussions and activities are exclusively in Hebrew.

HJCS 201 Intermediate Modern Hebrew I.
Section 001 REC
Class number: 5411
MWF 9-11 AM
Lamm, Doron

HJCS 201 Intermediate Modern Hebrew I.
Section 002 REC
Class number: 5412
MWF 11-1 PM
Lamm, Doron

HJCS 201 Intermediate Modern Hebrew I.
Section 003 REC
Class number: 5413
MWF 11-1 PM
Rosenburg, Ilan

HJCS 201 Intermediate Modern Hebrew I.
Section 004 REC
Class number: 5414
MWF 1-3 PM
Rosenburg, Ilan
5 Credits
The focus of instruction is on the development of advanced language skills with an emphasis on oral and written communication and in standard modern Hebrew. In addition to reading texts, relevant cultural materials are provided through the use of video and technology based materials. This course is taught in small sections and class discussion. The final grade is based on class activities, students presentations, written assignments, and unit tests: midterm and final. Class discussions and activities are exclusively in Hebrew.

HJCS 270 Introduction to Rabbinic Literature.
Section 001 LEC
Class number: 5415
JS 270
MWF 11-12 PM
Eliav, Yaron
See JS 270 for description.
3 Credits

HJCS 276 Introduction to Jewish Civilizations and Culture.
Section 001 LEC
Class number: 5416
MW 2:30-4 PM
Boccaccini, Gabrielle
See JS205 for description.
4 Credits

HJCS 301Advanced Hebrew I.
Section 001 REC
Class number: 5431
T Th 1-2:30 PM
Coffin, Edna
3 Credits
This is the third-year course within the Hebrew language sequence at the University of Michigan. As such, it constitutes a transitional stage from the lower levels – in which the concern is with learning introductory grammar and acquisition of functional vocabulary – to the more advanced levels in which we will focus on the more complex linguistic structures. At this level we will treat original texts which will serve as the jumping-off point for in-class discussion and the basis for composition of essays at home. The goal is to expose the student to a wide range of texts as a window unto "the Israeli Experience." The course will incorporate other communications media, e.g., material recorded on audio tape, video clips, and multi-media.

HJCS 373, Israeli Society and Cuture: Between War and Apocalypse
LEC
T Th, 11:30-1 PM
Ezrahi, Sidra
Prerequisites & Distribution: none
3 Credits
A comparison of literary representations of 'war' and catastrophe' or 'holocaust' as refledtive of fundamentally opposite cultural constructs. We look briefly at the 'poetry of lamentaion' in the Bible and its transformation in modern Hebrew literature; the cultural spaces of the martyr and the hero; the claims of private vis-a-vis collective memory; the sites and performances of memory as they relate to teh Holocaust and the modern Wars of Israel. We will look at the aesthetic and ethical vocabularies invoked in the shifting definitions of the Israeli Palestinian conflict between 'war' and 'apolcaypse'. Brief comparisons are drawn with representations of war in classical Greek in modern western literature.
Contemporary Hebrew writers under consideration include David Grossman, Aharon Appelfeld, Dan Pagis, Yehoshua Sobol and a sampling of the 'war poets' and writers (S. Yizhar, Natan Alterman, Amir Gilboa, Yehuda Amichai, Dalia Ravikovitch).

HJCS 471 Introduction to Modern Hebrew Literature I. Section 001 REC
Class number: 5434
T Th 11:30-1 PM
Tsoffar, Ruth
Prerequisites & Distribution: HJCS 302, (HU)
3 Credits
Hebrew 471 is an intensive introduction to Modern Hebrew literature. The purpose of the course is to read carefully a wide range of literary texts of different periods and different genres. The course will help to develop a theoretical framework in order to allow student to situate and respond critically to this body of literature. So along with studying specific strategies to articulate Israeli diversity of gender, religion, history and nationhood, we will discuss relevant issues such as colonialism, hybridity, orientalism and multiculturalism. The literary texts selected include Zionist and postZionist writers, women, Sephardic/mizrahi Jews, and Palestinians.

An advanced knowledge of Hebrew required (completion of Hebrew 302 or Hebrew 402 or equivalent). Short essays, term paper or project. The course is open to undergraduate and graduate students. Graduate Students have additional assignments and are expected to write a longer and more theoretically -oriented paper.

HJCS 478 Jewish Mysticism.
Section 001 LEC
JS 468/Religion 469
Class number: 5435
T Th 10-11:30 AM
Ginsburg, Elliot
See JS 468 for description.
3 Credits

HJCS 491, Post-Zionist Readings of Hebrew Fiction: Excluded Others Reshape Israeli Narrative
SEM
Wednesday 6-9 PM
Ezrahi, Sidra
Beginning with the short fiction of S.Y. Agnon, David Folget and Uri N. Gnessin, we will proceed to a reading of [Yaacov Shabtai (Zikhron Devarim) -- if time permits[, David Grossman (Ayen Erekh Ahava), Meir Shalev (Roman russi), A.B. Yehoshua (Mar Mani), Orli Kastel-Blum (short fiction), and Anton Shammas (Arabesques). We will explore the ideological and aesthetic positions of these texts vis-a-vis the evolution of therritory-based, predominatnly modernist Hebrew literature and ongoing debates over postmodernist attitudes and practivces in late twentieth-century Israeli culture. We will focusd on the emergence of a 'post-zionist' culture out of a more direct encounter with repressed selves, muffled voices and effaced events.
HJCS 577 Topics in the Study of Judaism/The Year as Spiritual Practice: Models of Sacred Time in Jewish Mysticism.

Political Science 452 Israel Society & Politics.
Section 001 REC
Class number: 19166
MW 8:30-10 am
Gitelman, Zvi
3 Credits
This course deals both with major topics in political analysis--for example, political culture, proportional representation, coalition formation, ethnopolitics, the interplay of religion and politics--as well as with the interplay of society and politics in the State of Israel, a relatively new state in a very old land, and one, which despite its small size, confronts many issues of general importance in political life. Among the topics covered are Zionism, political behavior and elections, socialization and integration, Arabs and immigrants in Israeli politics and society, religion and politics. Requirements include a mid-term exam or research paper and a final examination.

Religion 469 Jewish Mysticism.
Section 001 LEC
JS 468/HJCS 478
Class number: 7490
T Th 10-11:30 am
Ginsburg, Elliot
See JS 468 for description.
3 Credits

Religion 471 Topics in the Study of Judaism/The Year as Spiritual Practice: Models of Sacred Time in Jewish Mysticism.
Section 001 SEM
Class number: 7491
JS 467/HJCS 577
T 7:30-10 pm
Gingburg, Elliot
See JS 467 for description.
3 Credits

SW 600 Contemporary Issues in the American Jewish Community.
W 9-12 pm
3 Credits
Students identify critical issues facing the American Jewish community at the national and local levels, aided by resource people from local and national agencies. The Jewish community's experience serves as a case-study for understanding the dynamics of inter-group relations, ethnically-based self-help and the challenges to leadership facing other racial, ethnic and sectarian communities in the U.S. Any School of Social Work graduate student or LS&A senior can enroll.