COURSE DESCRIPTION:

     This course will explore how traditional understandings of Jewish history in the ancient and medieval periods were transformed with the rise of modern Jewish historiography beginning in the early nineteenth century. Examining some of the classics of Jewish historical writing as well as some innovative new voices, we will explore how Jewish historiography of the last two hundred years has been shaped both by the demands of the secular academy and by the challenges and concerns of modern Jewish life: the quest for Jewish emancipation, the rise of Jewish nationalist consciousness, and the search for a home in the diaspora. We will end with a survey of trends in recent scholarship, focusing particularly on how Jewish historiography is being reshaped by the Holocaust, feminism, postmodernism and postzionism.

TEXTS:

     The following texts are available for purchase at the Druid Hills Bookstore. They are also on reserve at the Woodruff Library.

• Yosef Hayim Yerushalmi, Zakhor: Jewish History and Jewish Memory (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1996), originally published 1982.

• Michael A. Meyer, The Ideas of Jewish History (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1987), originally published 1974.

• Gershom Scholem, The Messianic Idea in Judaism and Other Essays on Jewish Spirituality (New York: Schocken Books, 1995), originally published 1971.

• Jacob Katz, Out of the Ghetto: The Social Background of Jewish Emancipation, 1770-1870 (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1998), originally published 1973.

• Deborah Dash Moore, At Home in America: Second Generation New York Jews (New York: Columbia University Press, 1981).

• Karla Goldman, Beyond the Synagogue Gallery: Finding a Place for Women in American Judaism (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2000).

• Daniel Boyarin, Unheroic Conduct: The Rise of Heterosexuality and the Invention of the Jewish Man (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997).

• Benny Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, 1947-1949 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987).

A number of required readings are also on electronic reserve and accessible through the links below as well as on EUCLID's "Reserve Direct" system. These readings are indicated in the course schedule below by an asterisk (*).

COURSE REQUIREMENTS:
     The course will require substantial reading (both assigned and individual), participation in weekly discussion (whether or not it is your week to facilitate), and the completion of two (2) papers/oral presentations and two (2) oral responses. I have provided a list of questions to think about when reading that will help guide you in analyzing the various texts for the course.

Papers/Oral Presentations:
1) The first paper is a 5-7 page review of one set of readings from the first half of the course. Papers should place the works in historiographical context, critique their main points, assumptions, and conclusions, and (where appropriate in the case of multiple authors) identify the main points of agreement and disagreement between them.

2) The second paper is a 10-15 page review of one set of readings from the second half of the course, following the guidelines for the first paper, but which also compares and contrasts the readings with a major work from the first part of the course.

The student writing on the materials for a given week (both in the first and second parts of the course) will also be responsible for initiating the class discussion ("agenda setting") with a summary of the main points of their paper, which will be distributed to class members the night before we meet (see below for instructions). For each week, the course schedule also lists a set of books and/or articles "For Further Reading." These are intended to serve as resources that students can turn to in order to gain a broader perspective during the weeks when they are writing papers and facilitating.

"Agenda Setting":
Each student will be responsible for "agenda setting" (no more than 5-7 minutes) during the semester in weeks in which they are not presenting, once in the first part of the course and once in the second part. This entails summarizing the main points of interest in the readings and proposing interesting questions and points for consideration by the class.

Those writing papers should send a copy (or at least a good draft) to Prof. Goldstein by 5pm the night before class. He will distribute it to the members of the class so they can be ready to engage the author in discussion when we meet.

Your grades will be determined as follows:

Class participation 30%
First essay and presentation 25%
Second essay and presentation 35%
Agenda setting 10%

COURSE SCHEDULE:

I. INTRODUCTION

Sept. 10
The Transformation of Jewish Historical Consciousness
Reading:
Yosef Haim Yerushalmi, Zakhor: Jewish History and Jewish Memory.

II. EMERGENCE OF MODERN JEWISH HISTORIOGRAPHY

Sept. 17
History as a Tool of Emancipation: The Wissenschaft des Judentums Movement
Reading:
Meyer, The Ideas of Jewish History (=IJH), 141-55 (Wolf), 156-60 (Zunz), 175-186 (Jost), and 189-214 (Krochmal).
*Ismar Schorsch, "Breakthrough into the Past: The Verein für Cultur und Wissenschaft der Juden," in Schorsch, From Text to Context: The Turn to History in Modern Judaism (Hanover, NH and London: Brandeis University Press/University Press of New England, 1994), 205-232.
*Ismar Schorsch, "Scholarship in the Service of Reform," in Schorsch, From Text to Context, 303-333.
*Ira Robinson, "The Invention of American Jewish History," American Jewish History 81 (1994): 309-320.
For Further Reading:
Remaining essays in Schorsch, From Text to Context.

Sept. 24
Pillars of Modern Jewish Historiography: Graetz and Dubnow
Reading:
IJH, 217-244 (Graetz) and 247-269 (Dubnow).
*Simon Dubnow, History of the Jews in Russia and Poland (Phildelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1916), Vol. I, 66-70, 139-144.
*Ismar Schorsch, "Ideology and History in the Age of Emancipation," in Schorsch, From Text to Context, 266-302.
For Further Reading:
Sophie Dubnov Erlich, The Life and Work of S.M. Dubnov: Diaspora Nationalism and Jewish History, trans. Judith Vowles, ed. Jeffrey Shandler (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1991).
Shlomo Avineri, "Graetz: Revolutionizing Jewish Historical Consciousness," in Avineri, The Making of Modern Zionism: The Intellectual Origins of the Jewish State (New York: Basic Books, 1981), 23-35.

III. NATIONALIST HISTORIOGRAPHY

Oct. 1
Zionist Historiography: Benzion Dinur, Yitzhak Baer and Raphael Mahler
Reading:
IJH, 284-298 (Dinur), 299-316 (Mahler)
*Ben-Zion Dinur, "Israel and the Diaspora" in Israel and the Diaspora (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1969), 79-161.
*Yitzhak Baer, A History of the Jews in Christian Spain, 2 vols. (Philadephia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1961-1966), Introduction and chap. 15.
*Jonathan Frankel, "Assimilation and the Jews in Nineteenth Century Europe: Towards a New Historiography?" in Frankel and Steven J. Zipperstein, eds., Assimilation and Community: The Jews in Nineteenth Century Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), 1-15 (first half only).
For Further Reading:
Uri Ram, "Zionist Historiography and the Invention of Modern Jewish Nationhood: The Case of Ben Zion Dinur," History and Memory 7 (1995): 91-124.
Chapters on Baer and Dinur in David N. Myers, Re-Inventing the Jewish Past: European Jewish Intellectuals and the Zionist Return to History (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995).
Israel Jacob Yuval, "Yitzhak Baer and the Search for Authentic Judaism," in The Jewish Past Revisited: Reflections on Modern Jewish Historians, ed. David N. Myers and David B. Ruderman (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998), 77-87.

Week of Oct. 8 - TIME TO BE ANNOUNCED
Gershom Scholem and the Spiritual in Jewish History
Reading:
Gershom Scholem, "Redemption Through Sin" in Scholem, The Messianic Idea in Judaism, 78-141.
Gershom Scholem, "The Science of Judaism-Then and Now" in Scholem, The Messianic Idea in Judaism, 304-313.
For Further Reading:
David Biale, Gershom Scholem : Kabbalah and Counter-History (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1979).
Chapter on Scholem in Myers, Re-Inventing the Jewish Past.

IV. DIASPORA HISTORIOGRAPHY IN THE 20th CENTURY

Oct. 15
Salo W. Baron: Beyond the "Lachrymose Conception"
Reading:
IJH, 319-335 (Baron)
*Salo W. Baron, "Ghetto and Emancipation," in Leo Schwarz, ed. The Menorah Treasury, 50-63.
*Salo W. Baron, "World Dimensions of Jewish History," Leo Baeck Memorial Lecture 5 (1962): 1-26.
*Ellis Rivkin, "The Writing of Jewish History" (A review of Baron's Social and Religious History), Reconstructionist, June 15, 1959, 13-18, and June 26, 1959, 24-27.
For Further Reading:
Robert Liberles, Salo Wittmayer Baron: Architect of Jewish History (New York: New York University Press, 1995).

Oct. 22
S. D. Goitein and Jewish-Arab Symbiosis
Reading:
*S. D. Goitein, Jews and Arabs: Their Contacts Through the Ages (New York: Schocken Books, 1955), chap. 1.
*S. D. Goitein, A Mediterranean Society: The Jewish Communities of the Arab World as Portrayed  in the Documents of the Cairo Geniza, 5 vols. (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967-1988), Vol. II: 273-299 (Interfaith Relations); 395-407 (Communal Autonomy and Government Control), Vo1. III: 47-55 (Marriage); Vol. V: 307-323 (Sex); and 474-496 (Abraham Maimonides).
*Mark R. Cohen, "The Neo-Lacrymose Conception of Jewish-Arab History," Tikkun (May-June 1991): 55-60.
*Norman A. Stillman, "Myth, Counter-Myth and Distortion" Tikkun (May-June 1991): 60-64.
For Further Reading:
Gideon Libson, "Hidden Worlds and Open Shutters: S.D. Goitein Between Judaism and Islam," in The Jewish Past Revisited: Reflections on Modern Jewish Historians, ed. David N. Myers and David B. Ruderman (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998), 163-98.
Mark R. Cohen, Under Crescent and Cross: The Jews in the Middle Ages (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994).
Norman A. Stillman, The Jews of Arab Lands: A History and Sourcebook (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1979).


Oct. 29
Jacob Katz and the "European Model" of Modernization
Reading:
Jacob Katz, Out of the Ghetto: The Social Background of Jewish Emancipation, 1770-1880.
*Todd Endelman, The Jews of Georgian England: Tradition and Change in a Liberal Society, 1714-1830, Preface to New Edition, Introduction, chap. 4 and chap 6.
For Further Reading:
Jacob Katz, ed. Toward Modernity: The European Jewish Model (New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Books, 1987).

Nov. 5
Assimilation and Community in Europe and America
Reading:
Deborah Dash Moore, At Home in America.
*Todd Endelman, "Legitimization of the Diaspora Experience in Recent Jewish Historiography," Modern Judaism 11 (1991): 195-209.
*Jonathan Frankel, "Assimilation and the Jews in Nineteenth Century Europe: Towards a New Historiography?" 15-37 (second half).
For Further Reading:
Remaining essays in Frankel and Zipperstein, eds., Assimilation and Community.

V. RECENT TRENDS AND CHALLENGES

Nov. 12
The Shifting Contexts of Holocaust Historiography: The Role of Antisemitism
Reading:
*Omer Bartov, "Introduction," in Bartov, ed. The Holocaust: Origins, Implementation and Aftermath (London: Routledge, 2000), 1-18.
*Christopher R. Browning, "One Day in Jozefow: Initiation to Mass Murder," in David F. Crew, ed., Nazism and German Society, 1933-1945 (London: Routledge, 1994).
*Daniel Jonah Goldhagen, "The Evil of Banality," New Republic, July 13-20, 1992 (review of Browning, Ordinary Men).
*Daniel Jonah Goldhagen, Hitler's Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1996), Introduction.
*Omer Bartov, "Ordinary Monsters," New Republic, April 29, 1996 (review of Goldhagen).
*Marion A. Kaplan, Between Dignity and Despair: Jewish Life in Nazi Germany (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), Introduction and Conclusion.
For Further Reading:
Michael R. Marrus, The Holocaust in History (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1987).
Steven E. Aschheim, "Small Forays, Grand Theories and Deep Origins: Current Trends in the Historiography of the Holocaust," in Jonathan Frankel, ed. Reshaping the Past: Jewish History and the Historians, Studies in Contemporary Jewry 10 (1994): 139-163.
Robert R. Shandley, ed. Unwilling Germans? The Goldhagen Debate (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1998).

Nov. 19
Feminist Approaches to Jewish History
Reading:
*Paula E. Hyman, "Feminist Studies and Modern Jewish History," in Lynn Davidman and Shelly Tenenbaum, eds., Feminist Perspectives on Jewish Studies (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1994), 120-139.
Karla A. Goldman, Beyond the Synagogue Gallery.
*Marion A. Kaplan, The Making of the Jewish Middle Class: Women, Family and Identity in Imperial Germany (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991), Introduction and Chap. 2.
For Further Reading:
Paula E. Hyman, Gender and Assimilation in Modern Jewish History: The Roles and Representation of Women (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1995).


Nov. 26
Postmodernism and the "New" Jewish History
Reading:
Daniel Boyarin, Unheroic Conduct: The Rise of Heterosexuality and the Invention of the Jewish Man.
*Hillel Halkin, "Feminizing Jewish Studies," Commentary 105 (Feb. 1998): 39-45.
*Paul B. Reitter, "Heroic Conduct? Daniel Boyarin and the Future of the 'New' Jewish Cultural Studies," Shofar 17 (Summer 1999): 102-110.
*Todd M. Endelman, "In Defense of Jewish Social History," Jewish Social Studies, forthcoming.
For Further Reading:
Jonathan Boyarin and Daniel Boyarin, eds. Jews and Other Differences: The New Jewish Cultural Studies (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997).
Laurence J. Silberstein and Robert L. Cohn, eds., The Other in Jewish Thought and History: Constructions of Jewish Culture and Identity (New York: New York University Press, 1994).


Dec. 3
Revisiting the "Nation"
Seth Schwartz, Imperialism and Jewish Society, 200 BCE to 640 CE (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001).


Dec. 10
Israeli History and the "New Historians"
Benny Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, 1947-1949.
*Anita Shapira, "Politics and Collective Memory: The Debate Over the 'New Historians' in Israel," History and Memory 7 (Spring/Summer 1995): 9-40.
For Further Reading:
Laurence J. Silberstein, The Postzionism Debates: Knowledge and Power in Israeli Culture (New York: Routledge, 1999).
Special Issue of History and Memory on the "New Historians" Debate, vol. 7 (Spring/Summer 1995).