NewsSubscribe

We have some exciting courses coming up in Fall 2017 in the department of Judaic and Near Eastern Studies! Please check out the details of select courses below, and click here for the full department schedule. 

MidEast 290C Environmental History of the Middle East

Mon/Wed 2:30-3:45, taught by Malissa Taylor

• Enter the discipline of history by examining the often neglected role of nature in the history of the Middle East

• Ask how can we use environmental history, rather than relying solely on religion and culture, to analyze change and continuity in the region

• Evaluate arguments about the role of the environment that make use of newly discovered primary sources as well as known sources read through new perspectives

Judaic 318 Family and Sexuality in Jewish History and Culture  

Tues/Thurs 11:30-12:45, taught by Jay Berkovitz

• Examine transformations in the Jewish family and attitudes toward sexuality in Judaism, from antiquity to the present

• Topics include love, sexuality, and desire in the Bible and Talmud; marriage and divorce through the ages; position and treatment of children; sexuality and spirituality in the Kabbalah; sexual stereotypes in American Jewish culture and Israeli society

• Focus on readings spanning biblical and rabbinic literature, comparative Christian and Islamic sources, historical and scientific research on family and sexuality, and contemporary fictions

Judaic 326/MidEast 326 Sustainability in Comparative Religious Perspective

Tues/Thurs 1:00-2:15, taught by Aviva Ben-Ur

• Explore how various cultures through time and space have interacted with the natural environment in effort to achieve material, spiritual, and medical well-being

• Examine sustainability as reflected in a variety of spiritual traditions (from “animism” to Buddhism, Hinduism, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) and societies not necessarily driven by any religious system

MidEast 362 Religion and Politics in the Early Modern Middle East

Mon/Wed 4:00-5:15, taught by Malissa Taylor

• Ask if we have underestimated the scope and significance of changes to the relationship between political and religious authority that occurred in the Middle East in the early modern period

• Learn about the abrupt discontinuities of the period and the reconfiguration of what was deemed religious versus what was deem political

• Survey the transformation in the institutions, social movements, political writings and imperial policies of the Ottoman Empire and Iran from roughly 1400-1800

Judaic 375 The Jewish Experience in America

Mon/Wed 2:30-3:45, taught by Rachel Gordan

• Discover the development of Jewish identity and social institutions in the United States through a socio-historical perspective

• Topics include immigration patterns, labor movement, Yiddish culture, religious innovations, women's experiences, and interaction with American cultures

Judaic 383 Women, Gender, and Judaism

Tue/Thurs 2:30-3:45, taught by Susan Shapiro

• Focus on the shifting historical constructions (from biblical to contemporary times) of women’s and men’s gender roles in Judaism, and their cultural and social consequences

• Ask how making the male experience normative has shaped how Judaism has been understood