The Jewish Studies Program, an interdisciplinary program in the College of Arts and Sciences, includes courses offered in a number of disciplines. These courses in Anthropology, History, Language and Foreign Studies, Literature, Philosophy and Religion, and the School of International Service, as well as in Jewish Studies, count for credit towards the Jewish Studies major and minor.

You can also view the official AU Course Descriptions for Jewish Studies and our Fall 2007 course offerings. This page only includes courses in the Jewish Studies Program, and does not include courses offered by other departments that can be used toward a Jewish Studies major or minor.

General Course Descriptions

Anthropology

ANTH-337 Anthropology of Genocide (3)
Examines questions concerning how individuals, groups, and social institutions legitimize the power to repress, coerce, and kill, how victims experience and interpret their suffering, how “ordinary people” come to accept and justify violent regimes, and the possibility of constructing an understanding of genocide that extends across cultures and from individual impulse to global conflict. Case studies include genocide in the Americas, the Nazi Holocaust, and ethnic cleansing in Central Africa and Eastern Europe.

History

HIST-245 Modern Jewish Civilization (3)
Surveys Jewish responses to the challenges of modernity. Examines the creation of new Jewish communities in America and Israel, shifts on Jewish political status, and innovations in Jewish religious and intellectual history, such as Zionism and Hasidism.

HIST-318 Nazi Germany (3)
The political, social, and economic conditions that made it possible for Hitler to take power. The nature of Nazi rule. Emphasis on World War II and the Holocaust. Meets with HIST-618. Usually offered every spring.

HIST-319 Holocaust (3)
Traces the history of anti-Semitism and the development of racism that led to the Holocaust. Examines the historical development of the Final Solution. Considers the variety of responses to Jewish persecution by the Nazi perpetrators, the Jews, and the nations of the world. Meets with HIST-619. Usually offered every fall.

HIST-343 History of Israel (3)
Traces the development of modern political Zionism in nineteenth-century Europe; the historical background leading to the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948; and the history of Israel since then, including patterns of Jewish immigration and its relationship to the Arab world. Meets with HIST-643. Usually offered every spring.

HIST-344 Topics in Jewish History (3)
Topics vary by section, may be repeated for credit with different topic. Rotating topics in Jewish history exploring one theme, or period, or geographical region of the Jewish past, including the history of women in Jewish tradition, East European Jewry, the world of the shtetl, American Jewish women, and anti-Semitism. Meets with HIST-644.

HIST-373 American Jewish History (3)
Today American Jewry constitutes the preeminent Diaspora Jewish community. This course traces its historical development by examining the waves of Jewish immigration to the United States and the institutions that American Jews created to sustain their community. Meets with HIST-673. Usually offered alternate springs.

Jewish Studies

JWST-205 Ancient and Medieval Jewish Civilization (3)
Examines the independent Jewish states that flourished in Palestine, the rise of the most important Jewish communities outside the ancient Jewish homeland, and the foreign influences that shaped not only the political life of the Jews but also their internal organization and their creativity. Usually offered every fall.

JWST-210 Voices of Modern Jewish Literature 2:2 (3)
Explores a variety of literary works analyzing the historical experience of modern Jewish communities in Europe, as well as the United States and Israel, emphasizing how migration, racism, industrialization, and political change affected these Jews and their Judaism. Usually offered every spring.

JWST-320 Topics in Jewish Culture (3)
Topics vary by section, may be repeated for credit with different topic. Rotating topics on historical and contemporary aspects of the Jewish heritage, such as Judaism and Hellenism; Judaism and Islam; art, dance, and drama as expressions of the Jewish spirit; and Jewish education, its content, and method.

JWST-390 Independent Reading Course in Jewish Studies (1-6)

JWST-392 Cooperative Education Field Experience (3-9)

JWST-481 Senior Thesis in Jewish Studies I (3)
Jewish studies majors prepare a thesis on a topic selected after consultation with the student’s adviser. Usually offered every fall.

JWST-482 Senior Thesis in Jewish Studies (3)
Completion of senior thesis on a topic selected after consultation with the student’s advisor.

JWST-490 Independent Study Project in Jewish Studies (1-6)

JWST-491 Internship in Jewish Studies (1-6)
Provides students an opportunity to enrich organizational skills and gain experience in community relations, religious, Israel-centered, or social welfare agencies. Prerequisite: permission of instructor and director.

Graduate Courses

JWST-590 Independent Reading Course in Jewish Studies (1-6)

JWST-690 Independent Study Project in Jewish Studies (1-6)

Language and Foreign Studies

In the early twentieth-century bold pioneers determined that Hebrew – not Yiddish – would become the language of the emerging Jewish state. Learn the Hebrew modern Israelis speak by mastering its grammar as well as vocabulary particularly useful to those planning to visit Israel.

HEBR-116 Hebrew, Elementary Modern I (3)

HEBR-117 Hebrew, Elementary Modern II (3)

HEBR-216 Hebrew, Intermediate Modern I (3)

HEBR-217 Hebrew, Intermediate Modern II (3)

HEBR-396 Hebrew, Advanced Modern II

Literature

LIT-381 Interdisciplinary Approaches to Modern Jewish Literature (3)
Topics vary by section, may be repeated for credit with different topic. Meets with LIT-681.

Philosophy and Religion

PHIL-315 Topics in Jewish Philosophy (3)
Topics vary by section, may be repeated for credit with different topic. Rotating topics on the chief intellectual and philosophical currents of Jewish thought. Topics may include the study of the major Jewish thinkers of the past, such as Philo, Maimonides, or Martin Buber; or the course may be organized thematically around such questions as the relationship of Jewish thought to Aristotelian philosophy or the resonance of the Holocaust in Jewish philosophy. Meets with PHIL-615. Usually offered every fall.

RELG-371 Topics in Jewish Religion
Topics vary by section, may be repeated for credit with different topic. Rotating topics on the chief religious themes of Judaism, major Jewish religious thinkers of the past such as Rashi or other rabbinical scholars; or issues such as the role of mysticism in Judaism. Meets with RELG-671. Usually offered every spring.

School of International Service

SIS-365 Arab-Israeli Relations
A survey of Arab-Israeli relations from their origins to the present. Includes an account of Zionism and Palestinian nationalism, the history of the British mandate, the Arab-Israeli wars, the involvement of external powers, and the quest for peace. Usually offered every spring.

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