[Jewish] Looking for another class? Consider "The Rise of Secular Jewish Culture"

[rrHACU at hampshire.edu]

Dear all,
There is space in this interdisciplinary course, AND it fulfills distribution:
HACU/SS 190
THE RISE OF SECULAR JEWISH CULTURE
TTH 9-10:20, FPH 101

Jewishness has always involved more than religion. Jewish identity, even in the
pre-modern world, was expressed through language, work, music, food, and other
cultural behaviors. Modernity brought with it even more possibilities, and a
sense of radically different political, cultural, and artistic Jewish
identities beyond religion began to emerge. This interdisciplinary course draws
upon history, literature, political philosophy, and sociology in tracing the
rise of a pluralistic, multifaceted modern Jewish culture in Europe and the
U.S. between the seventeenth and twentieth centuries. We begin with Spinoza,
the most significant “heretical” Jewish thinker in the 17th century, and
continue through the European Enlightenment, the rise of modern Jewish
nationalist movements, and the emergence of secular Yiddish and Hebrew
literature. Finally, we will address the crisis of Jewish modernity provoked by
the Holocaust, and briefly survey secular Jewish identities today.

Consider joining, and spread the word!
--rr

Rachel Rubinstein
Assistant Professor of American Literature and Jewish Studies
School of Humanities, Arts, and Cultural Studies
Hampshire College
(413) 559-5821