Through much of their history, Jews have been known as a “people of the book” and have, often, prided themselves on such an association. The very definition of a book, what books contained, and who might use them are not so easy to define, and their study opens up new ways to think about the Jewish past. Books are perhaps the most important way people share ideas and change minds. But they are also commercial goods, collectors’ items, community memories, and cherished heirlooms.
This course offers a cultural history of communication and knowledge in Jewish experience through an exploration of the history of the book. It will use primary sources, scholarly articles, and hands-on encounters with books in different shapes and sizes to explore the way people of the past engaged with books both texts and material objects. It will also offer examples of new methods in the study of the book drawn from the digital humanities. Tracing changing conceptions and uses of the book from the ancient world until the present, we will consider the way that books have shaped religion, caused upheaval, and changed over time, even to face their possible obsolescence in our own age.

Development of the skills of reading, writing, and conversing in modern Hebrew on an intermediate level. Open to all students who have completed two semesters of Hebrew at Penn with a grade of B- or above and new students with equivalent competency.

Development of the skills of reading, writing, and conversing in modern Hebrew on an intermediate level. Open to all students who have completed two semesters of Hebrew at Penn with a grade of B- or above and new students with equivalent competency.

The course will begin with and historical introduction to Sephardic Jewry. It will discuss the history and language of the Jews in Spain prior to their expulsion in 1492 and follow up with their history in the Ottoman Empire. It will then introduce the students to the phonology of the language both in a descriptive and historical perspective. There will also be discussion of the contrast with Castillian Spanish. After a discussion of the grammar, there will be lessons designed to teach the students conversational Judeo-Spanish, using dialogs, pictures, videos, music, visits with native speakers and other interactive methods.

This course is designed to introduce students to the rich art of Modern Hebrew and Israeli literature and film. Poetry, short stories, and novel excerpts are taught in translation. The course studies Israeli cinema alongside literature, examining the various facets of this culture that is made of national aspirations and individual passions. The class is meant for all: no previous knowledge of history or the language is required. The topic changes each time the course is offered. Topics include: giants of Israeli literature; the image of the city; childhood; the marginalized voices of Israel; the Holocaust from an Israeli perspective; and fantasy, dreams & madness.

The aim of this course is to explore what the Bible means, and why it means such different things to different people. Why do people find different kinds of meaning in the Bible. Who is right in the struggle over its meaning, and how does one go about deciphering that meaning in the first place? Focusing on the book of Genesis, this seminar seeks to help students answer these questions by introducing some of the many ways in which the Bible has been read over the ages. exploring its meaning as understood by ancient Jews and Christians, modern secular scholars, contemporary fiction writers, feminist activists, philosophers and other kinds of interpreter.

The goal of this course is to help beginning students develop skills in Yiddish conversation, reading and writing. Yiddish is the medium of a millennium of Jewish life. We will frequently have reason to refer to the history and culture of Ashkenazie Jewry in studying the language.