This course studies the history of German Jews from the period of emancipation in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century to the present. The course examines the role of German Jews in German politics, economic life, and culture; Jewish enlightenment (“Haskalah”); the rise of anti-Semitism in the nineteenth century; the rise of the Reform movement; Jewish assimilation and its discontents; the Weimar Jewish Renaissance; the Nazi persecution of the Jews and the Holocaust; as well as post-war Jewish life in Germany. The course focuses especially on Jewish life in Berlin.
Method of presentation:
Lectures, discussion, student presentations, and field study excursions
Required work and form of assessment:
Students are asked to prepare several short oral presentations and short response papers during the course. In addition, every student works on an individual project, to be presented during the last week of class. Projects are developed in consultation with the instructor. They are to integrate aspects of the material read for this course with a particular authentic Berlin background. Students must present their projects in oral and in written form. Regular class attendance is absolutely required. There is also a final exam with essay questions. All assignments must be completed to receive a passing grade.
Final grades are based on class participation and preparation (20%); oral presentations (10%); three 3-page response papers, including revision (15%); individual creative project (30%); final exam (25%).
content:
Week 1
Introduction; Course Overview and Introduction Tour of “Jewish Berlin”
Reading: Peck (Preface and Ch.1), Broder (Reader)
Visit the Jewish Museum
Reading: Noah Isenberg (Reader); Elon (pp.65-183); Nachama, Schoeps, Simon (p.89-136); Peck (Ch.4 )
Visit to Weissensee Cemetery
Week 2
Haskalah and the German-Jewish Enlightenment
Reading: Elon (p.1-64); Peck (p.7-52)
German Jews in the 19th Century: Between Utopia and Nationalism
Reading: Elon (pp.295-354); Mosse (Reader); Freidenreich (Reader)
World War I and Weimar
Reading: Nachama, Schoeps, Simon (89-136, 137-180), Elon (185-295)
Week 3
Jewish Life under the Nazis
Reading: Baker (Reader), Elon (pp. 355-403); Nachama, Schoeps, Simon (pp. 181-221); Kaplan (Reader)
Examples of Nazi propaganda (The Eternal Jew, Triumph of the Will, Posters and Images)
Week Four
Nazi Persecution, the Holocaust, and German resistance Visit to Plötzensee Memorial
Reading: Klüger
Film: Die weisse Rose
Remembering and Representing the Holocaust Visit to the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe
Reading: Peck (Ch. 2), Primo Levi Survival in Auschwitz
The Postwar Years
Reading: Nachama, Schoeps, Simon (pp. 221-247); Brenner (Reader); Grossmann (Reader); Kessler (Reader)
Week Five
Jews in Germany Today
Guest: Esther Dischereit
Reading: Dischereit [excerpt]
The New "German Jews" (Immigration and Changing Jewish Identities)
Reading: Peck (Ch.3, 6); Gruber (Reader)
Film: Alles auf Zucker (Go for Zucker)
Visit Centrum Judaicum, guided tour
Week 6
Presentations
Review of all materials for final exam
Final Exam
Required readings:
Elon, Amos. The Pity of It All: A Portrait of Jews in Germany 1743-1933. London: Penguin, 2004.
Klüger, Ruth. Still Alive: A Holocaust Girlhood Remembered. New York: the Feminist Press at CUNY, 2003.
Levi, Primo. Survival in Auschwitz. Touchstone, 1996.
Nachama, Andreas, Julius H. Schoeps, and Hermann Simon, eds. Jews in Berlin. Berlin: Henschel Verlag, 2002.
Peck, Jeffrey. Being Jewish in the New Germany. New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 2006.
A reader with excerpts from other material will be provided at the start of the course.
Brief Biography of Instructor:
Dr. Bialas works on a research project on Nazi Ideology and Ethics. He held a position as an Associate Professor of Political Philosophy and Cultural Studies in the United Arab Emirates (2004-2007), and he also taught courses in modern European intellectual and cultural history at the University of California, Irvine (2000 - 2003). In addition, he had teaching positions at universities in Germany, Switzerland, Japan and Turkey. He has published numerous books and articles in various areas of the humanities, most recently on “Political Humanism and Nazism”, Vandenhoeck Rupprecht 2010 (in German) and "Nazi Germany and the Humanities" (co-edited with Anson Rabinbach), Oxford 2007.
His doctorate was on Hegel‘s Philosophy of Religion (1982), and his Habilitation (German Post-Doctorate) on The Philosophy of History in the Frankfurt School (1989). His current research interests are intellectual history of Nazism, political philosophy, and comparative cultural studies. Dr. Bialas is a member of the international and interdisciplinary research group "Political Culture of the Weimar Republic" and co-editor (with Gerard Raulet) of the "Series on Political Culture in the Weimar Republic".
In his various teaching positions abroad he worked with Blackboard. Most recently he took the “Master-E” beginning Moodle course. He also uses Moodle for the IES Abroad courses he teaches on German culture, history, and politics.
This course studies the history of German Jews from the period of emancipation in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century to the present. The course examines the role of German Jews in German politics, economic life, and culture; Jewish enlightenment (“Haskalah”); the rise of anti-Semitism in the nineteenth century; the rise of the Reform movement; Jewish assimilation and its discontents; the Weimar Jewish Renaissance; the Nazi persecution of the Jews and the Holocaust; as well as post-war Jewish life in Germany. The course focuses especially on Jewish life in Berlin.
Lectures, discussion, student presentations, and field study excursions
Students are asked to prepare several short oral presentations and short response papers during the course. In addition, every student works on an individual project, to be presented during the last week of class. Projects are developed in consultation with the instructor. They are to integrate aspects of the material read for this course with a particular authentic Berlin background. Students must present their projects in oral and in written form. Regular class attendance is absolutely required. There is also a final exam with essay questions. All assignments must be completed to receive a passing grade.
Final grades are based on class participation and preparation (20%); oral presentations (10%); three 3-page response papers, including revision (15%); individual creative project (30%); final exam (25%).
Week 1
Introduction; Course Overview and Introduction
Tour of “Jewish Berlin”
Reading: Peck (Preface and Ch.1), Broder (Reader)
Visit the Jewish Museum
Reading: Noah Isenberg (Reader); Elon (pp.65-183); Nachama, Schoeps, Simon (p.89-136); Peck (Ch.4 )
Visit to Weissensee Cemetery
Week 2
Haskalah and the German-Jewish Enlightenment
Reading: Elon (p.1-64); Peck (p.7-52)
German Jews in the 19th Century: Between Utopia and Nationalism
Reading: Elon (pp.295-354); Mosse (Reader); Freidenreich (Reader)
World War I and Weimar
Reading: Nachama, Schoeps, Simon (89-136, 137-180), Elon (185-295)
Week 3
Jewish Life under the Nazis
Reading: Baker (Reader), Elon (pp. 355-403); Nachama, Schoeps, Simon (pp. 181-221); Kaplan (Reader)
Examples of Nazi propaganda (The Eternal Jew, Triumph of the Will, Posters and Images)
Week Four
Nazi Persecution, the Holocaust, and German resistance
Visit to Plötzensee Memorial
Reading: Klüger
Film: Die weisse Rose
Remembering and Representing the Holocaust
Visit to the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe
Reading: Peck (Ch. 2), Primo Levi Survival in Auschwitz
The Postwar Years
Reading: Nachama, Schoeps, Simon (pp. 221-247); Brenner (Reader); Grossmann (Reader); Kessler (Reader)
Week Five
Jews in Germany Today
Guest: Esther Dischereit
Reading: Dischereit [excerpt]
The New "German Jews" (Immigration and Changing Jewish Identities)
Reading: Peck (Ch.3, 6); Gruber (Reader)
Film: Alles auf Zucker (Go for Zucker)
Visit Centrum Judaicum, guided tour
Week 6
Presentations
Review of all materials for final exam
Final Exam
A reader with excerpts from other material will be provided at the start of the course.
Dr. Bialas works on a research project on Nazi Ideology and Ethics. He held a position as an Associate Professor of Political Philosophy and Cultural Studies in the United Arab Emirates (2004-2007), and he also taught courses in modern European intellectual and cultural history at the University of California, Irvine (2000 - 2003). In addition, he had teaching positions at universities in Germany, Switzerland, Japan and Turkey. He has published numerous books and articles in various areas of the humanities, most recently on “Political Humanism and Nazism”, Vandenhoeck Rupprecht 2010 (in German) and "Nazi Germany and the Humanities" (co-edited with Anson Rabinbach), Oxford 2007.
His doctorate was on Hegel‘s Philosophy of Religion (1982), and his Habilitation (German Post-Doctorate) on The Philosophy of History in the Frankfurt School (1989). His current research interests are intellectual history of Nazism, political philosophy, and comparative cultural studies. Dr. Bialas is a member of the international and interdisciplinary research group "Political Culture of the Weimar Republic" and co-editor (with Gerard Raulet) of the "Series on Political Culture in the Weimar Republic".
In his various teaching positions abroad he worked with Blackboard. Most recently he took the “Master-E” beginning Moodle course. He also uses Moodle for the IES Abroad courses he teaches on German culture, history, and politics.