Understanding the Jewish Past

Module overview

This module explores the rich variety of Jewish life and the development of Jewish experience, including Antisemitism and violence from the ancient to the contemporary world. It introduces students to ideologies and cultures of antisemitism and examines attempts to theorise antisemitism as an historical and contemporary phenomenon; it places antisemitism within wider histories of racism and racialised thought. It also examines ideas, processes and experiences of emancipation, looks at histories of Jewish/non-Jewish economic, social, cultural and intellectual exchange, and examines Jewish experiences of violence such as pogroms and expulsion and Jewish community responses to persecution.

Aims and Objectives

Learning Outcomes

Subject Specific Intellectual and Research Skills

Having successfully completed this module you will be able to:

apply your developed knowledge of Jewish life, structuring your ideas and research findings into well-ordered essays.
engage with historiography and theoretical frameworks, contributing to the debates relating to Jewish life and antisemitism and its relationship to the wider world.
undertake a thorough critical analysis and assessment of a variety of textual, visual and material culture sources.

Transferable and Generic Skills

Having successfully completed this module you will be able to:

utilise and develop your time-management skills.
research complex historical questions and communicate your findings convincingly and concisely in written essays.
use to good effect textual, visual and material culture sources, synthesising this material to develop cogent and persuasive arguments.

Knowledge and Understanding

Having successfully completed this module, you will be able to demonstrate knowledge and understanding of:

a wide variety of primary sources relating to Jewish life and antisemitism.
the history of Jewish life, in particular the development of Jewish experience.
a wide variety of secondary source material relating to Jewish life and antisemitism, including theoretical frameworks used in the field.

Learning and Teaching

Teaching and learning methods

Teaching methods include seminars. Learning methods include close analysis of a range of primary sources and discussion of key themes and ideas.

Study time
Type	Hours
Wider reading or practice	52
Completion of assessment task	100
Preparation for scheduled sessions	100
Seminar	48
Total study time	300

Resources & Reading list

Textbooks

Ezra Mendelsohn (1983). The Jews of East Central Europe between the World Wars. Indiana.

Jeffrey Veidlinger (2021). In the Midst of Civilized Europe: The Pogroms of 1918-1921 and the Onset of the Holocaust. New York: Metropolitan Books.

Michael Stanislawski (1983). Tsar Nicholas I and the Jews. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America.

Assessment

Summative

This is how we’ll formally assess what you have learned in this module.

Breakdown
Method	Percentage contribution
Essay	70%
Written assessment	30%

Referral

This is how we’ll assess you if you don’t meet the criteria to pass this module.

Breakdown
Method	Percentage contribution
Written assessment	30%
Essay	70%

Repeat

An internal repeat is where you take all of your modules again, including any you passed. An external repeat is where you only re-take the modules you failed.

Breakdown
Method	Percentage contribution
Written assessment	30%
Essay	70%