Current Offerings
Spring 2026
FRS 002001 - Research focus Middle East (Environmental Peacebuilding in Times of Conflict) (4 Units)
Instructor: Yael Teff‑Seker
W 2:10-4:00 PM, Social Sciences and Humanities 2234
In times of political and geopolitical tension, environmental projects can address urgent humanitarian needs, as well as create important precedents and opportunities for supporting trust between groups, peacebuilding, and regional stability. The course aims to support the instructors' scientific work aimed at mapping previous and current, as well as planned, environmental peacebuilding initiatives in the Middle East and beyond.
The class will include understanding main theories and frameworks regarding environmental initiatives and peacebuilding efforts in general, as well as specific examples regarding previous and current attempts for environmental collaboration in the region, and examples of successful cross-border initiatives of the same nature around the world. It will also explain the specific nature of the environmental needs and challenges of main actors in the region, including those affected by recent wars and conflicts in the Middle East in the last several decades.
Students will have small in-class assignments and will be expected to participate during class discussions and exercises. In addition to small in-class assignments, main assignments will be a mid-quarter short paper (3 pages) on a current cross-border environmental initiative in the Middle East, and then a medium paper (5 pages) on another initiative, including a longer explanation of challenges and solutions, and incorporation of two class readings. The class will not include tests or quizzes.
GER 112 (Topics in German Literature): Life Writing, Graphic Novels, and the Holocaust (4 units)
Instructor: Elisabeth Krimmer
TR 1:10-4:00 PM, Wellman Hall 101.
This course examines the genre of life writing in the context of the Holocaust with particular attention to graphic novels. We will discuss works on graphic novels along with a number of graphic memoirs, including Charlotte Salomon's Life? or Theater?, Art Spiegelman’s Maus, Barbara Yelin’s Irmina, and Nora Krug’s Belonging.
The language of instruction and readings will be ENGLISH; however, interested students will have the option of reading some or all the course texts, and writing papers, in German.
General Education: Arts & History (AH), Oral Literacy (OL), World Cultures (WC), Writing Experience (WE).
GER 118A – Vienna at the Turn of the 20th Century (The End of the Habsburg Empire) (4 Units)
Instructor: Sven-Erik Rose
TR 12:10-1:30 PM, Hunt Hall 110
This course explores the explosion of modern(ist) culture in Vienna at the turn of the twentieth century, both before World War One, when Vienna was the capital of the multinational Habsburg empire, and in the early post-WWI (and post-imperial) years. We will study innovations in literature (e.g., Hugo von Hofmannsthal, Robert Musil, Arthur Schnitzler, Stefan Zweig), architecture (Adolf Loos), painting (Gustav Klimt, Oskar Kokoschka, Egon Schiele), psychoanalysis (Sigmund Freud), and music (Gustav Mahler, Arnold Schönberg). Recurrent themes of the course will include theories and representations of gender roles in the context of increasingly commodified modernity (especially men depicting women); tensions between an aesthetic of ornamentation and a spare, functional aesthetic; the dialectic of surface and depth; and social ferment amid mass migration, cosmopolitanism, and increasingly racialized ways of defining national groups. Can be taken for credit toward the minor in Jewish Studies.
The language of instruction and readings will be ENGLISH; however, interested students will have the option of reading some or all the course texts, and writing papers, in German.
General Education: Arts & Humanities (AH); World Cultures (WC).
HDE 180: Bubbies, Babies, and Brises: The American Jewish Family (4 units)
Instructor: Leah Hibel
W 12:10-4:00 PM, Kerr Hall 293.
This course will take you on a journey through the heart of American Jewish family life. What does it mean to be Jewish in America today? How do families transmit identity across generations while navigating intermarriage, evolving gender roles, and pressures to assimilate? Drawing on contemporary research, we will explore the intimate family spaces of wedding ceremonies and divorce proceedings, and parenting dilemmas and educational choices. We will examine how historical trauma echoes through generations and how contemporary crises like October 7th impact mental health. Throughout this class, you'll discover that the Jewish family is not a static institution but a dynamic, diverse, and deeply meaningful site of cultural survival and reinvention. This Human
Development (HDE) course is capped at 25 students. Jewish Studies students should contact Prof Leah Hibel ([email protected]) for a PTA number to enroll.
HIS 011: History of the Jewish People in the Modern World (4 Units)
Instructor: Joshua Shanes
TR 9:00-10:20 AM, Hoagland Hall 113.
Histories and cultures of the Jews since 1700. We look at how Jews in different places (Western Europe, Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and America) developed new, modern religious and political identities in dialogue with majority non-Jewish society. Topics include social, religious, and political change; integration and assimilation; antisemitism and the Holocaust.
General Education: Arts & Humanities (AH); Domestic Diversity (DD); Visual Literacy (VL); World Cultures (WC); Writing Experience (WE).
HIS 102X: Modern Jewish Politics (Comparative History) (5 units)
Instructor: Joshua Shanes
M 1:10-4:00 PM, Social Science & Humanities 2202.
Designed primarily for history majors but interested others are welcome. Expect intensive reading, discussion, research, and writing. This course explores the rise and development of Jewish political movements in three areas – Europe, Palestine/Israel, and the United States – from the late 19th century until today. We start in Eastern Europe, the source both of modern Jewish political ideologies as well as the Jews themselves, millions of whom emigrated to America and Palestine/Israel a century ago. These movements transformed modern Jewish life while impacting broader society and even international relations. Jewish political movements studied include evolving forms of Zionism and anti-Zionism, Diaspora Jewish Nationalism, Jewish Socialism, Liberalism, and
Political Orthodoxy.
General Education: Writing Experience (WE).
IST 008B: Zionism: Social and Intellectual History, 1882–1948 (4 units)
Instructor: Itay Eisinger
TR 12:10–2:00 PM, Academic Surge Bldg. 2363
This seminar tracks the development of Zionist ideas from their emergence in late nineteenth-century Europe to the establishment of Israel in 1948. We read the thinkers' own words and ask what problems they were trying to solve, what they were arguing against, and how scholars since have interpreted their legacy. Emphasis on primary sources and the main debates among Zionist thinkers and their critics. Non-Honors students are welcome to enroll. Open seats available.
General Education: Arts and Humanities (AH).
Upcoming Offerings
Fall 2026
