Spring 2006

HIST156:  Eastern European Jewish Experience: History and Historiography

 
T: 7-9:50 pm 422 PAC

Office Hours: T 2-3:30, Th 4-5 pm or by appointment (please email)

 Our concept of the life of east European Jews has been dominated by the Hollywood and Broadway blockbuster "Fiddler on the Roof." The "Shtetl" has been the paradigm of east European Jewish experience. But the powerful imagery of the "shtetl" is largely a creation of 19th-century writers. This is a course will take us beyond the "shtetl" and will look at the history the Jews in eastern Europe from the initial settlement of the Jews there until the eve of modernity. We will examine how historians and writers have shaped our understanding of Jewish history in that region, and the context in which the persisting imagery of eastern European Jews was created. Why were certain stories told? What can different historical sources show us about Jewish life in Eastern Europe? We will discuss how Jewish history in eastern Europe was studied by historians, and couple the narratives created by scholars with historical sources: privilege charters, crime records, rabbinic response, anti-Jewish literature, and others. We will try to probe the relation between history, historical sources, and historical writings. All books are available at the Atticus Bookstore:

S. Dubnow, HISTORY OF THE JEWS IN RUSSIA AND POLAND
E. Fram, IDEALS FACE REALITY
N. Hanover, ABYSS OF DISPAIR (YEVEN METSULAH)
M. Rosman, LORDS' JEWS
H. White, TROPICS OF DISCOURSE

Mary Lynn Rampolla, A POCKET GUIDE TO WRITING IN HISTORY
 

 
Magda Teter
 313 PAC 
 860-685-5356 
 E-mail: mteter@wesleyan.edu
Course Requirements
Wesleyan University's Library offers a lot of valuable research resources.  Contact Alan Nathanson to guide you through them.
 
SCHEDULE

Week 1:

 1.  Tu. 01/31  Introduction: ON ERESERVES:

 Week 2:

2. Tu 02/07 The Shtetl-- WE WILL MEET AT 7 PM at the CFA lab AWKS 112.

ON ERESERVES:  

 Bibliographic Assignment Announced

Week 3

3.Tu. 02/14 Simon Dubnow and the Writing of Eastern European Jewish History: 

Week 4

4. Tu. 02/21: Historians, Historical Sources, Historiography:

By NOW YOU SHOULD HAVE DISCUSSED YOUR PAPER TOPIC WITH ME

Week 5

Tu. 02/28 Narratives of the Origins:

Week 6:

4. Tu. 03/07:  Legal Status:

  • Dubnow History of the Jews in Russia and Poland, pp. 16-45;
  • Rosman "The Lords' Jews, 1-74;
  • Baron SRHJ vol. XVI, pp. 120-163;
  • J. Goldberg "De non tolerandis iudaeis"  Studies in Jewish History Presented to Professor Raphael Mahler, pp. 39-52;  
  • Maurycy Horn,  "Jewish Jurisdiction's dependence on Royal Power in Poland and Lithuania up to 1548"Acta Poloniae Historica [Poland] 1997 (76): 5-17;
  • The royal privilege of 1453 and the Jampol private privilege of 1711 presented by Adam Teller in Summer 2004 on www.earlymodern.org  Bibliography for your term paper: Monday 03/06 5 pm

Suggested Supplementary Reading: Wyczański "Problem of authority in sixteenth-century Poland" and Mączak "The Structure of Power in the Commonwealth of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries" in  J. Fedorowicz, ed., A Republic of Nobles (Cambridge University Press, 1982), 91-134 [available on Ereserves]

Final Draft of the First Paper Due FRIDAY 03/10 5 pm

SPRING BREAK 03/10-03/27

Week 7:

5. Tu. 03/28: Jews in Polish Economy: 

  • Dubnow, History of the Jews in Russia and Poland, 28-30, 66-69, 80-82 ;
  •  Edward Fram, Ideals Face Reality, 106-128;
  • Moshe Rosman, Lords' Jews, pp. 75-184;
  • On ERESERVES:  G. Hundert " Jews, Money and Society in the Seventeenth Century Polish Commonwealth:  The Case of Cracow"  in Jewish Social Studies 43/3-4 (Fall 1981) pp. 261-274.
  • Ereserves: Hundert Jews in Poland-Lithuania in the Eighteenth Century, 32-56.

Suggested Supplementary Reading: Bogucka, "Polish Towns between Sixteenth and Eighteenth Centuries" in J. Fedorowicz, ed., A Republic of Nobles (Cambridge University Press, 1982),135-152

Week 8:  Jewish-Christian Relations: The Church, the accusations and the daily contacts

6. Tu. 04/04: 

  •  Dubnow History of the Jews in Russia and Poland, pp.82-87;
  • Baron SRHJ vol. XVI, pp 89-120
  • Edward Fram, Ideals Face Reality, pp. 15-37;
  • On ERESERVES: Kalik "Patterns of Contact between the Catholic Church and the Jews in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth:  The Jewish Debts" in Studies in the History of the Jews in Old Poland in Honor of Jacob Goldberg, pp.102-122;
  • on ERESERVES: Teter, Jews and Heretics, pp. 21-40, 59-79, 99-121  
  • Primary Text: Church Robbery and Host Desecration text on www.earlymodern.org, and the text of the trials of two converts to Judaism in Dubno 1716 (on BlackBoard).

Suggested supplementary reading:  Teter, Jews and Heretics in Catholic Poland (Cambridge University Press, 2005), pp.1-20, 41-79, 122-141

Notes from your research due and paper outline DUE

Week 9:  

7. Tu. 04/11: Jewish Community and Self-Government:

Suggested supplementary reading: Israel Bartal "The Pinkas of the Council of Four Lands" in  Jews in Old Poland 1000-1795, 110-118;

Week 10:

8: Tu. 04/18: Religious Culture:

Week 11:

9. Tu. 04/25:  Narratives of the "Watershed:" The Chmielnicki Uprising of 1648-49:

Week 12: 

10. Tu. 05/02:  Hasidism:

  • Dubnow History of the Jews in Russia and Poland pp. 107-117;
  • Handouts: Essential Papers on Hasidism, pp. 11-85; M. Rosman Founder of Hasidism, 11-94;

Supplementary: Etkes The Besht,

Week 13

11. Tu. 05/09: Eastern European Jewish History: Reassessment: Moshe Rosman: "Innovative Tradition: Jewish Culture in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth" in D. Biale ed. Cultures of the Jews (Schocken, 2002), 519-570. FINAL DRAFT DUE ON Monday 05/08 by 5 pm