History of Jews in the Middle East

Undergraduate / Graduate

This class examines the history of Jews in the Middle East from the early modern period, when many Jewish refugees fleeing Spain and Portugal settled in the Ottoman Empire, to the modern Period, when Jews debated and challenged colonialist, reformist, nationalist, leftist, and secular ideologies. Reading novels, memoirs, and new works in the fields of Jewish and Middle Eastern Studies, we will examine how early modernity and modernity gave birth to new identity formations and new frames of belonging. We will visit the unknown histories of early modern Jews who produced translations and explications of the Hebrew Bible in Arabic, of Jews and Muslims who fought together Christian missionary activities, of Arab Jewish feminists, and of Jewish communists who established anti-Zionist societies in the Middle East.