HSY4165 - Final journey: the life and death of European Jews, 1900-1945

Leader(s): Mark Baker

Offered

Not offered in 2009

Synopsis

Based at the Monash campus in Prato, this three-week intensive study abroad unit explores the modern history of European Jews before the destruction. Students will travel to the major centres of interwar Jewish life in Berlin, Prague, and Warsaw, and encounter the diverse heritage of Jewish life in each country. The unit will explore issues central to this period and the individuals who shaped their times. Students will visit museums, synagogues, cemeteries, destroyed ghettos, and conclude with a guided visit to Auschwitz-Birkenau. We will ask what remains of the past, by looking at the ways in which the lost world of European Jews is being memorialised and renewed through tourism and return.

Objectives

Upon successful completion of this unit students will have:

1. the capacity to locate the development of modern Jewish life in the context of modern Europe
2. a demonstrated ability to evaluate the social, political , economic and intellectual concerns of the inter-war community
3. an understanding of the institutions and individuals that shaped the interwar European Jewish communities
4. the capacity to describe and analyse the diversity of Jewish communal life and cultural expression in interwar Europe
5. an understanding of gender and class issues within the framework of the interwar European Jewish communities
6. an understanding of the significance of Yiddish as a literary and cultural phenomenon
7. a broader appreciation of the social history and cultural differences in Europe gained through study abroad
8. In addition, students at fourth-year level will have a familiarity with the primary sources and an appreciation of the historiographical problems involved in reconstructing a history of these destroyed communities.

Assessment

Major essay (5000 words): 50%
Analytical travel diary: 30%
Exam (2-hours): 20%

Off-campus attendance requirements

Three-week intensive study abroad unit in Prato and other European sites

Prohibitions

JWC2425, JWC3425