A new minor in Jewish Civilization offered by the College will give students an opportunity to study the history and development of Judaism.
The new minor will be administered by the Program of Jewish Civilization, a research and teaching hub of the School of Foreign Service. Students declaring the minor will examine issues such as nationalism and the role of religion in international affairs as part of a broad study of early and modern Jewish civilizations.
Yossi Shain, faculty director of the PJC, said that the new minor “provides [students] a new opportunity to look into the subject of Jewish civilization from a broad perspective.”We look from antiquity to modernity,” he added.
Greg Goldberg, publicity director for the Jewish Students Association, said that the addition of the Jewish Civilization minor “definitely shows that the university is taking an interest in Jewish life on campus. Having it here [at Georgetown] will definitely do a lot in contributing to Jewish life and Jewish scholarship on campus,” he said.
“The Jewish civilization department is getting bigger, and now all students in the College will have access to it,” JSA President Scott Weinstein said. He called the minor a great opportunity for people “to diversify themselves in terms of religion,” and added that the minor will offer another option for College students excelling in theology.
The minor requires candidates to take at least four electives in the humanities, social sciences or Hebrew language, as well as a final capstone course during their senior year.
Interested students should apply for the minor before the end of their junior year, but are eligible to do so until the end of the senior fall semester.
Shain and Weinstein said that they expect interest in the Jewish Civilization minor to be strong, and said that preliminary application numbers have been promising. With nine students already signed up for the minor, Shain called it an “incredibly quick response.”
The two also said that the faculty members who will teach classes required for the minor are well-qualified. Shain said the program’s leadership involves many different professors from a variety of departments and areas of expertise.
Shain said that courses that may contribute to the Jewish Civilization minor encompass a wide range of subjects, including theology, philosophy and history, and that this breadth of topics covered differentiates the minor from similar programs at other universities.
“This is not a regular Jewish studies program,” Shain said. “The emphasis for the Program for Jewish Civilization is about Jewish people in international affairs.”
The PJC, which is now in its third year of existence, also oversees a certificate program in Jewish Civilization offered by the SFS, and the College’s minor will complement this existing certificate.
Shain said that once the PJC begins overseeing programs in both the College and the SFS, the two schools will be more united. The minor is “a bridge to other programs at Georgetown,” Shain said. “That’s the beauty of it.”
Shain called the minor an accomplishment for his department. “It is part and parcel for the development of the Program for Jewish Civilization that has grown dramatically over the last two years,” he said.
