BA blessings
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SINCE TUITION fees have risen to £9,000 a year in many univ e r s i t i e s , s o m e students must be thinking twice about taking up a place. But University College London’s Hebrew and Jewish studies department is offering a major incentive for applicants this year.
The new Chimen Abramsky scholarship, worth £25,000, will be open to an outstanding British undergraduate who is accepted for a BA at the country’s only full university department in Hebrew and Jewish studies. It is a coup for the department to be able to launch a scholarship of this value, which has been funded by one of its former students.
Few subjects span such a broad range of disciplines as Jewish studies — history, language, culture, politics, literature. UCL’s BA courses in Jewish history, Hebrew and Jewish studies, or European history combined with Jewish studies, normally take four years to complete, as they include a year abroad at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. But there is now a three-year course in Jewish studies available. UCL’s specialist MA degrees include Holocaust studies and Israel studies.
Undergraduates can choose from a large menu of options across 3,000 years of Jewish civilisation, from ancient languages such as Syriac to Aramaic to modern Israel. Its course list runs from feminist issues in Israeli writing or Jews in English-speaking lands to Maimonides or mysticism. Now that Israelis and Palestinians are finally back round the negotiating table, it could hardly be more timely for Professor Neil Lochery to re-introduce a course on the Middle East peace process.
While some Hebrew forms part of undergraduate studies, you do not need advanced knowledge of the language to start a degree.
UCL is particularly strong in Yiddish and one of its new options this year is a course in Judeo-Spanish (Ladino) language and literature. There is also the opportunity to take courses outside the department’s own specialisms, such as Egyptology.
From September 2014, those with a keen interest in antiquity will be able to take a BA which combines Hebrew with Latin or Greek. This classical blockbuster, according to Lily Kahn, the department’s undergraduate admissions’ tutor, “will fill a glaring gap in current teaching provision throughout the UK by offering the only degree specifically focused on the languages and literatures of the Mediterranean and Near East.”
An alternative to devoting your entire degree to Jewish studies is to do it for part of the time. And Southampton University offers one of the best opportunities for doing just that. You can combine studies for a humanities BA with a minor in Jewish history and culture — which involves opting for a number of courses each year. It will give you the chance, the university says, “to explore the variety of issues that have impacted on the Jewish people throughout history and in turn the factors that have influenced the relationship between Jews and non-Jews”.
Southampton has particular expertise in the Holocaust and modern European history, with course options ranging from an in-depth look at Anne Frank and her world to the Holocaust in literature and film. But there is a broad mix of other topics, from the story of Masada or ancient Jewish magic to London’s East End or modern Israel.
Southampton also offers an MA in Jewish history and culture, with a choice of modules that include Babylonian Jewry and how America and Britain reacted to the Holocaust. One special feature is that you don’t have to go to Southampton to do it: the MA is also available part-time via the London Jewish Culture Centre.
Over the past decade or so, Nottingham University has become one of the most popular among Jewish students and some may be attracted simply by the good Jewish social life. But what is less known is that the university has one of the leading departments for theology and religious studies.
BA course options in religious studies include “Sex, violence and God: ethics in the Hebrew Bible”, as well as prophecy, archaeological excavation in Israel, biblical Hebrew and modern Jewish thought. Two years ago the university signalled a growing interest in Jewish studies by establishing its first chair in the subject, held by Professor Agata Bielik-Robson, a specialist in modern Jewish philosophy. You can combine an undergraduate theology degree with philosophy or English.
One of Nottingham’s most interesting developments is a distance learning MA in Jewish history and thought, which you can take full- or part-time, online. Modules include rabbinic Judaism, more Jewish thought and the emergence of the New Testament.