History and Religion of Second Temple Judaism -- The Jewish Child, from the Bible to the Holocaust (2020 Boccaccini), course

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History and Religion of Second Temple Judaism: The Jewish Child, from the Bible to the Holocaust (MIDEAST 335) is a course offered by Gabriele Boccaccini in the Winter 2020.

Description

What is the role of children, boys and girls, in Judaism? Although the religious education of children in the family has always been a major concern in Judaism, children are rarely presented as role models in the Hebrew Bible. Since Hellenistic-Roman times (in Second Temple Judaism and the New Testament) we can see more attention being paid to children, which led Jews (and Christians) to stress the importance of schooling and formal education even outside the family. Children however were not recognized as autonomous until the nineteenth century, when Jews and Christians in Europe and the United States got involved in the general cultural debate on children's rights, which also led to the establishment of the first youth organizations. The course will focus in particular on the "ideal" role that Jews attributed to children based on their reading and rereading of ancient scriptures, and on the Holocaust as a very special chapter in the experience of the Jewish child, when thousands of children in total abandonment found themselves forced to take their destiny in their own hands, in the struggle to survive, in hiding, in ghettoes or concentration camps.

Office Hours

Office hours are before class M W from 4:15 to 5:15 in 4145 Thayer, or after class in the classroom (Tisch G040); or by appointment.

Syllabus

(1) Jan 8, 2020

Children in the Ancient Near East: General Introduction

(2-3) Jan 13 & 15, 2020

Children and their Education in Second Temple Judaism

Children in the Hebrew Bible

Young Josephus, the ideal childhood of a noble Jew.

Children in the Early Jesus Movement

Children in the Diaspora

The Book of Daniel

A dangerous world for children

The Child martyr (the Maccabean Martyrs)

(4) Jan 22, 2020 (no class on Jan 20)

The Jewish Child in the Middle Ages

The Blood Libel

The convert (Abduction of Children)

(5-6) Jan 27-29, 2020

After the Emancipation

Jewish Orphanages (late 19th-cent - early 20th cent. until WW2)

Jewish Schools

Children' literature

Children of the Holocaust: General Introduction

(7-8) Feb 3 & 5, 2020

Kindertransport

  • Film: All My Loved Ones (Vsichni moji blízcí), directed by Matej Minac (Rep. ceca 1997)

(9-10) Feb 10 & 12, 2020

Jews in the Ghettoes

  • Film: Border Street (Ulica Graniczna), directed by Aleksander Ford (Poland 1948) <Polish>

Feb 10: 5:30-6:15 - Discussion of the Kinderstransport and Intro to the Ghettos

6:15-6:45 - Border Street (30m)

5m - Questions

Feb 12 -

The Nazi Ghettos

Border Street (45m)

Discussion & Questions

(11-12) Feb 17 & 19, 2020

Feb 17: Border Street (45m- conclusion)

The Literature of the Holocaust

Feb 19: Holocaust Children's Diaries

I'm Still Here: Real Diaries of Young People Who Lived during the Holocaust (2005 Zapruder, Lazin), documentary

(13-14) Feb 24 & 26, 2020

FebMid-Term Exam

< Spring Break >

(15-16) March 9 & 11, 2020

Children in Hiding

  • [ Villa Nonantola]]
  • [ Jewish Children's Home in Oslo]
  • Christian Orphanages and Schools

Film: A Bag of Marbles (Un sac de billes), directed by Christian Duguay (France 2017) [110m]

(17-18) March 16 & 18, 2020

Children in concentration Camps

(a) Auschwitz

  • Film: Fateless (Sorstalanság), directed by Lajos Koltai (Hungary 2005) (part I - 50m)

(b)

Errand boys

Film: Fateless (Sorstalanság), directed by Lajos Koltai (Hungary 2005) (part 2 - 50m)

(19-20) March 23 & 25, 2020

(a) Buchenwald The Buchenwald Children

Film: Fateless (Sorstalanság), directed by Lajos Koltai (Hungary 2005) (part 3 - 50m)

(b) Bergen-Belsen

Film: Jonah Who Lived in the Whale / Look to the Sky / (Jona che visse nella balena, directed by Roberto Faenza (Italy 1993) [part I]

(21-22) : March 30 & April 1, 2020

(a)

Film: Jonah Who Lived in the Whale / Look to the Sky / (Jona che visse nella balena, directed by Roberto Faenza (Italy 1993) [part 2]

(b)

Film: The Search, directed by Fred Zinnemann (USA 1948) [105m]

(23) April 6, 2020

  • Film: The Search, directed by Fred Zinnemann (USA 1948) [105m] (part 2)

24-25 : April 13 & 15, 2020

Students' Presentations

26 : April 20, 2020 & April 22

Students' Presentations:

Final Exam: Students' Presentations

Exams

There will be a mid term exam and a final exam.

Midterm

By Monday Feb 2, you have to select 3 diaries (from the "Holocaust Children's Diaries" list in 4 Enoch), and 3 books (from the "Holocaust Children" list in 4 Enoch).

(1) Look first at the "Holocaust Children's Diaries" list in 4 Enoch. Read the description of ALL listed diaries and pick up 3 diaries of your choice. You may rather decide to pick up (instead of a diary) a couple of interviews made in 1946 by Dr. Boden and available online. The 4 Enoch page links to a couple of article of the Holocaust Encyclopedia that I would also would like you to read.

(2) Look at the "Holocaust Children" in 4 Enoch. Read the description of ALL listed book and pick up 3 books of your choice.

Note - If you have a special interest on a particular group of children, who are not specifically covered in the listed book (for instance, What happened to the children living in a particular ghetto, or in a particular concentration camp?) , you may indicate your interest as "one" book.

(3) Write your preferences on a paper and give it to me with your name this coming Monday. We will be assigned one diary, and one book.

For the mid term, we have to write a 6-page paper by Feb 24. 2 pages will be devoted to the diary (summary and comments), 2 pages to the book (summary and your comments), and 2 pages to your comments in which you list the most important things that we have learned from your readings about the experience of Holocaust children.

On Feb 26, at the mid-term we will be expected to share and discuss your research in groups with the other students, divided in small groups, and to answer individually some general questions about the first part of the class.

Final Exam

The final exam will be based on the reading of two memoirs by Holocaust survivors (one boy and one girl). The result will be presented orally in class and in a written short paper.

Grading

The final grade is based (a)on the mid-term (30%); (b) the final (40%); and (c) participation in class and weekly assignments (30%)

Note

Attendance is mandatory. Students who have missed more than 5 classes without justification will not be graded and will be given a NR (no report).

The usage of electronic devises (computers, i-phones, etc.) is not allowed in class except under specific authorization by the instructor.

Assigned Diaries

  • Mary Berg (Miriam Wattenberg) -- Chowdhary / Snyder
  • Anne Frank -- Basaleli / Kornblum
  • Éva Heyman -- DeStefano-Raskin / Zacks
  • I Never Saw Another Butterfly -- Hurd
  • The Diary of Dawid Rubinowicz -- Kopelman / Verschleiser
  • Young Moshe's Diary -- Bell / Kurian
  • The Diary of the Vilna Ghetto -- Principe / Scilken
  • I'm Not Even a Grown-Up: The Diary of Jerzy Feliks Urman -- Fleming / Williams
  • Ruthka: A Diary of War -- Winslow /
  • We Are Witnesses: Five Diaries of Teenagers Who Died in the Holocaust -- Kishore / Lieghio
  • Children in the Holocaust and World War II: Their Secret Diaries -- LaSata
  • The Diary of Dawid Sierakowiak -- Beesabathuni
  • And Yet, I Am Here! -- Zak
  • Girl with Two Landscapes: The Wartime Diary of Lena Jedwab -- Marinescu / McAllister
  • Salvaged Pages: Young Writers' Diaries of the Holocaust -- Hearn / Li
  • This Child Died Tomorrow: The Holocaust Diary of a Greek Boy -- McGregor
  • The Diary of Petr Ginz -- Bosek / Sumeico
  • Rutka's Notebook: A Voice from the Holocaust -- McClendon
  • Denik 194205 - Drawing the Holocaust (Michal Kraus) -- Patnaik
  • Helga's Diary -- Grupta / Tower
  • Rywka's Diary: The Writings of a Jewish Girl from the Lodz Ghetto -- Erdle / Gilbert

Assigned books

  • The Lost Generation (Eisenberg 1982) -- Hurd
  • Children and Play in the Holocaust (1988) -- Marinescu
  • Children with a Star (1991) -- Zak
  • The Hidden Children: The Secret Survivors of the Holocaust (1993) -- Hearn
  • Child Survivors of the Holocaust (1993) -- Basaleli
  • Did the Children Cry? (1994) -- Lieghio
  • Hiding the Survive (1994) -- McGregor
  • The Last Witness: The Child Survivor of the Holocaust (1996) - McClendon / Verschleiser
  • Flares of Memory: Stories of Childhood (2001) -- Gilbert
  • Cruel World: The Children of Europe in the Nazi Web (2005) -- Xinran Li
  • Children during the Holocaust (Heberer 2011) -- Beesabathuni
  • The Young Victims of the Nazi Regime (2016) -- Kurian
  • Children of the Holocaust (Bell 2019) -- Fleming
  • My Hundred Children (1948) -- Kornblum
  • The Hunted Children (1963) -- McAllister
  • The Murders at Bullenhuser Damm (1979) -- Zacks
  • The Children of Buchenwald (1984) -- Chowdhary
  • The Children of Izieu (1984) -- Scilken
  • The King of Children (1988) -- Snyder
  • Children of the Flames (1990) -- Gupta
  • The Search: The Birkenau Boys (1991) -- Kishore
  • The Boys: Triumph over Adversity (1991) -- DeStefano
  • The Children's Block (1994) -- Patnaik
  • Ten Thousand Children (1999) -- Sumeico
  • Into the Arms of Strangers (2000) -- Tower
  • The Girls of Room 28 (2004) -- Erdle
  • Hidden Children of the Holocaust (2008) -- Williams
  • 50 Children (2014) -- Bosek
  • Irena's Children (2016) -- LaSata
  • Suzanne's Children (2017) -- Principe
  • Child Survivors of the Holocaust (2018) -- Bell
  • Tehran Children (2019) -- Winslow
  • Children of Lublin -- Kopelman

Some questions after the first movie (Feb 6, 2020)

See Kindertransport: How It Happened

  • Why did it take so much time to so many Jews to realize the danger of the situation? Why only a few people left earlier? Why did Jews not rebel? Why did Jews not go into hiding? Were different levels of religiosity common within Jewish families at the time?
  • Why did so many countries not allow Jews and other groups to enter? Why were the United States (and other countries) not more open to accept refugees? Why didn't they move families (instead of children only)?
  • Why did Jews not go to Palestine? Was emigrating to Palestine a valid option at the time? What was the situation of Palestine at the time? Why religious and conservative as well as many liberal Jews opposed Zionism? Was Zionism very popular in Europe at the time? How did the way that European Jews viewed Zionism change in the years leading up to the war as well as during the war?
  • How did Germans know who the Jewish people were? Why did they allow the Jewish children to leave? Why were people like Winton not stopped or arrested?
  • How many children escaped? How much did it cost per child? Were the children mostly wealthy? Did poor Jewish children have the same chances to emigrate than rich children? Was parental consent necessary for emigration?
  • What happened to the children of the Kindertransport after they arrived in England? Were all British families welcoming? How did they contact and assigned potential hosts abroad? Did the families who hosted these kids receive any money? How long did they have to host them for? When the rescued children arrived in Great Britain, were they adopted, put into schooling, or began work? Did most children get placed in good homes, or did they face hardship when arriving in England?
  • What was the typical outcome? Once the war had ended how many children went back home, or did most end up living with their host family indefinitely? What are the traumas that the children had to endure? Why many of the children succeeded so well in their lives and careers?

Read Wikipedia.en, and USHMM Holocaust Encyclopedia

Also remember to read two interviews of your choice among those recorded by dr Boder in 1946 (see "Holocaust Children's Diaries" in 4enoch). Write down the names of your choice and add a few comments (at least, 5 to 10 sentences).

If you have missed the movie (or part of it), it is available online: "All My Loved Ones Movie".

Comments from your papers and the groups (Mid-term)

  • Children were especially targeted; they were the future and at the present they had no value. Children were less likely to survive than adults.
  • Children were the most vulnerable, but were also the most resilient, quick to adapt, resourceful, capable of looking at the bright side in small things.
  • Kids had to mature quickly and be able to adapt to new situations
  • Changing dynamic between parents and children (reversal of parent/child roles)
  • Kids became desensitized to the horrors around them, death became a common experience (numbness to death)
  • Kids who knew more languages (and German in particular) had more chances to survive; and so children who looked "less" Jewish or looked older.
  • Wealthiest kids had more chances to emigrate or being hidden; poorest children, however, could better endure forced labor and harsh conditions of life.
  • There was nearly no way to escape the Germans. Armed resistance was impossible. Emigration was very difficult, sine most countries were not eager to take refugees.
  • Education and cultural activities were a form of resistance, a way of pursuing normalcy.
  • Many non-Jews collaborated with the Nazi; many didn't, they helped Jews and risked their lives.
  • During the Holocaust, kids faced unimaginable hardship: hunger, diseases, beatings, they were forced into hard labor or prostitution.
  • If they survived, they suffered permanent traumas for the rest of their lives.

Weekly assignment (by March 9)

Dear students.

The week after the break, we will focus on the experience of children who lived in hiding, separated from their families, hosted by non-Jewish families.

I would like you to watch very carefully at home a documentary which is available online on YouTube:

"Secret Lives - Hidden Children And Their Rescuers During WWII" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4FF3p4xtC6I

You have time to watch (and re-watch) it very carefully. Please, write two pages, focusing in the first page on the experience and feelings of both children and the foster families during the war, and the second on their experience and feelings after the war.

The assignment is due on March 9 in class (hard copy).

I have already read all your papers and exams. You all did a very good job. I expect all of you to do as good also in the second part of the course where we will be focusing on stories of child survivors and the lives of the Jewish child after the Holocaust.

Have a nice break!

Boccaccini

Final Assignments

We are approaching the final weeks of the course. There is a final assignment by the end of next week. Most of the movies we have seen focus on boys, there are not many movies on girls. I would like to see the movie "The Devil's Arithmetic" (1999) [easily available online]. Exactly as you did with the movies "A Bag of Marbles" and "Au revoir les enfans", I would like you to compare "The Devil's Arthmetic" with "Fateless", discussing the gender diversity of experiences between boys and girls.

In the final (8-page) paper you will study one of the pair of children that you have identified (the pair about which you have found more material), reading their memoirs (if possibile), and/or listening to their oral testimony form the web. You will be given 10 minutes to present orally your research to the rest of the class, on April 13 & 15 and April 20 & 22. The written paper is due by April 24.

Presentations will be according to the alphabetical order.

April 13 = Basalevi, Beesabathuni, Bell, Bosek, Chowdhary, DeStefano, Erdle, Fleming

April 15 = Gilbert, Gupta, Hearn, Hurd, Kishore, Kopelman, Kornblum, Kurian

April 20 = LaSata, Li, Lieghio, Maninescu, McAllister, McClendon, McGregor, Patnaik, Principe

April 22 = Schilken, Snyder, Sumeico, Tower, Versschleiser, Williams, Winslow, Zacks, Zak

Please, take note that the April 20 & 22 sessions will last 10 minutes longer, until 7pm.

The present of future of the Jewish Child

Children become adults when they take their life in their own hands.

- The delay of adulthood: Today (21st cent.) in industrialized countries childhood lasts longer and longer. Do you agree? Why?

- Which are the fields is which today (21st cent.) children can excel? (labor?, sports?, entertainment?, literature? , music?, cinema?, education?, performing arts?, visual arts?, politics? … else?). How has the situation changed from the past? Why?

- Among the most famous children of the 21st century are Malala Yousafzai, and Greta Thunberg. Do you know the names of other children? (search the internet) Why most of the recipient of the International Children’s Peace Price are from emerging countries? Why many of them are girls?

- Who is or are in your opinion the most famous Jewish children of the 21st century? (search the internet). Why?

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