BHI 586 Philosophy of History
What is history and how do historical narratives contribute to our understanding of the past? Is history a distinct discipline? Does it produce a distinct body of knowledge? Is it possible to conduct historical research without the influence of an ideology? While very basic questions, how one answers such questions contributes to one's notion of the meanings and uses of history. This course is structured as an investigation of philosophies of history, with an emphasis on epistemology. The class will read together writings from Elizabeth Clark, Hayden White, Michel Foucault, Jonathan Wolff (on Marxist historiography), Catherine Gallagher and Stephen Greenblatt, among other authors. Class time will be spent discussing these writings in depth. Then, each participant will develop projects with the two instructors by taking a given philosophy of history and applying it to historical documents drawn from Biblical, Rabbinic, or Medieval Sources. Additionally, students will keep a kind of "intellectual diary" which traces their understanding of the authors we read, and their personal reactions to those authors. The readings and the application of theory to texts promise to transform one's sense of Jewish history and its meaning for contemporary Jewish thought and practice.