Winter

In consultation with a faculty research adviser and with consent of the Director of Undergraduate Studies, students devote the equivalent of a one-quarter course to the preparation of their Research Project. Students are required to submit the College Reading and Research Course Form. Please indicate that you wish to register for NEHC 29995 Section 01 with the Director of Undergraduate Studies.

We will read a choice of legal and administrative texts from the Kassite period (1400-1150 BC), including contracts, tables, receipts and letters. You will get an introduction to the Middle Babylonian dialect of Akkadian and learn how to approach those genres. We will also read unpublished material from photos, casts, and original tablets.

Elementary Sumerian II

This course will cover the history of the Fatimid (Shiite) caliphate, from its foundation in the North Africa about 909 until its end in Egypt 1171. Most of the material will be presented in classroom lectures. Sections of the course deal with Fatimid history treated chronologically and others with separate institutions and problems as they changed and developed throughout the whole time period. Readings heavily favored or highly recommended are all in English.

The second quarter of Intermediate Arabic

This sequence concentrates on the acquisition of speaking, reading, and aural skills in modern formal Arabic.

As part of a three-quarter sequence, this second quarter we finish the grammar and start reading Hittite texts, introducing the student to the various genres that Hittite literature has to offer. We will continue the introduction of important tools of the field and students will acquire further routine in reading cuneiform.

The course is an introduction to the texts, contexts, functions, and rhythms of Arabic poetry. Students read, translate, and analyze the most eloquent verse of the Arabic poetic canon, with a view to understanding its themes, metaphors, and forms. In addition, they study the prosody and rhetoric that underpins these texts in order to acquire a feel for its music and aesthetics. The class is part lecture, part readings. Its focus is on the classical material, but modern poetry (MSA and colloquial) is also introduced.

First Shiʿa Imam, and fourth Sunni caliph, Ali ibn Abi Talib (d. 40/661) is the acknowledged master of Arabic eloquence, revered by both Sunni and Shiʿa Muslims for his piety and wisdom. Through the centuries, his words have been collected, studied, and cited by generations of Muslims as well as non-Muslim Arabs, and have inspired both litterateurs and sages. Through a close reading and analysis of his orations, epistles, and sayings from Sharīf Raḍī’s (d. 406/1016) Nahj al-balaghah compilation, this course will explore an early stage of the development of these three important prose genres of classical Arabic literature, and Ali’s key themes and stylistic features. Secondary literature will be read and discussed for context and analysis. A main focus of the class will be on themes of virtue and piety.

The purpose of this three-quarter sequence is to enable the student to acquire a knowledge of the vocabulary and grammar of Classical Hebrew sufficient to read prose texts with the occasional assistance of a dictionary. The second quarter focuses on verb inflection and verbal sequences and includes written translation to and from Hebrew, oral exercises, and grammatical analysis of forms.