Winter

This course introduces the students to the scholarship on and the original texts of Ottoman court records. Thousands of registers with millions of court cases covering the period from the sixteenth century to modern times have survived to date. These documents are celebrated by modern historians as exceptional snapshots into the daily lives of common people. Monday sessions are reserved for the discussion of secondary literature; we will read from the original court records on Fridays.

This course, a continuation of Islamicate Civilization I, surveys intellectual, cultural, religious and political developments in the Islamic world from Andalusia to the South Asian sub-continent during the periods from ca. 950 to 1750. We trace the arrival and incorporation of the Steppe Peoples (Turks and Mongols) into the central Islamic lands; the splintering of the Abbasid Caliphate and the impact on political theory; the flowering of literature of Arabic, Turkic and Persian expression; the evolution of religious and legal scholarship and devotional life; transformations in the intellectual and philosophical traditions; the emergence of Shi`i states (Buyids and Fatimids); the Crusades and Mongol conquests; the Mamluks and Timurids, and the "gunpowder empires" of the Ottomans, Safavids, and Moghuls; the dynamics of gender and class relations; etc. This class partially fulfills the requirement for MA students in CMES, as well as for NELC majors and PhD students.

NOTE TO UNDERGRADS: This course does not fulfill Civilization Studies requirements in the College.

Using the original tablets excavated by the Oriental Institute in Nippur, we will read different texts found in House F, an Old Babylonian School. The class will include introductions to typical genres like lexical texts, model contracts, and literary school texts.

"The first man on moon", "the first Thanksgiving," or "the first kiss"--our society is still fascinated and remembers the exact moment something happened for the first time. The history of the Ancient Near East, especially the ancient civilization of Mesopotamia (modern Iraq), is quite rich of such "firsts in history." From the moment, writing is discovered there is an abundance of textual record, covering the first documents about politics, law, and economics. The first private documents allow us a glimpse into what living and dying were like more than 5,000 years ago. This course will explore what the cultural conditions of those innovations were, how innovations transform societies, and why it matters to study ancient civilizations. By discovering primary sources (in English translation), the fascination of reading those texts for the "first" time will be experienced. Visits at the Oriental Institute Museum will link textual record and object-based inquiry.

Arabic Through Debate

Taking debate as its central fulcrum, the course will develop all 4 language skills. Its language goals are served through preparing students to debate a number of issues of public interest.
Why “debate”?
a) Because debating, arguing, making claims, supporting claims with evidence, are all authentic activities that we all practice on a daily basis; debating is a relevant real-life skill;
b) Because the debate process pulls practitioners into all 4 language skills: debaters must read on the proposition topic, they must prepare their arguments in writing, they must clearly speak to an audience, and they must listen carefully to their team mates and to the arguments of the opposing team. In the process, they will be immersed in Arab culture (targeted expressions and historical references, of-the-moment issues, etc.)

Course Objectives
a) Expanding student vocabulary and structures into the abstract, analytic realm, i.e., placing them solidly in the advanced ACTFL levels (see the descriptions of the ACTFL standards and levels here: https://www.actfl.org/sites/default/files/pdfs/public/ACTFLProficiencyG…
b) Improving student speech techniques: pronunciation, intonation/voice modulation, pausing, emphasis, gesturing, visual communication;
c) Improving listening and writing skills and expanding them to include topics of general and academic interest;
d) Through a thoughtful selection of debate propositions, exposing students to some salient social, cultural, and political themes of importance to the Arab public.
e) Sharpening the logical argumentative skills of students.

This is a course for the advanced student of Arabic, focusing on improving listening comprehension and instilling an awareness of the social associations accompanying different speech styles. Through intensive exposure to a variety of authentic oral texts (talk shows, songs, soap operas, films, news shows, ads, comedy skits, etc.), students will delve into current social and political issues, as well as become sensitive to code switching between MSA and colloquial (all the major dialects). Through these texts, we will examine the themes of diglossia and code-switching; gendered discourse; urban-rural differences; class differences; youth language. A heavily aural course, class activities will involve student presentations (group and solo), discussion groups, and a final oral presentation project.

This course provides an introduction to the background and development of the first urbanized civilizations in the Near East in the period from 9000 to 2200 BC. In the first half of the course we will examine the archaeological evidence for the "Neolithic Revolution" - the first domestication of plants and animals and the earliest Neolithic village communities in the "fertile crescent" - the Levant, Anatolia, Mesopotamia and western Iran. The second half of the course will focus on the "Urban Revolution" - the economic and social transformations which took place during the development from, village based communities to the emergence of the urbanized civilizations of the Sumerians and neighboring groups in Mesopotamia during the fourth and third millennia BC.

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.

Selected monumental inscriptions from the Old Aramaic period (c. 1000-600 BCE) are read with special attention to the dialectal differences among various subgroups of texts.

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.