Oral Participation/engagement (10%)

1500 words first essay (10%) due term 1 Wed week 7

Source analysis of your choice. The essay should offer a close analysis of a single or small set of directly related primary sources. You need to read the source in its entirety, so if you, for instance, pick Herman Kruk's diary, you need to read all 800 pages. You pick your source yourself, it can come from the reading list or your own choice. It can come from any period of Jewish history the course covers. The essay should showcase your skill to read the source, point out its layers and possible interpretations, put it into context and relevant historiography - in 1500 words. It should have footnotes. Here are the marking criteria.

3000 word second assignment (40%) due term 2 Wed week 7

First person fictional autobiography of a Jewish person, or a person relevant for Jewish history. Your protagonist can live at any point in the time our course covers. They can be fictional or real. The account needs to span your whole life and relate to the key events that happen in your lifetime in the country where you live, but also to your class and gender. It needs to cover your life, not just a few year that you find interesting. It cannot be a dialogue. You should not be writing an autobiography of a real person who wrote a memoir, because that would defeat the purpose of your own research and context.

Include a relevant bibliography at the end which does not count towards the word count. The essay does not need to have footnotes. The bibliography will help you position your protagonist in historical context and make their experience authentic and probable. The bibliography should draw on both scholarly literature and (published or unpublished) sources.

The aim here is to offer as authentic biography as possible that is positioned in the contents of the syllabus. The essay does not need to be analytical, and if it suits the person's narrative and your inclination, can be written in formal or informal tone.

I will not mark the style but rather, historical accuracy. Try to be specific, avoid being vague. If your person lived through events important to Jewish history, they need to relate. Details can be key: for instance, if you are a Jewish politician in 1900 Paris, how do you experience the Dreyfus affair? what do you think about the socialist movement? about the occupation of Alsace? About Zionism? about refugees from pogroms in Russia? etc.

Authenticity: please avoid wildly improbable events (the French Jewish politician will not have met Lenin; there are no miracles).

Here are the marking criteria.

7 day take-home assessment (40%) (2 hours, 2 questions) due term 3 date TBC

Please pick from 10 questions.