The course "Israeli Minorities: Ethnicity, Gender, and Religion" introduces participants to critical contemporary topics in
Israel studies, focusing on Israeli society, culture, gender, ethnicity, and religion. A significant emphasis is placed on the
challenges of minority integration and minority rights within the framework of the country’s legislation.
The course will examine the current ethnic divisions within Jewish society, particularly among Ashkenazim, Sephardim, and
Mizrahim, and their implications for socio-cultural processes. It will also analyze the phenomenon of intersectionality as it
arises from multiple forms of othering within the context of Israeli communal divisions. The representations of "the Others"
in Israeli film and literature will be explored, providing a comprehensive understanding of these dynamics.
The course concludes with a debate on potential future developments, considering social and demographic data and
reflecting on the evolving realities in the 'New' Middle East, especially in light of the Abraham Accords. Additionally, the
course includes screenings of contemporary Israeli films, with annotated excerpts to enhance understanding.
This course is offered by the Centre for the Study of the Holocaust and Jewish Literature, Faculty of Arts, Charles
University.
It will be conducted online, with weekly sessions on Thursdays from 14:10 to 15:40, starting October 3, 2024.
The language of instruction is English. Consultations will be available upon request after each class.
Last update: Kafka Ivan, Mgr. (11.07.2024)
Course completion requirements - Czech
Examination Criteria
A) Active Participation in Discussions - 30%
Students are expected to engage actively in class discussions, demonstrating their understanding of the course material and contributing thoughtful insights.
B) Class Presentation on a Selected Topic - 40%
Each student will deliver a presentation on a topic of their choice, related to the course content. This presentation should reflect thorough reading, critical analysis, and the ability to articulate findings clearly and effectively.
C) Written Test or Essay - 30%
Students will complete a written test or submit an essay, which will assess their comprehension of the course material, ability to critically evaluate issues, and proficiency in written communication.
Last update: Kafka Ivan, Mgr. (11.07.2024)
Literature -
Required Readings: * Ben-Rafael, Eliezer - Schoeps, Julius H. - Sternberg, Yitzhak - Glöckner, Olaf (eds.). Handbook of Israel: Major Debates. De Gruyter, 2016. (SELECTED CHAPTERS) * Goldscheider, Calvin. Israeli Society in the Twenty-First Century: Immigration, Inequality, and Religious Conflict. The Schusterman Series in Israel Studies, Brandeis University Press, 2015.
Reading List: Averbukh, Lidia. “Israel on the Road to the Orient?: The Cultural and Political Rise of the Mizrahim”. Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik. German Institute for International and Security Affairs, SWP Comments 9. April 2017. Bar-On, Dan. The Others Within Us: Constructing Jewish-Israeli Identity. Cambridge: CUP, 2008. Belt, D. „Zapomenutí věřící: Arabští křesťané“. [Forgotten Believers: Arab Christians] National Geographic. 8 (2009), no. 6, 34-53. Benbassa, Esther. “Otherness, Openness and Rejection in Jewish Context”. Journal of the Interdisciplinary Study of Monotheistic Religions (JISMOR) 5. February 2010. Cahaner, Lee and Malach, Gilad. The Statistical Report on Ultra-Orthodox Society in Israel, The Israel Democracy Institute, 2019. Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS), Population of Israel on the Eve of 2022. Jerusalem: Central Bureau of Statistics, 2021. DellaPergola, Sergio. “World Jewish Population, 2018.” The American Jewish Year Book. Eds. Arnold Dashefsky and Ira M. Sheskin. Dordrecht: Springer, 2018. 361-452. DellaPergola, Sergio. Diaspora vs. Homeland: Development, Unemployment and Ethnic Migration to Israel, 1991-2019. Division of Jewish Demography and Statistics. The A. Harman Institute of Contemporary Jewry. The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 2020. Dowty, Alan (ed.). Critical Issues in Israeli Society. Series on Jewish and Israeli Studies. London: Praeger Publishers, 2004. Fischer, Shlomo. “Two Patterns of Modernization: An Analysis of the Ethnic Issue in Israel”. Israel Studies Review 31. January 2016. 66-85. Gitelman, Zvi (ed.). Religion or Ethnicity?: Jewish Identities in Evolution. New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 2009. Haddad Haj-Yahya, Nasreen - Khalaily, Muhammed - Rudnitzky, Arik – Fargeon, Ben. Statistical Report on Arab Society in Israel: 2021. The Israel Democracy Institute, 2022. Halperin-Kaddari, Ruth. Women in Israel: A State of Their Own. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004. Halperin-Kaddari, Ruth and Yadgar, Yaacov. Religion, Politics and Gender Equality among Jews in Israel. United Nations Research Institute for Social Development (UNRISD) and Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung, 2010. Herzog, Hanna. “Women in Israeli Society.” In Rebhun, U. - Waxman, Ch. I.( eds.). Jews in Israel: Contemporary Social and Cultural Patterns. (195-220) Hanover -London: Brandeis University Press, 2004. “Israel’s Religiously Divided Society.” Pew Research Center Washington, D.C. October 1 2016. Khazzoom, Loolwa. The Flying Camel: Essays on Identity by Women of North African and Middle Eastern Jewish Heritage. New York: Seal Press, 2003. Lavie, Ephraim. Integrating the Arab-Palestinian Minority in Israeli Society: Time for a Strategic Change. Published by Institute for National Security Studies and The Tami Steinmetz Center for Peace Research, 2018. Lewin-Epstein, Noah and Cohen, Yinon. “Ethnic origin and identity in the Jewish population of Israel”. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 2018. [Menachem] Zoufalá, Marcela. Judaismus a ženy v Izraeli. [Judaism and women in Israel]. Praha: Karolinum University Press, 2012, in Czech. [Menachem] Zoufalá, Marcela. “Judaism and Divorce Practices in the Modern State of Israel”. In Culturologia, 1(2), 2012, in English. [Menachem] Zoufalá, Marcela. “The Ordination of Women as Rabbis - Prospects of Female Believers in the State of Israel”. In Studia Ethnologica Pragensia, 2/2013, pp. 59-73, in Czech. [Menachem] Zoufalá, Marcela. “Israel Studies - A New Academic Discipline Seeking its Identity”, in Zoufalá, Marcela - Sládek, Pavel - Zdichynec, Jan /eds./: Židovská studia ve 21. století [Jewish Studies in the 21st Century], Historie - Otázky - Problémy 2013/1 - FA CU, Praha 2013, pp. 19-25, in Czech. Menachem Zoufalá, Marcela. “Ethno-religious Othering as a reason behind the Central European Jewish distancing from Israel”, in: Haim Fireberg, Olaf Glöckner, Marcela Menachem Zoufalá /eds./: Being Jewish in 21st Century Central Europe. Series: Europäisch-jüdische Studien, De Gruyter, 2020, in English. Menachem Zoufalá, Marcela. “Mizrahim or Arab-Jews: An Impact of Discriminated Groups on (re)Forming of Israeli Society”, in: P. R. Kumaraswamy /ed./: International Palgrave Handbook on Israel, Palgrave Macmillan, 2022 (Forthcoming). Menachem Zoufalá, Marcela, Joanna Dyduch, and Olaf Glöckner. 2022. "Jews and Muslims in Dubai, Berlin, and Warsaw: Interactions, Peacebuilding Initiatives, and Improbable Encounters" Religions 13, no. 1: 13. Open Access: https://doi.org/10.3390/rel13010013 “A Portrait of Jewish Americans.” Pew Research Center Washington, D.C. October 1 2013. Rosner, Shmuel Rosner and Ruskay, John. “70 Years of Israel-Diaspora Relations: The Next Generation”. Eds. Barry Geltman and Rami Tal. The Jewish People Policy Institute (JPPI), 2018. Scham, Paul. - Pogrund, Benjamin. - Ghanem, As´ad. Shared Narratives - A Palestinian-Israeli Dialogue. Israel Studies 18 (2013), no. 2, Indiana University Press. Stern, Yedidia, Z. “Israeli law and Jewish law in Israel: A zero sum game?” In Batnitzky, L., & Dagan, H (Eds.). Institutionalizing rights and religion: competing supremacies (pp. 57-73). Cambridge University Press, 2017. Tzameret, Hagar – Chazan, Naomi – Herzog, Hanna – Basin, Yulia – Brayer, Ronna - Hadass Ben Eliyahu, Garb. The Gender Index: Gender Inequality in Israel 2021. Van Leer Institute Press, 2021. Weil, Shalva. “Ethiopian Jewish Women: Trends and Transformations in the Context of Transnational Change.” Nashim: A Journal of Jewish Women's Studies & Gender Issues, No. 8, Multiculturalism and Migration in Israel (Fall, 5765/2004), pp. 73-86 (14 pages), Published By: Indiana University Press. Weiss, Avi, Ed.“State of the Nation Report: Society, Economy and Policy in Israel 2021 ”, The Singer Annual Report Series. Jerusalem: Taub Center for Social Policy Studies in Israel, 2021.
Last update: Kafka Ivan, Mgr. (11.07.2024)
Required Readings:
* Ben-Rafael, Eliezer - Schoeps, Julius H. - Sternberg, Yitzhak - Glöckner, Olaf (eds.). Handbook of Israel: Major Debates. De Gruyter, 2016. (SELECTED CHAPTERS)
Goldscheider, Calvin. Israeli Society in the Twenty-First Century: Immigration, Inequality, and Religious Conflict. The Schusterman Series in Israel Studies, Brandeis University Press, 2015.
Recommended Reading:
Averbukh, Lidia. “Israel on the Road to the Orient?: The Cultural and Political Rise of the Mizrahim”. Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik. German Institute for International and Security Affairs, SWP Comments 9. April 2017.
Bar-On, Dan. The Others Within Us: Constructing Jewish-Israeli Identity. Cambridge: CUP, 2008.
Belt, D. „Zapomenutí věřící: Arabští křesťané“. [Forgotten Believers: Arab Christians] National Geographic. 8 (2009), no. 6, 34-53.
Benbassa, Esther. “Otherness, Openness and Rejection in Jewish Context”. Journal of the Interdisciplinary Study of Monotheistic Religions (JISMOR) 5. February 2010.
Cahaner, Lee and Malach, Gilad. The Statistical Report on Ultra-Orthodox Society in Israel, The Israel Democracy Institute, 2019.
Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS), Population of Israel on the Eve of 2022. Jerusalem: Central Bureau of Statistics, 2021.
Darawshe, Mohammad. "18 A Jewish Nation-State Can Also Be a State of All Its Citizens". A Jewish State: 75 Perspectives, edited by Aharon Barak, Jehuda Reinharz, Yedidia Z. Stern and Haim Zicherman, Boston, USA: Academic Studies Press, 2024, pp. 114-118.
DellaPergola, Sergio. “World Jewish Population, 2018.” The American Jewish Year Book. Eds. Arnold Dashefsky and Ira M. Sheskin. Dordrecht: Springer, 2018. 361-452.
DellaPergola, Sergio. Diaspora vs. Homeland: Development, Unemployment and Ethnic Migration to Israel, 1991-2019. Division of Jewish Demography and Statistics. The A. Harman Institute of Contemporary Jewry. The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 2020.
Dowty, Alan (ed.). Critical Issues in Israeli Society. Series on Jewish and Israeli Studies. London: Praeger Publishers, 2004.
Fischer, Shlomo. “Two Patterns of Modernization: An Analysis of the Ethnic Issue in Israel”. Israel Studies Review 31. January 2016. 66-85.
Gitelman, Zvi (ed.). Religion or Ethnicity?: Jewish Identities in Evolution. New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 2009.
Haddad Haj-Yahya, Nasreen - Khalaily, Muhammed - Rudnitzky, Arik - Fargeon, Ben. Statistical Report on Arab Society in Israel: 2021. The Israel Democracy Institute, 2022.
Halperin-Kaddari, Ruth. Women in Israel: A State of Their Own. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004.
Halperin-Kaddari, Ruth and Yadgar, Yaacov. Religion, Politics and Gender Equality among Jews in Israel. United Nations Research Institute for Social Development (UNRISD) and Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung, 2010.
Herzog, Hanna. “Women in Israeli Society.” In Rebhun, U. - Waxman, Ch. I.( eds.). Jews in Israel: Contemporary Social and Cultural Patterns. (195-220) Hanover-London: Brandeis University Press, 2004.
“Israel’s Religiously Divided Society.” Pew Research Center Washington, D.C. October 1 2016.
Khazzoom, Loolwa. The Flying Camel: Essays on Identity by Women of North African and Middle Eastern Jewish Heritage. New York: Seal Press, 2003.
Lavie, Ephraim. Integrating the Arab-Palestinian Minority in Israeli Society: Time for a Strategic Change. Published by Institute for National Security Studies and The Tami Steinmetz Center for Peace Research, 2018.
Lewin-Epstein, Noah and Cohen, Yinon. “Ethnic origin and identity in the Jewish population of Israel”. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 2018.
[Menachem] Zoufalá, Marcela. “Judaism and Divorce Practices in the Modern State of Israel”. In Culturologia, 1(2), 2012, in English.
[Menachem] Zoufalá, Marcela. “The Ordination of Women as Rabbis - Prospects of Female Believers in the State of Israel”. In Studia Ethnologica Pragensia, 2/2013, pp. 59-73, in Czech.
Menachem Zoufalá, Marcela. “Ethno-religious Othering as a reason behind the Central European Jewish distancing from Israel”, in: Haim Fireberg, Olaf Glöckner, Marcela Menachem Zoufalá /eds./: Being Jewish in 21st Century Central Europe. Series: Europäisch-jüdische Studien, De Gruyter, 2020, in English.
Menachem Zoufalá, Marcela. “Racism Debate and Israel. Impact of Discriminated Groups on (Re)forming of Israeli and International Discourses.” In: Kumaraswamy, P.R. (eds) The Palgrave International Handbook of Israel. Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore, 2023.
Menachem Zoufalá, Marcela, Joanna Dyduch, and Olaf Glöckner. 2022. "Jews and Muslims in Dubai, Berlin, and Warsaw: Interactions, Peacebuilding Initiatives, and Improbable Encounters" Religions 13, no. 1: 13. Open Access:
Menachem Zoufalá, Marcela, “Israel Studies in Poland, Czech Republic, and Germany: paths of development, dynamics, and directions of changes,” in: Derek Penslar, Johannes Becke /eds./: Israel Studies as a Global Discipline, Journal of Israeli History, with Joanna Dyduch, Olaf Glöckner, 2023.
Menachem Zoufalá, Marcela, “Ambivalence, Dilemmas, and Aporias of Contemporary Czech Jewish Lived Experience” in: ‘United in Diversity’ - An Interdisciplinary Study of Contemporary European Jewry and Its Reflection. Marcela Menachem Zoufalá, Olaf Glöckner, /eds./, Series: Europäisch-jüdische Studien, De Gruyter, 2023. Open Access ISBN 978-3-11-078310-0
Menachem Zoufalá, Marcela, “Mizrahim’s Ambiguous Role as ‘Arab Brothers’ in Peacebuilding Initiatives in the ‘New Middle East’”, 2023 Report of the Oxford Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies
Mizrachi, Nissim, Beyond Suspicion: The Moral Clash between Rootedness and Progressive Liberalism, June 2024, University of California Series in Jewish History and Cultures, ISBN: 9780520382855, DOI:
“A Portrait of Jewish Americans.” Pew Research Center Washington, D.C. October 1 2013.
Rosner, Shmuel Rosner and Ruskay, John. “70 Years of Israel-Diaspora Relations: The Next Generation”. Eds. Barry Geltman and Rami Tal. The Jewish People Policy Institute (JPPI), 2018.
Scham, Paul. - Pogrund, Benjamin. - Ghanem, As´ad. Shared Narratives - A Palestinian-Israeli Dialogue. Israel Studies 18 (2013), no. 2, Indiana University Press.
Sion, Liora (2014) Passing as hybrid: Arab-Palestinian teachers in Jewish schools, Ethnic and Racial Studies, 37:14, 2636-2652, DOI:10.1080/01419870.2013.851398
Stern, Yedidia, Z. “Israeli law and Jewish law in Israel: A zero sum game?” In Batnitzky, L., & Dagan, H (Eds.). Institutionalizing rights and religion: competing supremacies (pp. 57-73). Cambridge University Press, 2017.
Tzameret, Hagar - Chazan, Naomi - Herzog, Hanna - Basin, Yulia - Brayer, Ronna - Hadass Ben Eliyahu, Garb. The Gender Index: Gender Inequality in Israel 2021. Van Leer Institute Press, 2021.
Weil, Shalva. “Ethiopian Jewish Women: Trends and Transformations in the Context of Transnational Change.” Nashim: A Journal of Jewish Women's Studies & Gender Issues, No. 8, Multiculturalism and Migration in Israel (Fall, 5765/2004), pp. 73-86 (14 pages), Published By: Indiana University Press.
Weiss, Avi, Ed.“State of the Nation Report: Society, Economy and Policy in Israel 2021 ”, The Singer Annual Report Series. Jerusalem: Taub Center for Social Policy Studies in Israel, 2021.
