{"id":1363,"date":"2012-07-16T14:07:28","date_gmt":"2012-07-16T20:07:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/?p=1363"},"modified":"2012-07-16T14:07:28","modified_gmt":"2012-07-16T20:07:28","slug":"mazel-tov-tulane-jewish-studies-program-becomes-a-department","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/mazel-tov-tulane-jewish-studies-program-becomes-a-department\/","title":{"rendered":"Mazel tov! Tulane Jewish Studies program becomes a department"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By FRAN SIMON<\/p>\n<p>(Reprinted by permission of Tulane University Publications)<\/p>\n<p>The Jewish studies program at Tulane University has come into its own. When students attend fall semester courses, the program will be a stand-alone department within the School of Liberal Arts.\u00a0Nearly 30 years after the\u00a0Jewish studies program\u00a0was established by Joe Cohen, the Department of Jewish Studies opened its doors on July 1. Jewish studies courses are in demand, with more than 400 students enrolling in them each semester.<\/p>\n<p>With the establishment of the department, Tulane can expand Jewish studies curricular offerings, says Michael Cohen, director of the (former) Jewish studies program.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe number of Jewish studies majors and minors has grown enormously, and we have to serve them well with a full program,\u201d Cohen says.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_1364\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/logo-Tulane_University_edit.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1364\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-1364 lazyload\" title=\"Tulane University's popular Jewish studies program enlargens to a department.\" data-src=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/logo-Tulane_University_edit-300x112.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"112\" data-srcset=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/logo-Tulane_University_edit-300x112.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/logo-Tulane_University_edit.jpg 500w\" data-sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 300px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 300\/112;\" \/><noscript><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1364\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-1364\" title=\"Tulane University's popular Jewish studies program enlargens to a department.\" src=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/logo-Tulane_University_edit-300x112.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"112\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/logo-Tulane_University_edit-300x112.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/logo-Tulane_University_edit.jpg 500w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/noscript><\/a><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-1364\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Tulane University&#39;s popular Jewish studies program enlargens to a department.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>The department\u2019s emphasis is on the modern Jewish experience, rather than religion. In the lower-level courses, about a third of the students are not Jewish.<\/p>\n<p>Cohen, whose expertise is in the modern history of Jews, is one of five Sizeler Professors of Jewish Studies at Tulane; the others are Ronna Burger (philosophy), Brian Horowitz (German and Slavic languages), Marline Otte (history) and Gary Remer (political science).<\/p>\n<p>\u201cJews have played a very important role in American history,\u201d Cohen says. \u201cStudents are starting to see it as a valuable area of study. We look at the human experience from a particular focus perspective. Looking at the totality of the Jewish experience can teach you a lot about the world \u2026 it\u2019s America, it\u2019s Europe, it\u2019s the Middle East.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The fledgling department will host more guest lecturers and special events with visiting scholars. Tom Freudenheim, who has a 40-year career in museums, will speak on \u201cDo Holocaust Museums Matter?\u201d on April 18 at 7 p.m. at Tulane Hillel, with support from the Center for Scholars. Freudenheim, a visiting fellow at Goodenough College in London, was assistant secretary for museums for the Smithsonian Institution.<\/p>\n<div style=\"padding-bottom:20px; padding-top:10px;\" class=\"hupso-share-buttons\"><!-- Hupso Share Buttons - https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/ --><a class=\"hupso_toolbar\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" data-src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/share-medium.png\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top: 5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" class=\"lazyload\" \/><noscript><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/share-medium.png\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top: 5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\"\/><\/noscript><\/a><script type=\"text\/javascript\">var hupso_services_t=new Array(\"Twitter\",\"Facebook\",\"Google Plus\",\"Pinterest\",\"Linkedin\",\"Tumblr\",\"Email\");var hupso_background_t=\"#EAF4FF\";var hupso_border_t=\"#66CCFF\";var hupso_toolbar_size_t=\"medium\";var hupso_image_folder_url = \"\";var hupso_url_t=\"\";var hupso_title_t=\"Mazel%20tov%21%20Tulane%20Jewish%20Studies%20program%20becomes%20a%20department\";<\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/js\/share_toolbar.js\"><\/script><!-- Hupso Share Buttons --><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[8790,8795,290,8788,289],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1363"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1363"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1363\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1365,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1363\/revisions\/1365"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1363"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1363"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1363"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}