AI Summary
5 min readIn 2023, the Posen Library of Jewish Civilization and Culture launched a fellowship program that paid eight scholars to create open-access teaching modules built from its vast anthology of primary sources. The goal was straightforward: take thousands of curated texts, images, and—increasingly—audio and video clips, and turn them into ready-to-use classroom materials that any instructor could adopt, even without deep expertise in the subject. As senior pedagogy editor Sasha Goldstein-Sabah put it, the library wanted to “assist instructors in their teaching to be able to teach using primary sources,” because that is where pedagogy is heading.
From print anthology to digital pedagogy
The Posen Library began in the late 1990s as a ten-volume print anthology covering Jewish civilization from the Torah to the present. But as Goldstein-Sabah explained, “the way people access information is changing.” Simply putting thousands of excerpts online did not make them teachable. The fellowship was designed to bridge that gap: scholars would select five to eight primary sources per class session, write an introductory overview of their theme, and supply discussion questions and classroom activities. Each module contains four classes. The first cohort produced modules on Jewish culture around the world, emancipation and citizenship, Jews of the Middle East and North Africa, Sephardic jour
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What you'll learn
- 1 (01:30) **Welcome & Episode Overview** - Host Janine Gutfin introduces the Posen Library’s Jewish Studies Curriculum Initiative and guests Sarah Bunin Benor and Sasha Goldstein Saba.
- 2 (03:14) **Sasha’s Professional Trajectory & the Posen Library’s Digital Shift** - Sasha explains how her background in publishing and digital platforms led to her role in transitioning the Posen Library from print to online.
- 3 (05:16) **Sarah’s Path to the Fellowship** - Sarah describes her work in Jewish languages, public engagement, and pedagogy, and how she joined the initiative after seeing a Facebook post.
- 4 (07:27) **The Fellowship’s Eight Themes** - Sasha outlines the eight thematic modules from the first cohort, explaining how they were chosen to cover diversity and classroom usability.
- 5 (08:44) **How the Fellowship Works** - Sasha details the process of creating modules: scholars curate primary sources, write introductions, and design discussion questions.
- 6 (12:42) **Sarah’s Module: Jewish Culture Around the World** - Sarah explains her module’s structure (four classes: food, music, language, names) and her unique approach to selecting sources.
- 7 (14:58) **Deep Dive: Language Class & Orthodox Jewish English** - Sarah uses a promotional video for Yeshiva Sha’arei Torah to illustrate Orthodox Jewish English, a dialect not mutually intelligible with standard American English.
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Show Notes
Bring the breadth of Jewish history and civilization into your classroom with ready-to-use teaching modules curated by experts.
The Posen Library is an educational resource grounded in primary sources and made broadly accessible through the creation and curation of engaging contextual material. Its goal is to highlight the varieties of Jewish culture and civilization across time and space for English-speaking audiences and to be the first stop for those, in university settings and beyond, who are interested in teaching about the significant breadth of Jewish experiences.
Originally conceived as a 10-volume print anthology, the Posen Library’s free digital platform makes the published content globally accessible. Content from print volumes is added to the site as the volumes are published by Yale University Press. Nine out of the ten volumes have been published to date.
The Jewish Studies Curriculum Initiative comprises teaching modules centered around core teaching topics. Each module consists of an overview and curricular material that can be used in four class meetings, focusing on 20–25 primary sources (texts, images, and other media) with interpretive content and supplementary resources for both students and instructors. Posen Library curricula offer flexibility and are designed to be easily integrated into coursework in a variety of ways—perfect for launching a new class or refreshing a syllabus to include new perspectives and voices.
Sarah Bunin Benor is Professor of Contemporary Jewish Studies and Linguistics at Hebrew Union College, Los Angeles.
Sasha Goldstein-Sabbah is assistant professor of Middle Eastern studies at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands and the Senior Scholar for Pedagogy at the Posen Library.
Geraldine Gudefin is a Visiting Scholar at the Centre for Asian Legal Studies at the National University of Singapore.
Mentioned in this episode:
- Posen Library Teaching modules: here
- Jewish Studies Curriculum Initiative Fellowship: here
- Sarah Bunin Benor’s “Jewish Culture around the world” Module: here
- Lila Corwin Berman’s “Who Is American? Citizenship, Law, and Jewish History in the United States” Module: here
- Geraldine Gudefin’s “Jewish Emancipation, Citizenship, and Belonging” Module: here
- Geoffrey Levin’s “Jews of the Middle East and North Africa: Empire, Colonialism, and Identity” Module:
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