REL 335
Humanitarianism and Jewish History Spring 2025
Division II Writing Skills
Cross-listed JWST 434 / HIST 434

In the twentieth century, Jewish history and humanitarian history became deeply intertwined. As the victims of persecution and expulsion, mass violence and genocide, Jews repeatedly figured as the recipients of aid and humanitarian intervention. At the same time, Jewish political figures, legal thinkers, intellectuals and scholars, social activists, and aid workers played central roles in the establishment of humanitarian organizations and in debates about the moral, political, and legal frameworks that have shaped approaches to humanitarianism across the decades since World War I. This research seminar is designed to open up big questions about the history of humanitarianism and to carve out space for students to conduct research on a particular place, time, and aspect of that larger history in conversation with other students working on related topics. In the first half of the semester, in discussions of common readings, we will examine various works of scholarship that connect to the history of humanitarianism from the nineteenth century to the present. Beginning in the first half of the semester and with greater intensity in the second half of the semester, you will conduct independent archival research on some aspect of the history of humanitarianism using the digitized archives of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, culminating in a twenty-plus-page paper. In the final weeks of the semester, the seminar will continue to meet weekly as a research colloquium, to provide a forum for you to present your research and drafts in progress and to give feedback on fellow students’ work. In this seminar, we are not merely studying history; you are actually doing history. Over the semester, you will learn how to pose historical questions; to engage critically with readings beyond summarizing them; to synthesize an enormous amount of source material; and to learn how to write more clearly. The goal is for each student to produce a polished research paper based on engagement with archival sources and relevant secondary literature that will serve as a capstone to your coursework at Williams or as a potential jumping-off point for future research projects, including a senior thesis in History or Jewish Studies.