Modern Jewish Thought (Fall 2005)

TEXT PREPARATION 1 - Assignment due in class on Wednesday, September 21

Please read Jean-Paul Sartre, Anti-Semite and Jew (1946), pp. 7-39, 53-80.

Answer the following questions concerning Sartre's Anti-Semite and Jew in 1-2 paragraphs each. Since this is your first reading of this text, and since we have not yet discussed it in class, you are not being asked to supply definitive answers but preliminary, thoughtful responses based on close attention to the text. Your answers may also include 1-2 important questions raised by your reading for further discussion.

(pp. 7-39) What does Sartre mean when he says that antisemitism is not an "opinion"? How does he define antisemitism?

Consider the situation described on pp. 76-77 (Sartre is here talking about Nazi-occupied France during World War II). What is Sartre getting at with this description? In what sense did "the Nazi ordinances only [carry] to its extreme a situation to which we had formerly accommodated ourselves very well" (77)?

In preparation for writing this assignment, please consult

Gordon Harvey, Writing with Sources, pp. 1-5; 20 ("Abbreviated Citation for Frequently Used Sources"), and 37-38 ("In-Text Style for the Humanities")

Please type and double-space your answer, use 1-inch margins, and number and staple the pages you hand in.

Please keep a copy of your assignment to refer to in our class discussion of Sartre.