The Emergence of Modern Hebrew

The course will analyze the unique position of language within the Zionist movement in the last hundred years, claiming that while being a supposedly secular, anti-religious movement, it has actually shifted from worshipping one God to worshiping the concept of one (single- sourced) language. Many Israelis believe that speakers must adhere to Hebrew grammatical rules, which can be paralleled to the belief that Jews should follow good deeds (mitzvoth); and that the language needs an authoritative institution (Academy of the Hebrew Language), which can be paralleled to the belief that Jews needed religious leaders. Finally, the course will introduce students to revivalistics, a new trans-disciplinary field of enquiry surrounding language reclamation, revitalization and reinvigoration. The course will analyze the Hebrew revival, which is so far the most successful known reclamation of a sleeping beauty language. It will study comparatively and systematically the universal constraints and global mechanisms on the one hand, and local peculiarities and idiosyncrasies on the other hand, apparent in revival attempts across various sociological backgrounds, all over the world.