Spring 2027

Yiddish Literature and Culture in America

Explores American Yiddish poetry, fiction, theater, and cinema by European Jews in the US, covering themes like language politics, minoritized status, and Jewish identity.

offering recorded3 credits
Recorded instructors · Spring 2027 Sunny Yudkoff3.9/5

Summary

1 / 6

Past student reviews · Phil Hollander

A student reported nightly homework assignments and long readings, describing the material as challenging and sometimes confusing.

What you’ll be able to do

  • Prepare students for life and careers in an increasingly multicultural and multilingual US environment

  • Develop critical thinking skills through sustained discussion with one’s peers and foster a constructive climate in which to engage with questions concerning cultural, racial, religious, and linguistic difference

  • Acquire a critical vocabulary to speak about historical and present-day issues concerning migration, ethnic identity, and religious difference

  • Engage in reflective writing practices, respond critically to feedback, and assess one’s own communicative strengths

  • Identify the major themes of American Yiddish literature and culture from the early-twentieth century until today. These themes include: the politics of language use; the negotiation of a minoritized status; regional vs. national American Jewish identity; inter-generational conflict; Jews and the question of race

Source: UW Guide 1 UW Guide 2 UW Guide 3

Grade history

↗
average GPA
letter grades
A
AB
B
BC
C
D
F

All recorded terms · compare terms & instructors

Prerequisites

Course map

None

  • None
GERMAN/JEWISH/LITTRANS 279

This is a best-effort interpretation; check the catalog requirements above.

Prerequisite text tree
  • None

Professors

Spring 2027
Adjusted rating
RMP difficulty
captured reviews
About this rating

Raw average: 4.07/5 from 30 quality ratings. The adjusted rating blends this with the UW review average (3.66/5), weighted as 20 additional ratings. Smaller samples stay closer to that average. Each captured review is counted once in the prior; this does not correct who chooses to leave a review.

RMP profile ↗ · All captured review dates; profile matched by name.

Recent recorded grades — Spring 2023: 3.52 GPA, 71.4% A/AB (n=105 letter grades); Spring 2025: 3.68 GPA, 87.0% A/AB (n=46 letter grades); Spring 2026: 3.43 GPA, 70.6% A/AB (n=34 letter grades).

Historical instructors & teaching patterns

PHILIP HOLLANDER is recorded teaching in Spring 2015, Spring 2016, Spring 2017, Spring 2018. Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

SUNNY YUDKOFF is recorded teaching in Spring 2020, Spring 2023, Spring 2025, Spring 2026. Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Calendar & sections

Spring 2027

Schedule loads here as you scroll.

SectionModeEnrolled / capacityWaitlist
LEC 001Classroom Instruction0 / 470
LEC 001Classroom Instruction0 / 470
LEC 001Classroom Instruction0 / 470

Times are Central. Select a meeting for details; export includes recorded dates for the selected sections. Enrollment reflects scan time.

Meeting source records
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Student experience

the class

Past student reviews · Phil Hollander

A past student found the course engaging, noting that the instructor made a potentially dry subject very interesting.

Recent recorded grades — Spring 2023: 3.52 GPA, 71.4% A/AB (n=105 letter grades); Spring 2025: 3.68 GPA, 87.0% A/AB (n=46 letter grades); Spring 2026: 3.43 GPA, 70.6% A/AB (n=34 letter grades).

difficulty & workload

Past student reviews · Phil Hollander

A student reported nightly homework assignments and long readings, describing the material as challenging and sometimes confusing.

Past student reviews · Phil Hollander

One student appreciated the moderate reading load but emphasized that assignments required consistent effort and could not be ignored.

Topics

  • American Yiddish poetry, fiction, theater, and cinema
  • Language politics, minoritized status, regional vs. national identity, inter-generational conflict, and race

Skills

  • Critical thinking and discussion on cultural, racial, religious, and linguistic difference
  • Critical vocabulary for discussing migration, ethnic identity, and religious difference
  • Reflective writing and self-assessment of communicative strengths

Grades

Latest available · Spring 2026— not enough history to project Spring 2027.

average GPA
A / AB grades
letter grades
Instructor

Grade distribution · % of letter grades

A
AB
B
BC
C
D
F

Grades over time

Through Spring 2026

More grade details Grade mix, volume & source data

Where this course fits relative to

Latest available grades · Spring 2026 · all course levels

GPA

Higher than % of other courses in this group.

Course GPAs · red marks this course’s range

letter grades

More recorded grades than % of other courses in this group.

Typical course in this group: letter grades.

About this comparison

1280 courses over the same term, each with at least 30 recorded letter grades. Cross-listed courses count once. GPA is not a measure of difficulty or teaching quality. The typical course is the median by recorded grade count; tied values are not counted as lower. Grade counts describe course scale, not unique students or typical section size.

Descriptions compare GPA with this group’s average: at least 0.20 higher or lower; otherwise close to average. Section size uses median recorded enrollment: small up to 30, mid-sized 31–99, large 100+. Lectures and discussion/lab sections are described separately.

Sources & history

UW–Madison

Catalog & offerings

Descriptions, prerequisites, and recorded course offerings.

Catalog observation history

Observations at scan time; dates do not imply when a catalog change took effect.

Download part 1
Selected offering source records
GERMAN/JEWISH/LITTRANS 279 · Spring 2027

Yiddish Literature and Culture in America

Recorded 2026-10-14
GERMAN/JEWISH/LITTRANS 279 · Spring 2027

Yiddish Literature and Culture in America

Recorded 2026-10-14
GERMAN/JEWISH/LITTRANS 279 · Spring 2027

Yiddish Literature and Culture in America

Recorded 2026-10-14
Raw records 
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    "title": "Yiddish Literature and Culture in America",
    "credits_min": 3,
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    "course_id": "GERMAN/JEWISH/LITTRANS 279",
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Rate My Professors

Student reviews

Original comments behind the course and instructor summaries.

Read original reviews
Download part 1
Madgrades

Grade history

Recorded grade distributions by term, section, and instructor.

Explore recorded grades
Dataset & model

Recorded 2026-10-14

View the dataset on Hugging Face
Model outputs & technical records
Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B
LLM outputs across runs
Download part 1
Full model traces

Recorded model configuration, reasoning, and tool conversations.

Download part 1
Model & dataset provenance 
{
  "model": "Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B",
  "model_revision": "1d4bf0f2ff6012fd82039f2fa52739d0dd7c60c0",
  "task_version": "17",
  "output_id": "32fd4dbcd25dc2f1cf5925805d72e22525e1b2c0da90fab2098d8473a7d9c2b7",
  "requirements_status": "valid",
  "dataset_revision": "fc1811fa52e581ea57a35c0cf3343f8740a8ffbf",
  "observed_at": "2026-10-14 17:50:09.728220+00:00"
}