Special Programs

Understanding the Middle East Region: Political Science in Tel Aviv

The NYU Department of Politics emphasizes the science in Political Science and teaches modern methods for analyzing and explaining political events. Students in the "Understanding the Middle East Region" cluster will enroll in two Politics Department courses, and one language course in either Hebrew or Arabic at the appropriate skill level. A fourth class in Qualitative Research Methods which will require fieldwork is encouraged. Students will also have the opportunity at intern at one of numerous organizations to help bring the material learned in class to everyday life.

Students will gain a vivid and objective understanding of the Middle East region and the interrelationships among cultures, political movements, environments, and religious traditions. Students will have an incomparable vantage point from which to survey and explore the many forces that shape all regions of the world today.

Reporting World Issues: Journalism in Tel Aviv

Ranked as one of the leading undergraduate departments of journalism in the United States, NYU Journalism offers an exciting opportunity for student reporters to develop their writing skills and their understanding of the region while studying in the Middle East. Journalism students follow a “Reporting World Issues” cluster by enrolling in the course Reporting Armed Conflict while simultaneously following a track in politics (Diplomacy and Negotiation, Electoral Politics), sociology (Religion, Politics and the State; Politics and the Production of Everydayness), or the arts (Israeli Cinema). Students choose to enroll in a language course in either Hebrew or Arabic at the appropriate skill level. Students will have the opportunity to intern in one of numerous organizations in Tel Aviv.

Tel Aviv is one of the world’s most important and closely-watched global cities, ranking third after Tokyo and Paris as the city with the most news agencies. From their base in Israel, journalists cover the entire Middle East.

Featured Courses

Topics in Mideast Politics: The Iranian Revolution

More than 30 years have passed since 1979, the year when a self-styled Islamic Revolution unfolded in Iran. Historian Eric J. Hobsbawm branded this revolution as "one of the central social revolutions of the twentieth century"; and social scientist Richard Cottam described it as perhaps "the most popular revolution in the history of mankind." Whatever the case may be, we are now permitted to use the benefit of hindsight to revisit the 1979 revolution. In the first part of the course we will review the manifold causes of the 1979 revolution in a historical perspective, tracing the social, political, economic and cultural bases of the rise of the revolutionary movement and political Islam (or Islamism) in Iran. We will then move on to situate the revolution in a global context. This will enable us to examine Iranian history since 1979 in comparative perspective as well as to integrate the revolution into the "entangled histories" of modernity of which it is part. At the same time we will examine the cultural dimensions of the post-1979 state in Iran. We will consider cultural production in the Islamic Republic of Iran as a site of state domination and oppositional resistance. We will suggest that the Islamic Republic is a "scopic regime," developing a symbolic Islamism as a tool of propaganda and hegemony. At the same time, literature, cinema, and the visual arts have been sites of resistance.

Intro to Documentary Film Making

Introduction to Documentary Filmmaking combines storytelling, research, and cutting-edge filmmaking technology. Students will be encouraged to ask engaging questions and delve into investigations of the region's social, cultural and political realities, and in the process, make a series of short documentary videos. Through the viewing of recent documentary films, to meeting with filmmakers, students will be introduced to a variety of documentary methodologies.

Students will work in Production Crews. They will choose their own projects for their documentary short films. Each crew will research, produce, shoot and edit its project.