The Jew
Assumptions of Identity
Juliet Steyn(Author)
Continuum International Publishing Group Ltd.
Published on 1. November 1999
Book
Hardback
224 pages
978-0-304-70031-8 (ISBN)
Description
This text examines questions of Jewish identity by applying cultural theory to the social and political condition of the Jew at particular moments of the 19th and 20th centuries in Britain and America. Using case studies, this text looks at the representation and construction of the notion of Jews as alien. The case studies include legislation in Britain on alien immigration; art exhibitions staged in London's so-called Jewish East End; figures such as Mark Gertler, Clement Greenberg and R.B. Kitaj. The book argues that all these, in different ways, shed light on the limits to and processes of, Jewish emancipation, raising questions of assimilation and the dialectic of identity and difference. While the book acknowledges assumptions of Jewish identity, it also disassembles the old myths of identity.
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Target group
College/higher education
Professional and scholarly
Illustrations
23 b&w illustrations
Dimensions
Height: 234 mm
Width: 153 mm
Weight
480 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-304-70031-8 (9780304700318)
Copyright in bibliographic data is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or its licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Content
Which history? - questions of Jewish identity formation; neither/nor - the Pearlmans portrayed; the otherness of the other - Fagin as a sign; fried fish and the matzo meal - representation of the Jewish in evidence presented to the Royal Commission on Alien Immigration, 1902-03; cutting the suit to fit the cloth - assimilation in the 1906 Whitechapel Gallery exhibition "Jewish Art and Antiques"; yids, mods and foreigners - the processes of alienization; the mythical edges of assimilation - Mark Gertler; the subliminal Greenberg - assimilation and the "sublime" other; the defiant other - accusation and justification in the work of R.B. Kitaj; conclusion - reassumptions of identity.