| Klezmer America: Jewishness, Ethnicity, Modernity Contributor(s): Freedman, Jonathan (Author) |
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ISBN: 0231142781 ISBN-13: 9780231142786 Publisher: Columbia University Press OUR PRICE: $103.95 Product Type: Hardcover - Other Formats Published: January 2008 Annotation: By comparing and contrasting the performances that go into the making of Jewishness in America with those that build different forms of cultural identity-Latino, Asian, white, black, and homosexual-Jonathan Freedman believes we can learn much about the attitudes toward Jews in the United States and the construction of racial, ethnic, and sexual categories. Freedman's central focus is klezmer-a Jewish musical tradition that has its roots in biblical times but is continually reshaped through contact with different cultures. As klezmer has entered the United States, it has continued to evolve, reflecting Jews' changing relationship to Judaism and Jewishness and their frequent interaction with outside groups and influences. A similar dynamic characterizes the experience of a number of ethnic groups in America, affecting ideas of maleness and femaleness, queerness and normativity, and the very terms defining these categories. From the 1880s to today, Jewish Americans have shaped notions of "the immigrant," "the ethnic," "the model minority," "the pervert," and even "the Antichrist," and have transformed or have been transformed by the social, racial, and ethnic groups around them. Freedman's chapters address the crossover between jazz and klezmer, the relationship between Tony Kushner's "Angels in America" and contemporary fiction about crypto-Jews in Cuba and the Mexican-American borderland, the connection between the Christian apocalyptic Left Behind thrillers and narratives focusing on "new immigrants," and the emigrant literature of Bharathi Mukherjee, Lan Samantha Chang, and Gary Shteyngart. Using klezmer as the primary metaphor, Freedman emphasizes the value of cultural hybridityin these contexts and offers a better understanding of the increasing ethnoracial complexities facing the United States. |
| Additional Information |
| BISAC Categories: - Social Science | Jewish Studies - Music | Ethnic - History | United States - General |
| Dewey: 973.049 |
| LCCN: 2007026326 |
| Physical Information: 1.22" H x 6.46" W x 9.09" (1.48 lbs) 408 pages |
| Themes: - Ethnic Orientation - Jewish |
| Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
| Publisher Description: Klezmer is a continually evolving musical tradition that grows out of Eastern European Jewish culture, and its changes reflect Jews' interaction with other groups as well as their shifting relations to their own history. But what happens when, in the klezmer spirit, the performances that go into the making of Jewishness come into contact with those that build different forms of cultural identity? Jonathan Freedman argues that terms central to the Jewish experience in America, notions like "the immigrant," the "ethnic," and even the "model minority," have worked and continue to intertwine the Jewish-American with the experiences, histories, and imaginative productions of Latinos, Asians, African Americans, and gays and lesbians, among others. He traces these relationships in a number of arenas: the crossover between jazz and klezmer and its consequences in Philip Roth's The Human Stain; the relationship between Jewishness and queer identity in Tony Kushner's Angels in America; fictions concerning crypto-Jews in Cuba and the Mexican-American borderland; the connection between Jews and Christian apocalyptic narratives; stories of "new immigrants" by Bharathi Mukherjee, Gish Jen, Lan Samantha Chang, and Gary Shteyngart; and the revisionary relation of these authors to the classic Jewish American immigrant narratives of Henry Roth, Bernard Malamud, and Saul Bellow. By interrogating the fraught and multidimensional uses of Jews, Judaism, and Jewishness, Freedman deepens our understanding of ethnoracial complexities. |