Jewish Peoplehood: An American Innovation

Noam Pianko

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Jewish Peoplehood

An American Innovation

Noam Pianko

Language: English

Published/Copyright: 2015

Published by

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About this book

Winner of the 2017 Saul Viener Book Prize from the American Jewish Historical Society

Although fewer American Jews today describe themselves as religious, they overwhelmingly report a strong sense of belonging to the Jewish people. Indeed, Jewish peoplehood has eclipsed religion—as well as ethnicity and nationality—as the essence of what binds Jews around the globe to one another. In Jewish Peoplehood, Noam Pianko highlights the current significance and future relevance of “peoplehood” by tracing the rise, transformation, and return of this novel term.

The book tells the surprising story of peoplehood. Though it evokes a sense of timelessness, the term actually emerged in the United States in the 1930s, where it was introduced by American Jewish leaders, most notably Rabbi Stephen Wise and Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan, with close ties to the Zionist movement. It engendered a sense of unity that transcended religious differences, cultural practices, geographic distance, economic disparity, and political divides, fostering solidarity with other Jews facing common existential threats, including the Holocaust, and establishing a closer connection to the Jewish homeland. But today, Pianko points out, as globalization erodes the dominance of nationalism in shaping collective identity, Jewish peoplehood risks becoming an outdated paradigm. He explains why popular models of peoplehood fail to address emerging conceptions of ethnicity, nationalism, and race, and he concludes with a much-needed roadmap for a radical reconfiguration of Jewish collectivity in an increasingly global era.

Innovative and provocative, Jewish Peoplehood provides fascinating insight into a term that assumes an increasingly important position at the heart of American Jewish and Israeli life.

For additional information go to:

http://www.noampianko.net

Author / Editor information

NOAM PIANKO is the Samuel N. Stroum Professor of Jewish Studies at the University of Washington and directs the Stroum Jewish Studies Center there. He is the author of Zionism and the Roads Not Taken: Rawidowicz, Kaplan, Kohn.

Reviews

"This work significantly advances the understanding and assessment of a central figure of American Judaism."

— Religious Studies Review

"Erudite and engaging, this book should ruffle some Jewish communal feathers ... Recommended. All levels/libraries."

— CHOICE

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	v
Foreword Deborah Dash Moore, MacDonald Moore and Andrew Bush Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Acknowledgments Publicly Available Download PDF	ix
Introduction: A Deceptively Simple Key Word Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed	1
1. Terms of Debate: Jewish Nationhood and American Peoplehood
What Is a Nation? Peoplehood’s European Precursors Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed	17
The Emergence of Peoplehood Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed	27
1948, Israel, and a Crisis of Terminology Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed	48
From Critique to Code Word Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed	51
Into the American Mainstream Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed	56
2. State of the Question: Enduring Entity or Constructed Community
Unity, Solidarity, Statehood Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed	71
Nationalism, Globalization, and the Limits of Peoplehood Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed	82
Race, Ethnicity, and Peoplehood Studies Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed	92
Jewish Studies and Jewish Peoplehood Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed	106
3. In a New Key: Can Peoplehood Speak to a Global Era?
Jewish: From Periphery to Center, from Describing to Defining Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed	119
Neighborhood: From National to Local, from Core to Cohort Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed	125
Project: From Being to Doing, from Essence to Action Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed	129
Jewishhood Project(s) Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed	133
Notes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed	141
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed	163
About the Author Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed	173

Publishing information

Pages and Images/Illustrations in book

eBook published on:

September 2, 2019

eBook ISBN:

9780813563664

Pages and Images/Illustrations in book

https://doi.org/10.36019/9780813563664

eBook ISBN: 9780813563664

Audience(s) for this book

For universities and colleges of further and higher education

Jewish Peoplehood

Overview

About this book

Author / Editor information

Reviews

Topics

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