Jewish Ethnography and the Question of the Book

Boyarin, Jonathan

doi:10.2307/3317833

Cited by 8 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 19 publications

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“…2–3). Boyarin has also explored the reasons for Jewish marginality in anthropology as rooted in the Christian theological heritage of anthropological thought, in spite of the Jewish genealogy of so many of the discipline's founders, a topic to which I now turn (1991a).…”

Section: Anthropology Of Judaism: the Early Yearsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…American and European anthropology claim, among their founders, a notable number of intellectuals with some Jewish ‘roots’ (see Boyarin 1991a, 1992; Feldman 2004). Mauss, Malinowski, Durkheim, Boas, and Levi‐Strauss (intellectual giants of anthropology) all came from Jewish families.…”

Section: Anthropology Of Judaism: the Early Yearsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Despite Kugelmass’ assertion of secularism as a defining factor for Jews worldwide, a popular branch of anthropology of Jews and Judaism is composed of ‘synagogue ethnographies’ whose narrative and theoretical questions center on life in houses of worship and their attendees concomitant committees and ceremonies (Heilman 1976; Prell 1989; Shokeid 1995; Kugelmass 1996; Goluboff 2003). While these inquiries fit neatly into a classic anthropological model in some sense, in which the field and subjects of study are geographically bound in physical space (see Boyarin 1991a, p. 61), we must ask ourselves what is lost in such a focus. Goluboff's ethnography, for example, seems to be missing women, despite the gender of the anthropologist embarking on the study 3…”

Section: Categorizing Judaism As ‘Religion’?mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…If American anthropology (and anthropologists) long avoided studying Judaism and German anthropology justified the denigration, expulsion, and extermination of Jews, Israeli anthropology took a very different approach to the study of those people whom the country's political and intellectual leaders felt were part of -and, at the same time, apart from -its national collective (see Boyarin 1992). Israeli anthropology has produced voluminous ethnographic and folkloric material on Diaspora and Israeli Jewry.…”

Section: The Study Of Judaism Beyond Anglophone Anthropology: Germanymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Despite anthropology's typically presentist focus, a dominant segment of ethnographies of Jews and Judaism fall into a category I might call 'the anthropology of Jewish memory' in which the stories, customs, and lifeways of 'lost' or dwindling Jewish communities are catalogued and recreated. Bahloul (1996), Boyarin (1991b), Haskell (1994), Deshen and Zenner (1996), Kugelmass et al (1998), Solomon (1999) and, most recently, Behar (2007) have crafted beautiful ethnographies memorializing the life of Jews from Algeria, Cuba, and Poland, to name just a few. The fact that the distribution of Jews in the world has dramatically changed in the past hundred years (whether that should be through changing political scenarios, through expulsion, or through genocide) indeed demands a reckoning of what was lost in 'the old country'.…”

Section: From Synagogues To Theories: Recent Trends and Concernsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Anthropological Perspectives on Judaism: A Comparative Review

Brink-Danan

2008

Religion Compass

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How has the discipline of anthropology studied Judaism? This review provides a brief overview of the variety of approaches the discipline has taken to the subject of Jewish religion, society and culture. By situating these approaches in their historical, political and geographic locations, I offer a comparative look at the development of a sub‐discipline of the anthropology of religion. In addition to providing a comparative review of the sub‐discipline, I also highlight theoretical issues which remain central to the anthropological study of Judaism. These include: reflexivity in the writing of Jewish ethnography, the conceptual problem inherent in using ‘religion’ as the category through which many scholars define Judaism, the place of Judaism in anthropological theories of Diaspora and, lastly, the overemphasis on the notion of ‘memory’ in so many Jewish ethnographies.

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Section: Anthropology Of Judaism: the Early Yearsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Anthropology Of Judaism: the Early Yearsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Categorizing Judaism As ‘Religion’?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: The Study Of Judaism Beyond Anglophone Anthropology: Germanymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: From Synagogues To Theories: Recent Trends and Concernsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Anthropological Perspectives on Judaism: A Comparative Review

Brink-Danan

2008

Religion Compass

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Recent articles on contemporary jewry: A bibliography of works published in 1991

1992

Cont Jewry

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Humanity Lost: Alterity and the Politics of a Melancholic Anthropology

Vliet

2016

Anthropology and Humanism

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Anthropology's approach to the study of difference has been marked by dramatic shifts defined in political terms. Nonetheless, the accompanying historical trajectory of the discipline's theorization of politics hasn't substantially changed, and has focused less on what constitutes politics, its terms and concepts, and more on how to do politics, often with the assumption that this politics should be in solidarity with the victims of unequal relations of power. In so doing, anthropology has often reinforced humanist assumptions about the human, based on the liberal subject of European modernity. An analysis of Jewish-Israeli political identifications puts into question such humanist assumptions. I show how an analysis of two examples from my fieldwork in Israel calls into question concepts of community and identity, including that of the human, as the foundational ground on which anthropology's analyses of politics often rest. Drawing on Freud's concept of melancholia, and on a Levinasian concept of alterity, I suggest the notion of a melancholic anthropology as the study of difference which acknowledges the inhuman within the human, and the impossibility of a common humanity. This article thus builds on recent discussions about how anthropological investments in doing politics have consequences for understandings of responsibility, ethics, and the human itself. [Israel, Jew, alterity, politics, anthropology, human]. The place: Tel Aviv The time: November 2008 The event: A friend gets on a public bus in the city center.It is an accordion bus, it is morning, and the bus is crowded with passengers. As she pays her fare, the driver says to her, "Quickly, call 101 [like 911], there is a 'cousin' behind me with . . ." She glances back and sees a young man with a large package. The driver is clearly agitated and scared. In that moment, between the suspected bomber, the driver, the other passengers, and herself, she must make a decision. The question is not only if the passenger sitting behind the driver is a bomber or not, but whether or not he is (and it is impossible to know for sure then) should she call? It does not matter who she is in this moment or what her political views might be-neither work as an alibi. She is forced to make a decision between those with whom she shares the bus. Specifically and explicitly, it is the demand of the driver for her to call to which she must respond, and she and everyone else on the bus are implicated.

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Jewish Ethnography and the Question of the Book

Cited by 8 publications

References 19 publications

Anthropological Perspectives on Judaism: A Comparative Review

Anthropological Perspectives on Judaism: A Comparative Review

Recent articles on contemporary jewry: A bibliography of works published in 1991

Humanity Lost: Alterity and the Politics of a Melancholic Anthropology

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