Men of Valor and Anxiety

Mariusz Kalczewiak is Professor of Jewish Studies at the University of Lucerne, Switzerland. He is author of Polacos in Argentina: Polish Jews, Interwar Migration, and the Emergence of Transatlantic Jewish Culture.

"Men of Valor and Anxiety explores daily lives of Polish Jews through the lens of gender norms, roles, and practices in the aftermath of the Great War. In doing so, Mariusz Kałczewiak reveals a fascinating tapestry of Polish Jewish masculinities both embedded and negotiated in the context of general European and Polish norms. Richly researched and argued with intellectual depth and nuance, this book brings social and cultural history and gender studies into sharp focus. Kałczewiak encourages us to revisit geographic, ethnic, and religious assumptions about lived modern Jewish experience."—Natalia Aleksiun, author of Conscious History: Polish Jewish Historians before the Holocaust"Mariusz Kalczewiak's study is an innovative, long-overdue social analysis of gender in early twentieth-century Eastern European Jewish communities. It is a necessary antidote to portrayals of Polish-Jewish men as backwardly caught in the world halakhic orthodoxy. Based on archival materials, this book portrays the rich, diverse, and contested world of Jewish masculinities in Poland at the eve of the Holocaust. A book full of surprises."—Bjorn Krondorfer, author of The Holocaust and Masculinities: Critical Inquiries into the Presence and Absence of Men"In this masterful book, Kalczewiak brilliantly demonstrates how Polish Jewish men navigated between tradition and modernity to forge highly complex identities. From synagogues to boxing rings, from barracks to cafés, their masculinity took shape through daily struggle—before the annihilation of the Holocaust."—Ivan Jablonka, author of A History of Masculinity: From Patriarchy to Gender Justice"Kalczewiak offers an erudite treatment of Polish-Jewish masculinity. He demonstrates that this masculinity had both Jewish and non-Jewish influences and embraced physical culture without eschewing religious culture—a conclusion that is made all the more convincing because of the impressive breadth of his historical sources in Polish, Yiddish, German, Hebrew, and English."—Sarah Imhoff, author of Masculinity and the Making of American Judaism

• AcknowledgmentsA Note on Translation, Spelling, and TransliterationIntroduction1. Yeshiva Men: Elite Religious Knowledge and Intellectual Potency2. A Jew and His Penis: Circumcision and the Entanglements of Jewishness and Masculinity3. Boys Showing Off: Working Class, Strongmen, and Corporeality4. Tender Bonds of Fraternal Affection: Student Fraternities, Homosocial Sociability, and Jewish Respectability5. Pulling the Trigger: Military and Jewish Masculinities6. Leisure and Toil: Masculinity in Profession, Family, and Consumer Culture7. Homosexual Masculinities: Between Crime, Progressive Calls and Homophobic SubversionEpilogueNotesBibliographyIndex