Postzionism Debates

Laurence J. Silberstein is the Philip and Muriel Berman Professor of Jewish Studies at Lehigh University. He is the author of Martin Buber's Social and ReligiousPhilosophy (1989, and has edited several collections.

"...Silberstein's work offers a compendium of critical Israeli voices that have long been marginalized in both the U.S. and Israeli academies." -- Journal of PalestineStudies, Rebecca Luna Stein"...fascinating study... A major strength of the book is that it examines not only the plurality, but also the variety, of post-Zionist views, ranging from political history to art, Hebrew literature and feminism." -- Jewish News"The Postzionism Debates is one of the most important books on Israeli culture that will be published in the next few years. It documents for the first time in English major shifts in Israeli culture, as well as peripherally in Jewish political culture outside of Israel. A Foucauldian study of the discourse of postzionism in its varied forms, as a shift from the unqualified knee-jerk Zionism endemic only fifteen or so years ago, Silberstein's book prepares the way for a rethinking of Jewish politics at the end of the 20th century." -- Daniel Boyarin, author of Unheroic Conduct:The Rise of Heterosexuality and the Invention of theJewish Man"In the past decade a younger generation of Israeli scholars began opening a window on the power implications of the conventional Zionist discourse. In ThePostzionism Debates, Laurence J. Silberstein has accomplished a formidable task by providing a sensitive and insightful account of these academic debates and literary works, the ways in which they problematized conventional academic discourse, and the means they propose for integrating marginalized or excluded groups into a broader Israeli cultural identity. This is one of the best scholarly books on contemporary Israel." -- Gershon Shafir, author of Land, Labor, and the Origins ofthe Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, 1882-1914"...Silberstein's work offeres a compendium of critical Israeli voices that have long been marginalized in both the U.S. and Israeli academies." -- Journal of PalestineStudies, Rebecca Luna Stein"Silberstein's study will be appreciated by those seeking familiarity with Israel's recent intellectual fireworks, but (like most of the world) lack[ing] facility in Hebrew...Although this book is of obvious interest to thosee concerned with the history of Zionism and the State of Israel, it also contributes substantially to theoretical literature on ethnic identity, nationalism, intellectual history, and historiography in general. This book is to be commended for surveying watershed texts and figures, synthesizing crucial elements of the debates, and drawing reasonable conclusions." -- Religious Studies Review

• Mapping Zionism/Zionist Mapping Critique of Zionism: Critics From Within Critique of Zionism: Critics From Without Postzionism: The Academic Debates Palestinian Critics and Postzionist Discourse: Anton Shammas and Emile Habiby Postzionism, Postmodernism and Postcolonial Theory: A Radical Postzionist Critique