Nyhet

Yiddish in the Land of Sunshine

Race, Labor, and Jewish Radicalism in Los Angeles

AvCaroline Luce

Inbunden, Engelska, 2026

Del i serien Goldstein-Goren Series in American Jewish Studies

644 kr

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Beskrivning

How a cohort of young Jewish radicals from the borderlands of Eastern Europe was critical in reshaping multiracial left-wing activism in southern CaliforniaYiddish in the Land of Sunshine offers a novel account of Eastern European Jewish immigration and Yiddish public culture in Southern California. It traces the journeys of a cohort of young Jewish radicals as they moved from the borderlands of the Russian empire to the borderlands of the American southwest, exploring their engagement with well-known labor and left-wing movements in Los Angeles.Much of the book is focused on Boyle Heights, a residential neighborhood east of the L.A. River once home to the highest concentration of Jews west of Chicago as well as to dozens of other diasporic communities, showing how the neighborhood's particular ethno-racial diversity shaped Yiddish public culture. Rich with new details drawn from previously untranslated Yiddish sources, it examines new relationships and tensions that emerged as the Jewish radicals worked to forge multiracial coalitions in the workplace and the community, including with their Mexican, Asian, and African-American neighbors. It frames the community as a site of convergence, where multiple marginalized populations cultivated their own modes of belonging in overlapping ways, as well as of divergence, where residents' experiences were differentiated by international and domestic political-economic developments. The book decenters traditional narratives of Jewish immigration and acculturation focused on cities of the northeast, moving Jewish workers in the west from the margins to the center of American Jewish history. It showcases the variety of organizing practices through which Jewish radicals recreated Yiddish public culture in LA, offering a new perspective on the relational dynamics of race and place-making in the American west. Yiddish in the Land of Sunshine recovers the contributions of Eastern European Jewish radicals and trade unionists, demonstrating the ways in which immigrant workers shaped the city of Los Angeles.

Produktinformation

Utgivningsdatum:2026-09-30
Mått:152 x 229 x undefined mm
Format:Inbunden
Språk:Engelska
Serie:Goldstein-Goren Series in American Jewish Studies
Antal sidor:312
Förlag:New York University Press
ISBN:9781479838356

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Mer om författaren

Caroline Luce is Project Director with the UCLA Institute for Research on Labor and Employment and formerly Chief Curator of Mapping Jewish Los Angeles, a project of the UCLA Leve Center for Jewish Studies.

Recensioner i media

"Based on stunningly original research, Caroline Luce chronicles the creation of a new Yiddish public culture in Boyle Heights by a generation of radical Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe. Luce traces this unique contribution to radical Los Angeles with subtlety and insight into the wider impact on the city and region." - George J. Sánchez, author of Boyle Heights "Beautifully written and exhaustively researched, Yiddish in the Land of Sunshine masterfully narrates intersecting tales of Yiddish culture, radical politics, labor organizing, and Jewish Los Angeles. Each of these slices is a world unto its own, but Caroline Luce has miraculously brought them together into this long-awaited, foundational book. Luce has produced a genuine historical gem." - David Myers, UCLA