Judith Noemí Freidenberg – författare

By the mid-twentieth century, Eastern European Jews had become one of Argentina's largest minorities. Some represented a wave of immigration begun two generations before; many settled in the province of Entre RÍos and founded an agricultural colony. Taking its title from the resulting hybrid of acculturation, The Invention of the Jewish Gaucho examines the lives of these settlers, who represented a merger between native cowboy identities and homeland memories. The arrival of these immigrants in what would be the village of Villa Clara coincided with the nation's new sense of liberated nationhood. In a meticulous rendition of Villa Clara's social history, Judith Freidenberg interweaves ethnographic and historical information to understand the saga of European immigrants drawn by Argentine open-door policies in the nineteenth century and its impact on the current transformation of immigration into multicultural discourses in the twenty-first century. Using Villa Clara as a case study, Freidenberg demonstrates the broad power of political processes in the construction of ethnic, class, and national identities. The Invention of the Jewish Gaucho draws on life histories, archives, material culture, and performances of heritage to enhance our understanding of a singular population-and to transform our approach to social memory itself.

Contemporary Conversations on Immigration in the United States: The View from Prince George’s County, Maryland contextualizes the narratives of international migrants arriving to Prince George’s County, Maryland from 1968 to 2009. The life course trajectories of seventy individuals and their networks, organized chronologically to include life in the country of origin, the journey, and settlement in the county, frame migration as social issue rather than social problem. Having internalized the American dream, immigrants toil to achieve upward social mobility while constructing an immigrant space that nurtures well-being. This book demonstrates that an immigrant’s experience is grounded in personal, social, economic, and political spheres of influence, and reflects the complexity of migrants’ stories to help demystify homogenous categorization.

What is daily life like for an elderly person whose income barely covers basic needs? How is life constrained if that person is living within the same marginal enclave to which she first migrated decades ago? How does the implementation of national policies and programs affect the daily life of those growing old in Spanish Harlem?In Growing Old in El Barrio, Judith Freidenberg addresses these questions by examining the life-course and daily experiences of the elderly residents of El Barrio. She interweaves the economy of immigrant neighborhoods with the personal experiences of Latinos aging in Harlem--such as Doña Emiliana, who lived in Spanish Harlem from her migration in 1948 to her death in 1995. Freidenberg further links policy issues to social issues critical to the daily lives of this population.Combining extensive fieldwork interviews with historical and demographic population data, Growing Old in El Barrio paints an ethnographic picture of aging in Spanish Harlem and illustrates the emergence of New York as a city divided by ethnicity and class.

What is daily life like for an elderly person whose income barely covers basic needs? How is life constrained if that person is living within the same marginal enclave to which she first migrated decades ago? How does the implementation of national policies and programs affect the daily life of those growing old in Spanish Harlem?In Growing Old in El Barrio, Judith Freidenberg addresses these questions by examining the life-course and daily experiences of the elderly residents of El Barrio. She interweaves the economy of immigrant neighborhoods with the personal experiences of Latinos aging in Harlem--such as Doña Emiliana, who lived in Spanish Harlem from her migration in 1948 to her death in 1995. Freidenberg further links policy issues to social issues critical to the daily lives of this population.Combining extensive fieldwork interviews with historical and demographic population data, Growing Old in El Barrio paints an ethnographic picture of aging in Spanish Harlem and illustrates the emergence of New York as a city divided by ethnicity and class.