Walter P. Zenner – författare

Jews Among Muslims is a collection of analytical and graphic descriptions of Jewish communities in North Africa and the Middle East in the 19th and early 20th century, written by anthropologists and historians.

The Jews from Aleppo, Syria, and their descendants compose a remarkable but little-known community that has spread throughout the world during the past two centuries, adapting to myriad social settings from Kobe to Buenos Aires. A Global Community is the first comprehensive scholarly interpretation of the historical experience of this unusual community in Syria and in the other places to which Aleppan Jewry have immigrated. Walter P. Zenner points to the social, economic, and cultural links that the various Syrian Jewish communities have made for the unique persistence of community throughout the diaspora. He places special emphasis in the communities in Israel and the United States but also studies the communities in England and Latin America. He utilizes rabbinical responsas, travelers' writings, secondary sources, interviews, and oral histories to provide a unique look into this Middle Eastern Jewish community for those interested in Ashkenazic as well as Sephardic Judaism.

Imagine a traditional Jewish community on the eve of the 19th century, and you will most likely picture the Eastern European shtetl. This prevailing European-oriented view obscures the fact that Jewry is a coat of many colors, with many diverse yet traditional manifestations, including the numerous Jewish communities of North Africa and Southwest Asia. While we know that in recent centuries such countries as Iraq, Tunisia, and Morocco contained a large proportion of the Jewish people, and that communities such as Fez, Aleppo, Tunis, and Baghdad were major centers of Jewish culture, our detailed knowledge of these Jewries remains limited. Jews Among Muslims gathers together some of the most insightful work describing the life and culture of Jews in the traditional Middle East in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Spanning the vast belt from Morocco to Afghanistan, which has been dominated by Islam since the seventh and eighth centuries, Jewish communities have long coexisted alongside their Muslim neighbors.Revealing Jewish life in such countries as Yemen, Morocco, Iraq, Iran, Tunisia, Syria, and Kurdistan, Jews Among Muslims tells us much about Jewish religious life and leadership, economic status, connections to the state, social relations with surrouding ethnic groups, internal community organization, and family and gender roles.

Imagine a traditional Jewish community on the eve of the 19th century, and you will most likely picture the Eastern European shtetl. This prevailing European-oriented view obscures the fact that Jewry is a coat of many colors, with many diverse yet traditional manifestations, including the numerous Jewish communities of North Africa and Southwest Asia. While we know that in recent centuries such countries as Iraq, Tunisia, and Morocco contained a large proportion of the Jewish people, and that communities such as Fez, Aleppo, Tunis, and Baghdad were major centers of Jewish culture, our detailed knowledge of these Jewries remains limited. Jews Among Muslims gathers together some of the most insightful work describing the life and culture of Jews in the traditional Middle East in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Spanning the vast belt from Morocco to Afghanistan, which has been dominated by Islam since the seventh and eighth centuries, Jewish communities have long coexisted alongside their Muslim neighbors.Revealing Jewish life in such countries as Yemen, Morocco, Iraq, Iran, Tunisia, Syria, and Kurdistan, Jews Among Muslims tells us much about Jewish religious life and leadership, economic status, connections to the state, social relations with surrouding ethnic groups, internal community organization, and family and gender roles.

Using a variety of anthropological approaches, the authors illustrate how the Jewish identity has persisted in the United States despite great subcultural variation and a wide range of adaptations. Within the various essays, attention is given to both mainstream Jews and to the Hasidim, Yemenites, Indian Sephardim, Soviet Emigres, and "Jews for Jesus." Institutions such as the family, the school, and the synagogue, are considered through techniques of participation/ observation and in archeological research. Persistence and Flexibility provides a means of viewing the Jewish community through the prism of key events, or rituals, and symbols.

Throughout the world, certain ethnic groups have made a living through trade and have found a place for themselves in their societies' middle strata. At times, these 'middlemen minorities' have aroused the envy of their neighbors and been subjected to a variety of persecutions. In this book, Walter P. Zenner examines explanations for this phenomenon and analyzes such groups as the Jews, the Chinese, the Scots, and the South Asians abroad.

Throughout the world, certain ethnic groups have made a living through trade and have found a place for themselves in their societies' middle strata. At times, these 'middlemen minorities' have aroused the envy of their neighbors and been subjected to a variety of persecutions. In this book, Walter P. Zenner examines explanations for this phenomenon and analyzes such groups as the Jews, the Chinese, the Scots, and the South Asians abroad.

Critical Essays on Israeli Social Issues and Scholarship is part of a series of review volumes sponsored by the Association for Israel Studies and published by SUNY Press that provides a framework for discussion of research and scholarship on all aspects of Israeli society. This book brings together review essays commenting on issues in Israeli culture, literature, politics, scholarship, and society. The authors identify a series of recently published books and provide critical commentary. In their examination, they go beyond the works themselves to comment on the state of scholarship and social conditions. Topics covered include Israeli writers' reactions to the Holocaust, critical analyses of the popular Israeli poet and novelist Amnon Shamosh, the linguistic relations between Yiddish and Modern Hebrew, ethnic relations, the emerging "mainstream" of Israeli culture, politics, Israeli historical revisionism, and social, psychological, and political aspects of the continuing Israel-Palestine conflict.