<p>This dissertation examines the ideological developments and strategies of boundary formation which accompanied the sociological novelty of gentiles&rsquo; becoming Jews in the Second Temple period. I argue that the phenomenon of gentile conversion influenced ancient Jews to re&ndash;conceive their God as they devised new ways to articulate the now&ndash;permeable boundary between Jew and &lsquo;other,&rsquo; between insiders and outsiders. Shaye Cohen has shown that this boundary became porous as the word &lsquo;Jew&rsquo; took on religious and political meanings in addition to its ethnic connotations. A gentile could therefore become a Jew. I focus on an ancient Jewish author who thought that gentiles not only could become Jews, but that they should: that of <italic>Joseph and Aseneth</italic>. Significant modifications of biblical traditions about God, Israel, and &lsquo;the other&rsquo; were necessary in order to justify, on ideological grounds, the possibility of gentile access to Jewish identity and the Jewish community. </p><p>One such rewritten tradition is the relationship of both Jew and gentile to the &lsquo;living God,&rsquo; a common epithet in Israel&rsquo;s scriptures. Numerous Jewish authors from the Second Temple period, among whom I include the apostle Paul, deployed this biblical epithet in various ways in order to construct or contest boundaries between gentiles and the God of Israel. Whereas previous scholars have approached this divine title exclusively as a theological category, I read it also as a literary device with discursive power which helps these authors regulate gentile access to Israel&rsquo;s God and, in most cases, to Jewish identity. <italic>Joseph and Aseneth</italic> develops an innovative theology of Israel&rsquo;s &lsquo;living God&rsquo; which renders this narrative exceptionally optimistic about the possibilities of gentile conversion and incorporation into Israel. Aseneth&rsquo;s tale uses this epithet in conjunction with other instances of &lsquo;life&rsquo; language not only to express confidence in gentiles&rsquo; capability to convert, but also to construct a theological articulation of God in relationship to repentant gentiles which allows for and anticipates such conversion. A comparison of the narrative&rsquo;s &lsquo;living God" terminology to that of the book of <italic>Jubilees</italic> and the apostle Paul sets into relief the radical definition of Jewishness which <italic>Joseph and Aseneth</italic> constructs &mdash; a definition in which religious practice eclipses ancestry and under which boundaries between Jew and &lsquo;other&rsquo; are permeable.</p> / Dissertation

This thesis analyses the fabled public exchange of letters that occurred between political theorist Hannah Arendt and historian of Jewish religion Gershom Scholem in 1964 following the historic trial of Adolf Eichmann and Arendt's subsequent publication of her report of the event, Eichmann in Jerusalem. The thesis covers the historical issues that form the contextual background to the exchange. It involves the introduction of the two participants as defining Jewish intellectuals of the past century, the course of the trial itself and the political and ideological problems it entailed as well as the turbulent history of the reception of Arendt's book. It is down to these four factors that guaranteed the eminence of the exchange of letters analysed in the thesis. Oft-quoted as the exchange is, there has been no proper analysis of it to this date. To accomplish this task, the thesis adopts the theoretical-methodological framework of discourse analysis in general, and the version of rhetorically oriented discursive psychology, proposed mainly in the publications of Potter and Wetherell (1987) and Billig (1996), in particular. This approach allows the thesis to provide a fine-grained analysis of the various ways of textual construction. Firstly, the ways examined concern the significance, worth and value of the debate itself, as formulated by both of the participants. Secondly, they involve the construction of the attempt to establish definite versions of the content of the book. Thirdly, they cover the textual acts of accounting for that content, or the practice of misinterpretation of that content, respectively. What all these three aspects have in common is the positioning of the problems touched upon in a moral and political context, and ultimately approaching them in terms of the identities of the participants. In this sense, versions of the events and ways of accounting for it will not only aim at producing accurate descriptions of events but in the forms of an implied morality or politics an implied "action-plan" for the future as well. The construction of Arendt and Scholem is, hence, analysed in terms of its argumentative organisation in order to undermine the other's counterversion and to establish its own as the definite one. While, structurally, there are many similarities in the two letters, what distinguishes them is that they conceive of their objects (i.e. the text), subject positions, and political or moral values according to which they should be assessed in quite diametrically opposite ways. This thesis not only registers the various rhetorical ways the participants fashion their versions as definite ones, but also accounts for the differences in their contents.

The aim of this thesis is an interpretation of three prose works of a Prague Jewish German Author, Ludwig Winder (1889 - 1946). The introduction describes cultural and social milieu of the Jewish community in the beginning of the 20th century in Bohemia and Moravia.The Jewish identity was determined by three general factors: The assimilation of Jewish inhabitants arising from Enlightenments, anti-Semitism and birth of Zionism. The position of Czech Jewry was even more complicated due to the background of the society at the time, including Conflicts between Czechs and Germans in the multinational Monarchy and later on also in Czechoslovakia. Ludwig Winder deals with this subject in his book, 'Die Geschichte meines Vaters' (1946, published 2000). His novel, 'Die jüdische Orgel' (1922), talks about the specific discrepancies between the orthodox Jewish milieu of a small Moravian village and also a modern city at the turn of the 20th century. The novel points out a fight between the father and his son and the influence of rigid religious upbringings in relation of the protagonist to Judaism. In the short story 'Hugo. Tragödie eines Knaben' (1924), the work describes a lonely Jewish child, who no longer lives in his Jewish community, but in a secular society and outlines his upbringing and life....

A presente investigação tem como objetivo estabelecer uma reflexão sobre as relações entre a história e a memória por meio da análise da minissérie Holocausto (1978), produção televisiva veiculada pela rede norte-americana NBC. O enredo de Holocausto está centrado na trágica narrativa sobre uma família judia-alemã no período que vai de 1935 a 1945. Modelo típico de judeus assimilados na Berlim dos primeiros anos do nazismo, a família Weiss testemunha as trágicas mudanças em sua realidade com a ascensão do nazismo e o estabelecimento do antissemitismo como política de estado. A minissérie é apontada como um marco na emergência do interesse sobre o Holocausto na consciência pública norte-americana, apresentando um discurso narrativo a respeito do extermínio dos judeus europeus que está diretamente vinculado à valorização desta mesma memória pela comunidade judaica. Pretende-se apontar que o aspecto comemorativo dessa produção audiovisual e o impacto verificado em sua exibição fora dos Estados Unidos, sobretudo na República Federal Alemã, evidenciam a complexidade da relação entre a história e os discursos de memória. / This investigations purpose is to establish a reflection about the relations between history and memory through the analysis of the miniseries Holocaust (1978), production broadcasted by the North American television channel NBC. The plot of Holocaust focuses on the tragic narrative of a Jewish-German family in the period from 1935 to 1945. A typical example of assimilated Jews, the Weiss family witnesses the tragic changes in their lives with the rise of Nazism and the establishment of anti-Semitism as a state policy. The miniseries is considered a landmark in the emergence of interest about the Holocaust in the public conscience of American people, presenting a narrative concerning the extermination of European Jews that is directly linked to the appreciation of this memory by the Jewish community. We intend to point that the commemorative aspect of this audio-visual production and the impact shown by its exhibition outside the United States, mainly in the Federal Republic of Germany, evidence the complexity of the relation between history and the memory discourse.

This thesis in intellectual history examines the work of art historian Ernst Gombrich (1909-2001), one-time Director of London's Warburg Institute, on that institute's founder, Aby Warburg (1866-1929). The memory of War burg, as evoked in Gombrich's scholarship, is investigated as a focal point for contemporary concerns on the part of Gombrich and his peers, and as an influence on Warburg's reception in 20th century scholarship. The thesis gives a close account of Gombrich's particular intellectual achievements, in order better to understand his status as a figure of great popular and academic significance in mid-to-Iate 20th century art history and art theory. Gombrich was an emigre who left his native Austria for the United Kingdom in the 1930s and this thesis also considers the impact on intellectual history of the mid-20th century emigration from Central Europe, which was driven by ethnonationalist and above all Nazi persecution. Specifically, the thesis examines the significance for Gombrich's work of his Austrian background, in terms of both the German-language humanist culture of Bi/dung and Gombrich's sense, as a person of Jewish background, of Jewish identity. Using a methodology informed by the anthropology of emotions and the discipline of memory studies, Warburg is approached specifically as a lieu de memoire on Pierre Nora's model. The argument is that Gombrich invested his own concerns in his scholarly representations of the older art historian. The means by which this investment was made, and the negotiation of this investment amongst Gombrich's colleagues at the Warburg Institute, are traced through archival research. The impact of Gombrich's investment in Warburg on the older art historian's subsequent, posthumous reception in academia is examined, and the potential for alternative visions of Warburg marginalised by Gombrich's representation is also considered.

This project examines the depiction of Jewish and Christian identity in Acts of the Apostles by placing the writer’s ethnic claims within a broader material and epigraphic context. Scholarship on Jewish identity in Acts has often emphasized Jewish and Christian religious difference, an emphasis that has tended to mask the intersections of civic, ethnic, and religious identifications in antiquity. Such identity categories did not exist as distinct, stable entities. Rather, as discussions of identity in antiquity demonstrate, they were contested, negotiable, and ambiguous. Bringing Acts into conversation with recent scholarly insights regarding identity as represented in Roman era material and epigraphic remains shows that Acts presents Jews and Jewish identity in multiple, complex ways, rather than as a simple foil for “Christianity.” The dissertation argues that when the modern distinctions between ethnic, religious, and civic identities are suspended, the innovative ethnic rhetoric of the author of Acts comes into focus. The underlying connection between ethnic, religious, and civic identities provided him with space to present non-Jewish Christians as converted Jews and therefore to identify all Christians as Jews. On the basis of this identification, he marked Christians as a unified Jewish community that enhanced the stability of the city, contrasting them with other Jewish communities. By creating an internal distinction between Christians and other Jews, he privileged Christians as the members of an ideal, unified Jewish community and contrasted them with what he identified as factious, local Jewish associations.

This paper focuses on issues of Jewish identity, whiteness and victimhood within hegemonic Holocaust education. I argue that today, Jewish people of European descent enjoy white privilege and are among the most socio-economically advantaged groups in the West. Despite this privilege, the organized Jewish community makes claims about Jewish victimhood that are widely accepted within that community and within popular discourse in the West. I propose that these claims to victimhood are no longer based in a reality of oppression, but continue to be propagated because a victimized Jewish identity can produce certain effects that are beneficial to the organized Jewish community and the Israeli nation-state. I focus on two related Holocaust education projects – the March of the Living and the March of Remembrance and Hope – to show how Jewish victimhood is instrumentalized in ways that obscure Jewish privilege, deny Jewish racism and promote the interests of the Israeli nation-state.

This paper focuses on issues of Jewish identity, whiteness and victimhood within hegemonic Holocaust education. I argue that today, Jewish people of European descent enjoy white privilege and are among the most socio-economically advantaged groups in the West. Despite this privilege, the organized Jewish community makes claims about Jewish victimhood that are widely accepted within that community and within popular discourse in the West. I propose that these claims to victimhood are no longer based in a reality of oppression, but continue to be propagated because a victimized Jewish identity can produce certain effects that are beneficial to the organized Jewish community and the Israeli nation-state. I focus on two related Holocaust education projects – the March of the Living and the March of Remembrance and Hope – to show how Jewish victimhood is instrumentalized in ways that obscure Jewish privilege, deny Jewish racism and promote the interests of the Israeli nation-state.

Sovietinio laikotarpio Lietuvos istorijai skirtuose tyrimuose savo vietą atranda naujos arba ankščiau mažai tyrinėtos temos. Viena tokių temų – žydų tapatumas sovietų okupacijos Lietuvoje laikotarpiu – atskleidžiama ir šiame darbe. Keliamas tikslas – remiantis šaltiniais bei istoriografija probleminiu būdu išanalizuoti sovietinio laikotarpio Lietuvos žydų tapatumą bei jo santykį su repatriacijos į Izraelį procesu XX a. aštuntuoju ir devintuoju dešimtmečiais. Tokios chronologijos pasirinkimas sąlygotas būtent paskutiniaisiais SSRS gyvavimo dešimtmečiais padidėjusio iš Lietuvos bei kitų sovietinių respublikų išvykstančių žydų skaičiaus. Tokį pagausėjimą nulėmė sušvelninta Sovietų Sąjungos emigracijos politika, kuria siekta sumažinti įtampą tarp jos ir Vakarų valstybių, o ypač JAV. Suvokiant, kad Izraelio valstybė bei persikėlimas į ją nuolatiniam gyvenimui – aliyah – yra glaudžiai susiję su žydų tapatumo klausimu, darbe tam skiriamas pagrindinis dėmesys. Siekiama nustatyti, kaip Lietuvos žydų bendruomenė apibrėžė savo tautinį tapatumą paskutiniaisiais SSRS gyvavimo dešimtmečiais, kaip jis kito ir ar kito. Į žydų tautinį tapatumą mėginama žvelgti per keletą žymenų: kalbą, pačios žydų bendruomenės sudėties kaitą bei visuomenės, valdžios požiūrį į juos. Jeigu pirmieji du aspektai akcentuoja vidinius bendruomenės gyvenimo procesus, tai pastarajame išskiriamas individo ir jų grupių santykis su supančia aplinka bei jos poveikis individualaus, bendruomeninio tapatumo kaitai. Darbe... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / Nowadays new or less known historical topics easily find their place in researches of Soviet Lithuanian history. One of these new topics – Jewish identity during Soviet occupation period in Lithuania – has been revealed in this research. The main goal of this research is to analyze the identity of Lithuanian Jews and its‘ relations with the process of repatriation to Israel on 8th and 9th decades of the 20th Century. This chronology was chosen because of strong increase in numbers of Jews emigrating from Soviet Union during last two decades of Soviet state existence. This increase was conditioned by subdued USSR emigration policy, as an attempt to reduce tension between Soviet Union and the West, especially United States of America. State of Israel and resettlement to this place for constant living – aliyah – are closely linked with Jewish identity topic, on which we will be concentrating the most. The aim is to determine how Lithuanian Jewish community defined their ethnical identity on the last decades of USSR existence, how did it change, if it did at all. Ethnical identity is analyzed through language, inner changes of Jewish community, society and authority attitude towards them. While the first two mentioned aspects emphasize inner processes of community life, the other one highlights the relation of individuals and their groups with surrounding environment and its‘ effect to personal or communal identity transformation. This research seeks to unpack the motives which... [to full text]

Holocaust monuments are often catalysts in the ‘nationalization’ of the Holocaust – the process by which Holocaust memory is shaped by its national milieu. Between 2009 and 2011, the Parliament of Canada debated a bill which set out the guidelines for the establishment of a National Holocaust Monument (NHM), which ultimately became a federal Act of Parliament in early 2011. I examine the discourse generated by this bill to understand how the memory of the Holocaust is being integrated into the Canadian identity, and argue that the debate surrounding the NHM has been instrumental in the ‘Canadianisation’ of the Holocaust. I summarise my findings by placing them into dialogue with other national memories of the Holocaust, and identify three distinct features of Holocaust memory in Canada: a centrifugal trajectory originating in the Jewish community, a particular-universal tension rooted in multiculturalism, and a multifaceted memory comprising several conflicting – though not competing – narratives. Monuments de l’Holocauste sont souvent des catalyseurs de la «nationalisation» de l'Holocauste – le processus par lequel mémoire de l'Holocauste est formé par son milieu national. Entre 2009 et 2011, le Parlement du Canada a débattre un projet de loi qui crée les lignes directrices pour la mise en place d'un Monument national de l'Holocauste (MNH), qui est finalement devenu une loi fédérale du Parlement au début de 2011. J'examine le discours généré par ce projet de loi pour comprendre comment la mémoire de l'Holocauste est intégrée dans l'identité canadienne, et soutien que le débat entourant le MNH a joué un rôle déterminant dans la «canadianisation» de l'Holocauste. Je résume mes conclusions en les plaçant dans le dialogue avec d'autres mémoires nationales de l'Holocauste, et d'identifier trois caractéristiques distinctes de mémoire de l'Holocauste au Canada: une trajectoire centrifuge d’origine dans la communauté juive, une tension particulière-universelle enracinée dans le multiculturalisme, et une mémoire à multiples facettes comprenant plusieurs récits contradictories – mais pas compétitifs.