| Description |
1 online resource illustrations |
| Contents |
Intro -- Cover Page -- Title page -- Copyright page -- Dedication -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction: Popularizing Judaism -- Postwar Stories in 1940s America -- Changing Attitudes during the Uneasy 1940s -- Becoming an American Religion -- The World around the Books -- Religion-and the Need to Have One -- Religion's Midcentury Moment -- The Midcentury Jewish Middlebrow Moment -- Two Genres at Work -- The Power of Midcentury Jewish Middlebrow Culture -- 1 From Race to Religion and the Challenge of Antisemitism -- When Antisemitism Was Part of the Novel -- Not Quite Religion |
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Overcoming Race -- Striving to Move beyond Negativity -- A Fake Science to Fuel the Fire of Bigotry -- A Discourse of Illness and Disability -- Thinking with Wolfson in the 1950s -- Moving toward Pride -- 2 The Roots of 1940s Anti-Antisemitism Fiction -- Writing against the Tide of Antisemitism -- A Choice for Gentiles -- 3 When Women Made Anti-Antisemitism Fiction Popular -- Hobson's Journey to Anti-Antisemitism -- Reclaiming Moral Indignation -- The Great Jewish Book Corresponding to Strange Fruit -- From Antisemitism to Anti-Racism -- 4 The Limits of Anti-Antisemitism Literature |
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Achieving Jewish Identity within a White Racial Order -- Learning about Race while Un-learning Jewishness as Race -- "Jew" and the "Average American" -- "Propaganda of the most artful kind" -- Acceptance within Reason -- The Gentleman's Agreement of American Religion -- Connecting Jews and Others -- 5 How Basic Is Basic Judaism? -- Writing about Jewish Religion -- "This is the kind of book that should sell forever." -- Transitioning from Problem to Religion -- Coming to Judaism from the Outside -- The Irony of the Genre -- A Judaism for Main Street America |
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6 Philip Bernstein and the 1950s Religious Revival -- A New Popularity for Judaism -- A Mirror to the Middle Class -- Religion in Life -- 7 Life's "Old-Fashioned Jews" -- An Unexpected Win -- Like "an essay on Protestantism featuring the Amish" -- 8 "Why I Choose to Be a Jew" -- Forging Jewish Paths -- Judaism in an American Idiom -- Finding Teachers and Friends -- Writing about a Freely Chosen Religious Life -- Creating Jewish Literacy -- Judaism as Choice -- Conclusion: After the Middlebrow Moment -- Notes -- Introduction -- Chapter 1 -- Chapter 2 -- Chapter 3 -- Chapter 4 -- Chapter 5 |
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Chapter 6 -- Chapter 7 -- Chapter 8 -- Conclusion -- References -- Archives -- Secondary Sources -- Index |
| Summary |
Drawing on several archives, magazine articles, and nearly-forgotten bestsellers, Rachel Gordan examines how Jewish middlebrow literature helped to shape post-Holocaust American Jewish identity. Positive depictions of Jews in popular literature had a normalizing effect, while at the same time forging the notion of Judaism as an American religion distinct from Christianity but part of America's alleged 'Judeo-Christian' heritage |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references and index |
| Notes |
Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (EBSCOhost, viewed on April 11, 2024) |
| Subject |
Jews -- United States -- History -- 1945-
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Antisemitism -- United States -- History -- 20th century
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Antisemitism in literature.
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Jews in literature.
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American literature -- Jewish authors -- History and criticism
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Society & culture: general
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Society
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| Form |
Electronic book
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| ISBN |
9780197694367 |
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0197694365 |
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9780197694350 |
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0197694357 |
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9780197694343 |
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0197694349 |
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