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Encyclopedia of Modern Jewish
Culture Edited by Glenda Abramson Two Volumes |
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The Encyclopedia
provides an analytical overview, according to its own definition of modern
Jewish culture, covering wide geographical, intellectual, and artistic areas,
and offering material for every kind of reader, from the scholar to the
casual browser. Although the book is not encyclopedic, its detailed
bibliographies provide the means of probing more deeply into the topic and
figures treated here. The Jewish culture represented in the previous Encyclopedia
was Ashkenazi; those individual writers, scholars and artists of Sephardi
origin who were included were those who entered the mainstream of
Ashkenazi-Western culture. Beginning in the 1950s, a vast immigration to
Israel from Arabic-speaking countries in the Middle East and North Africa
created a new dichotomy in Israel which has been largely ignored until
recently. Now it is leading to a re-evaluation of Zionism itself and the
politics of identity previously viewed almost exclusively from the Ashkenazi
(European) standpoint. In a comprehensive collection of biographical entries
and essays, Reuven Snir has provided this volume with a substantive
discussion of Arab-Jewish culture and also of its development in Israel. |
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