That Pride of Race and Character : : The Roots of Jewish Benevolence in the Jim Crow South / / Caroline E. Light.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter New York University Press Complete eBook-Package 2014-2015
• VerfasserIn: Light, Caroline E.,
• Place / Publishing House: New York, NY : : New York University Press, , [2014]; ©2014
• Year of Publication: 2014
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource

“Ithas ever been the boast of the Jewish people, that they support their own poor,”declared Kentucky attorney Benjamin Franklin Jonas in 1856. “Their reasons arepartly founded in religious necessity, and partly in that pride of race andcharacter which has supported them through so many ages of trial andvicissitude.” In That Pride of Race andCharacter, Caroline E. Light examines the American Jewish tradition ofbenevolence and charity and explores its southern roots.Light provides a critical analysis ofbenevolence as it was inflected by regional ideals of race and gender, showinghow a southern Jewish benevolent empire emerged in response to the combinedpressures of post-Civil War devastation and the simultaneous influx of easternEuropean immigration. In an effort to combat the voices of anti-Semitism andnativism, established Jewish leaders developed a sophisticated and cutting-edgenetwork of charities in the South to ensure that Jews took care of thoseconsidered “their own” while also proving themselves to be exemplary whitecitizens. Drawing from confidential case files and institutional records fromvarious southern Jewish charities, the book relates how southern Jewish leadersand their immigrant clients negotiated the complexities of “fitting in” in aplace and time of significant socio-political turbulence. Ultimately, thesouthern Jewish call to benevolence bore the particular imprint of the region’sracial mores and left behind a rich legacy.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction. Loving kindness and cultural citizenship in the Jewish south -- 1. “to the Hebrews the world is indebted”: the southern roots of American Jewish benevolence -- 2. “For the honor of the Jewish people”: gender, race, and immigration -- 3. “Virtue, rectitude and loyalty to our faith”: Jewish orphans and the politics of southern cultural capital -- 4. “A very delicate problem”: the plight of the southern agunah -- 5. “None of my own people”: subsidizing Jewish motherhood in the depression-era south -- 6. Sex, race, and consumption: southern sephardim and the politics of benevolence -- Conclusion. Loving kindness and its legacies -- Notes -- Selected bibliography -- Index -- About the author