Ethnic and National Identities in Jewish and Israeli Minority Literature

My research examines the construction of ethnic-national identities through cultural work that subverts national-historical narratives. German and Israeli authors both rejected a dichotomy between Germaneness and Jewishness, and between Jewishness and Arabness, respectively. Here I explore the works of German-Jewish artists on Jewishness, and Mizrahi- and Palestinian-Israeli artists on Israeliness. The artists’ explorations of fragmented identities occurred in distinct historical contexts, but the similarities between the German-Jewish pre-WWII experience, and the Mizrahi- and Palestinian-Israeli contemporary experience, raise political and ethical questions about Jewishness, Israeliness, and nationhood