German Jewish rituals, bodies, and citizenship.

German Jewish Rituals, Bodies, and Citizenship is an examination of the nineteenth-century German ritual slaughter and circumcision debates. Between 1843 and 1914, several German Jews and non-Jews publicly and privately questioned the appropriateness of Jewish religious rites. During the 1840s, 1850s, 1860s, and 1870s, several German-Jewish communities found themselves divided over the question of whether or not an uncircumcised child born to a Jewish mother could be considered a member of a local or regional Jewish community. At the same time, a nascent animal-sentimentalist movement became increasingly interested in the method used by Jews to slaughter animals for food (shehitah). The latter deliberations escalated during the 1890s and 1900s when many veterinary, animal-protection, and nature societies pushed for ritual slaughter's prohibition. The late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries also witnessed a renewed concern with circumcision, though this time the circumcision question encouraged German Jewish and non-Jewish participation in public, private, and scholarly spheres. The discussions concerning circumcision and ritual slaughter tapped into contemporary controversies. They drew from and influenced important discussions concerning emancipation, the rise of the nation state, medicalization, the growing popularity of conservatism, and the development of mass politics. In fact, as this dissertation shows, interest in Jewish rites grew in popularity when these allegedly unrelated discussions were at their peaks, namely during the 1840s, the late 1860s, and the 1890s. The debates concerning these rites are significant for three reasons. First, the deliberations suggest that a variety of motivations and contexts, not merely anti-Jewish animus, encouraged a wide segment of the population to become interested in Jewish ritual behavior. Furthermore, the debates about ritual slaughter and circumcision provide a window into a myriad of strategies that governmental institutions and leaders employed in order to contend with the changing state. Finally, the nineteenth- and early twentieth-century deliberations concerning circumcision and ritual slaughter refute the hypothesis that after the onset of secularization Germany's distinct religions and religious sects ceased to inform spheres of modern life. Instead, religion remained a central defining category in the ways in which people made sense of their daily lives.Ph.D.Ethnic studiesEuropean historyModern historySocial SciencesUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/132602/2/9977186.pd