'mydi~identity': "diasporizing" on race & religion
*
'significant
differences
between Jewishness
& the modern sociopolitical senses
of race'
~!@!~
THE
primary
dissimilarities
involve the fact that people can convert to Judaism,
which would seem to suggest
that it is merely a confession,
and that there are no "racial" characteristics
that mark Jews off from other human groups,
as there are,
for instance,
for Japanese people
or Europeans.
-
More
revealingly, however, the convert's name
is changed to "ben Avraham" or "bat/bas Avraham,"
son or daughter
of Avraham/Abraham/Ibrahim.
-
The
convert
is adopted into the family and assigned a new "genealogical" identity,
but also,
since Avraham is the first convert in Jewish tradition,
converts are his descendents in that sense
as well.
-
There
is thus
a sense in which the convert becomes the ideal type
of the
Jew.
~!@!~
ON
the other hand,
Jews do not sense of themselves
that their association is confessional,
that it is based on common religion,
for many people whom both religious & secular Jews call Jewish
neither believe nor practice the religion
at all.
-
This
kind of "racialism"
is built into the formal cultural system
itself.
-
While you
can convert in to Judaism,
you cannot convert out,
and anyone born of Jewish parents is Jewish,
even if she doesn't
know it.
-
Jewishness
is thus certainly not contiguous with modern notions of race,
which have been, furthermore discredited
empirically.
-
Nor are Jews
marked off biologically,
as people are marked for sex;
nor finally, can Jews be reliably identified by a set of practices,
as for example
gay people
can.
-
On
the other hand,
Jewishness is not an affective association of individuals
either.
-
Jews
in general
feel not that Jewishness is something they have freely chosen
but rather that it is an essence
- an essence often nearly empty of any content other than itself -
which has been inscribed - sometimes even imposed -
on them by
birth.
~!@!~
HOW
can this sense of genealogically given essence
be distinguished from
racism?
-
What it
comes down to, finally,
is this:
ANY claimed or ascribed essence
has two directly opposed meanings
depending simply on the politics of the given social
situation.
-
For
people
who are somehow part of a dominant group,
any assertions of essence are ipso facto products and reproducers
of the system of
domination.
-
For
subaltern groups,
however, essentialism is resistance on the "right" of the group
to actually
exist.
-
Essence,
as such, always makes an appeal to the body,
to the "real,"
the referential.
-
For women,
the appeal is to the difference in the reproductive, sexual body;
for gay peole the appeal is to the difference in their sexual practices;
for Jews, the appeal is to
filiation.
-
What we see
in each of these cases is that the very things appealed to
in order to legitimate the subaltern identity
are appealed to as well by dominating groups
in order to exploit the
dominated.
-
The valence
of the claim shifts from negative to positive
with the political status of the group making
the claim.
-
Therefore,
I suggest, that which would be racism
in the hands of the dominating group
is resistance in the hands of a subaltern
collective.
-
In order, then, to preserve the positive ethical,
political value of Jewish genealogy as a mode of identity,
Jews must preserve their subaltern status.
-
I wish to set out,
at least in nuce, a notion of identity,
which I will call Diaspora identity,
which will be of value
beyond the articulation of Jewishness
alone.
~
~
~
~
'significant
differences
between Jewishness
& the modern sociopolitical senses
of race'
~!@!~
THE
primary
dissimilarities
involve the fact that people can convert to Judaism,
which would seem to suggest
that it is merely a confession,
and that there are no "racial" characteristics
that mark Jews off from other human groups,
as there are,
for instance,
for Japanese people
or Europeans.
-
More
revealingly, however, the convert's name
is changed to "ben Avraham" or "bat/bas Avraham,"
son or daughter
of Avraham/Abraham/Ibrahim.
-
The
convert
is adopted into the family and assigned a new "genealogical" identity,
but also,
since Avraham is the first convert in Jewish tradition,
converts are his descendents in that sense
as well.
-
There
is thus
a sense in which the convert becomes the ideal type
of the
Jew.
~!@!~
ON
the other hand,
Jews do not sense of themselves
that their association is confessional,
that it is based on common religion,
for many people whom both religious & secular Jews call Jewish
neither believe nor practice the religion
at all.
-
This
kind of "racialism"
is built into the formal cultural system
itself.
-
While you
can convert in to Judaism,
you cannot convert out,
and anyone born of Jewish parents is Jewish,
even if she doesn't
know it.
-
Jewishness
is thus certainly not contiguous with modern notions of race,
which have been, furthermore discredited
empirically.
-
Nor are Jews
marked off biologically,
as people are marked for sex;
nor finally, can Jews be reliably identified by a set of practices,
as for example
gay people
can.
-
On
the other hand,
Jewishness is not an affective association of individuals
either.
-
Jews
in general
feel not that Jewishness is something they have freely chosen
but rather that it is an essence
- an essence often nearly empty of any content other than itself -
which has been inscribed - sometimes even imposed -
on them by
birth.
~!@!~
HOW
can this sense of genealogically given essence
be distinguished from
racism?
-
What it
comes down to, finally,
is this:
ANY claimed or ascribed essence
has two directly opposed meanings
depending simply on the politics of the given social
situation.
-
For
people
who are somehow part of a dominant group,
any assertions of essence are ipso facto products and reproducers
of the system of
domination.
-
For
subaltern groups,
however, essentialism is resistance on the "right" of the group
to actually
exist.
-
Essence,
as such, always makes an appeal to the body,
to the "real,"
the referential.
-
For women,
the appeal is to the difference in the reproductive, sexual body;
for gay peole the appeal is to the difference in their sexual practices;
for Jews, the appeal is to
filiation.
-
What we see
in each of these cases is that the very things appealed to
in order to legitimate the subaltern identity
are appealed to as well by dominating groups
in order to exploit the
dominated.
-
The valence
of the claim shifts from negative to positive
with the political status of the group making
the claim.
-
Therefore,
I suggest, that which would be racism
in the hands of the dominating group
is resistance in the hands of a subaltern
collective.
-
In order, then, to preserve the positive ethical,
political value of Jewish genealogy as a mode of identity,
Jews must preserve their subaltern status.
-
I wish to set out,
at least in nuce, a notion of identity,
which I will call Diaspora identity,
which will be of value
beyond the articulation of Jewishness
alone.
~
~~
~
03 sep 2005 - bewerkt op 22 mrt 2008
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