Final Paper Topic

For my final paper, I will focus on the growing tension that arises between blacks and Jews post World War II.  I hope to discuss not only the viewpoints of blacks (other than James Baldwin in “Blacks Are Anti-Semitic Because They Are Anti-White”) who may or may not have shared similar anti-Semitic sentiment but also any discriminatory or racist feelings Jews may have felt for blacks.  I hope to put both sides in conversation with each other.  How did blacks view the racial identity of Jewish-Americans? How did they engage and discuss whiteness and negotiate the demands of the greater white society?  How did Jews respond to black anti-Semitism?  How did Jews view their own racial, ethnic, and religious identity?  From the articles I have read so far, I have noted that blacks tend to view Jews as solely white based on the economic privileges their skin tone has afforded them, while Jews responsively view themselves as separate from Christian whites because of their religious and historical differences.  Though leaders from both sides effectively voice the anger and frustration of their respective communities, tension arises from the growing miscommunication over white identity. 

Primary Sources

James Baldwin, “Negroes Are Anti-Semitic Because They’re Anti-White”

Earl Raab, “The Black Revolution and the Jewish Question”

Rabbi Jay Kaufman, “‘Thou Shalt Surely Rebuke Thy Neighbor’”

Walter Karp and H.R. Shapiro, “Exploding the Myth of Black Anti-Semitism”

Julius Lester, “A Response”

Secondary Sources

Cheryl Lynn Greenberg, “Troubling the Waters: Black-Jewish Relations in the American Century”

Jennifer Lee, “From Civil Relations to Racial Conflict: Merchant-Customer Interactions in Urban America”

Milton D. Morris and Gary E. Rubin, “The Turbulent Friendship: Black-Jewish Relations in the 1990s”