Why Is America Different?: American Jewry on its 350th Anniversary

Does the American Jewish experience represent a singular communal circumstance, or does it repeat, with obvious and unavoidable variation, the older European pattern of Jewish existence? In 2004, on the occasion of the 350th anniversary of the establishment of the American Jewish community, this question seemed well worth revisiting. To explore it more fully, the Elie Wiesel Center for Judaic Studies at Boston University brought together a distinguished group of expert scholars on the main areas of American Jewish life, stretching from the colonial Jewish experience to the image of Jews in contemporary films. The present volume represents the fruit of this collective reflection and interrogation.

Table of Contents:
Chapter 1 Preface Chapter 2 In Place of an Introduction: Some Thoughts on American Jewish Exceptionalism Chapter 3 1. Enlightenment, Statesmen, and the Jews in Europe and the United States, 1776-1820 Chapter 4 2. American Exceptionalism: The Case of the Jews, 1750-1850 Chapter 5 3. Why and How Are Americans Different? Chapter 6 4. Immigrant Jews and the Challenge of American Athleticism Chapter 7 5. American's Most Memorable Zionist Leaders Chapter 8 6. Encountering Jewish Feminism Chapter 9 7. Judaism and the Pluralist Dynamic Chapter 10 8. From Treifene Medina to Goldene Medina: Changing Perspectives on the United States Among American Haredim Chapter 11 9. From Many, One? Reflections on the Notion of American Jews Chapter 12 10. Superbowl Parties, Women Rabbis, and Freedom Seders: Twenty-first Century Jewish American Synergy Chapter 13 11. American Anti-Semitism: The Myth and Reality of American Exceptionalism Chapter 14 12. To "Make a Jew": Projecting Anti-Semitism in Post-War America Chapter 15 13. Jews in the United States: How Good it has Been Chapter 16 14. Anti-Semitism Today Chapter 17 15. The NYT: The Newspaper American Jews Love to Hate Chapter 18 16. Confessions of a Jewish Journalist Chapter 19 17. Portraits of America in Jewish Culture Chapter 20 18. Yiddishkeit and the American Jewish Writer: The Breakthrough Reconsidered Chapter 21 19. Cinema as a Lens on America's Jews Chapter 22 20. What Makes America Different: Jewish Artists and their Concerns in the Twentieth Century Chapter 23 21. Studies in Hysteria, or Jewish Comedy from Shtetlach to Shticklach Chapter 24 22. The Transformation of Traditional Jewish Music in Jewish America Chapter 25 23. America: Memories of Doubts and Hope

About the Author :
Steven T. Katz is director of the Elie Wiesel Center for Judaic Studies at Boston University, Boston, Ma., and holds the Alvin J. and Shirley Slater Chair in Jewish and Holocaust Studies. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge in 1972.