Blacks and Jews in America: An Invitation to Dialogue Hardcover – February 1, 2022 by Terrence L. Johnson et al.

Description

Author: Johnson Terrence L.

Package Dimensions: 0x0x788

Number Of Pages: 224

Release Date: 01-02-2022

Details: Product Description
A Black-Jewish dialogue lifts a veil on these groups’ unspoken history, shedding light on the challenges and promises facing American democracy from its inception to the present

In this uniquely structured conversational work, two scholars ― one of African American politics and religion, and one of contemporary American Jewish culture ― explore a mystery: Why aren’t Blacks and Jews presently united in their efforts to combat white supremacy? As alt-right rhetoric becomes increasingly normalized in public life, the time seems right for these one-time allies to rekindle the fires of the civil rights movement.

Blacks and Jews in America investigates why these two groups do not presently see each other as sharing a common enemy, let alone a political alliance. Authors Terrence L. Johnson and Jacques Berlinerblau consider a number of angles, including the disintegration of the “Grand Alliance” between Blacks and Jews during the civil rights era, the perspective of Black and Jewish millennials, the debate over Louis Farrakhan and the Nation of Islam, and the Israel-Palestine conflict.

Ultimately, this book shows how the deep roots of the Black-Jewish relationship began long before the mid-twentieth century, changing a narrative dominated by the Grand Alliance and its subsequent fracturing. By engaging this history from our country’s origins to its present moment, this dialogue models the honest and searching conversation needed for Blacks and Jews to forge a new understanding.
Review
”
Blacks and Jews in America: An Invitation to Dialogue arrives at an urgent moment of moral necessity ― amidst shocking hate crimes, deepening partisan division, as well as widening fault lines of race and fissures of ethnicity. This powerful, not unduly polite, invitation to dialogue comes through a book that permits the reader to openly eavesdrop on a radically honest, morally blunt, and intellectually nuanced conversation among Professors Johnson and Berlinerblau. This conversation has the incisive candor of the Black barbershop and the discursive breadth of an off-the-record discussion among plain-talking professors. It ranges from Israel and Palestine, Black Lives Matter, the Civil Rights Movement, Afro-Jews, Minister Louis Farrakhan, hate crimes, affirmative action, romanticized coalitions, and the harsh realities of allyship, to literary representations of the Black-Jewish relationship. Readers will likely find points of agreement, disagreement, and the unexpected enlightenment of hope ― all of which demand to be read. Read the book, accept their invitation, there is no more necessary time than now.” ―
Cornell William Brooks, President of the NAACP

“An engagingly written, clear-eyed conversation about the Black-Jewish ‘relationship’ in America for our post-Charlottesville, BLM moment, this book offers a smart, fresh take not only on the complicated history of a fraught alliance but also on topics like liberalism, intersectionality, and Israel-Palestine that tend to separate the two groups today.” ―
Maurice Samuels, director, Yale Program for the Study of Antisemitism

”
Blacks and Jews in America is a penetrating and provocative contribution to the literature on ‘Black-Jewish relations.’ Its breadth―from slavery to Palestine, from Jews of color to white liberalism―is matched by its thoughtful and thoroughly researched depth. In conversation with one another as well as with prominent thinkers in the field, the authors’ nuanced exploration of the many facets of relationships among white Jews, Jews of color and Black Christians is both a thoughtful work of scholarship and a model for how difficult conversations should be conducted.” ―
Cheryl Greenberg, Paul E. Raether Distinguished Professor of History, Trinity College

“Immensely readable, Johnson and Berlinerblau’s book really does invite readers ― even or especially those who have grown weary of decades of Black and Jewish debates ― to return to a welco