A people's writings can play a dramatic role in nation building, as the development of modern Hebrew literature powerfully illustrates. Since the end of the nineteenth century, Hebrew writers in Europe and Palestine/Israel have produced texts and consolidated moments in the shaping of national identity.

Yet, this process has not always been a unified and continuous one. The processes of canon formation and the suppression of heterodox discourses have been played out publicly and vociferously. Producing the Modern Hebrew Canon offers a sweeping view of the entirety of modern Hebrew...

-Moore focuses on Buber's central message about what it means to be a human being, a person of faith, and what mankind can do to overcome the eclipse of God.-
--Shofar

-Solid, well researched, and sympathetic.... might well spur a person to go back and read Buber.-
--Commonwealth

In this volume a distinguished group of international scholars draws from history, folklore, political anthropology, historiography, and cultural criticism to reexamine critical issues surrounding the birth of Israel. The authors explore such issues as the transition form yishuv to state, early state policy toward the Arab minority, the origins of the Palestinian refugee problem, the conflict over myths and symbols in the early state, early attitude toward Holocaust victims and survivors, Arab historiography of the 1948 war, Israel-Diaspora relations, and the shaping of Israeli foreign...

In recent decades, religious fundamentalism has played an increasingly significant role in Western and Middle Eastern politics and culture. In this volume, an international group of scholars from fields such as religious studies, sociology, political science, history, and anthropology explore diverse dimensions of religious fundamentalism and relate it to a range of cultural and political issues. Although the focus is on fundamentalism in its Jewish guise, the methodological and comparative emphases make it valuable to specialists in a variety of fields.

Among the issues examined...

In recent decades, religious fundamentalism has played an increasingly significant role in Western and Middle Eastern politics and culture. In this volume, an international group of scholars from fields such as religious studies, sociology, political science, history, and anthropology explore diverse dimensions of religious fundamentalism and relate it to a range of cultural and political issues. Although the focus is on fundamentalism in its Jewish guise, the methodological and comparative emphases make it valuable to specialists in a variety of fields.

Among the issues examined...

Cultural boundaries and group identity are often forged in relation to the Other. In every society, conceptions of otherness, which often reflect a group's fears and vulnerabilities, result in deep-rooted traditions of inclusion and exclusion that permeate the culture's literature, religion, and politics.

This volume explores the ways in which Jews have traditionally defined other groups and, in turn, themselves. The contributors, a distinguished international group of scholars, explore the discursive processss through which Jewish identity and culture have been constructed,...

Cultural boundaries and group identity are often forged in relation to the Other. In every society, conceptions of otherness, which often reflect a group's fears and vulnerabilities, result in deep-rooted traditions of inclusion and exclusion that permeate the culture's literature, religion, and politics.

This volume explores the ways in which Jews have traditionally defined other groups and, in turn, themselves. The contributors, a distinguished international group of scholars, explore the discursive processss through which Jewish identity and culture have been constructed,...

Is Jewish identity flourishing or in decline? Community leaders and scholarly researchers continually seek to determine the attitudes, beliefs, and activities that best measure Jewish identity. At issue, according to these studies, is the very survival of the Jewish community itself. But such studies rarely ask what actually is being examined when we attempt to assess -Jewish identity- or any identity. Most tend to assume that identity is a preexisting, relatively fixed frame of reference reflecting shared cultural and historical experiences.

Drawing on recent work in such fields as...