The Jewish Diaspora in Latin America and the Caribbean: Fragments of Memory - Softcover

"Kristin Ruggiero has assembled a stellar cast of multinational and multidisciplinary scholars and artists that imparts this book both depth and variety. Geographically, the chapters range from Mexico and tropical Caribbean islands to temperate South America and its large Jewish communities. Topically, the volume tackles a multiplicity of contradictory forces and trends: anti-Semitism and Judeophilia; cultural hybridity and separation; terrorism (of various ideological hues) and communal self-defense; collective memory and amnesia. Epistemologically and aesthetically, the essays range from the intellectual impartiality and keenness of first-rate scholarly analysis to the poignant poetics of personal testimonials. The volume's documentary base extends from diplomatic dispatches and a legendary literary magazine to oral interviews and the diary of a polyglot grandmother. The result is a broad and vivid portrayal of the Jewish presence in Latin America." -- Jose Moya, UCLA, Department of History Chair, Latin American Studies Program. "Contributes significantly toward a phantom reconstruction of the multifaceted Latin American Jewish experience." -- Judith Laikin Elkin, University of Michigan, Founder of the Latin American Jewish Studies Association. "These diverse chapters enable the reader to touch the 'fragments of memory' that form an important measurre of Jewish experience in Latin America and the Caribbean. This interdisciplinary collection assembled by Ruggiero explores and celebrates individual lives and collective Jewishness. One cannot depart the pages of this volume without a deep sense of connecting with a culture committed to survival, even through genocide and holocaust. This is not a volume of numbing statistics and dry rhetoric; it is a book of passionate commitment to portraying the Jewish presence in twentieth century Latin America and the Caribbean." -- Robert Kemper & Ryan Fisher, European Review of Latin American and Caribbean Studies, No. 80, April 2006.

Since the 1970s, the Latin American Jewish Diaspora has been recognized as a unique phenomenon in diasporic studies, due to the development of new ways of thinking about internationalism and globalization. Important works of the 1980s and 1990s established the critical role of Jews in Latin America. This collection moves the field forward by providing an interdisciplinary and comparative view of Jewish experiences through history, literature, painting, anthropology, poetry, sociology, and politics.