Full Description
The Portuguese Jewish diaspora was born out of a double tragedy: the expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1492 and the forced conversion/expulsion of the Jews from Portugal in 1497. The potent combination of expulsion, Inquisition, and crypto-Judaism left people neither wholly Jewish nor wholly Christian in their identity. Subsequently many left the Iberian peninsula; some found refuge in the Caribbean, but succeeded in maintaining strong connections with Portuguese Jews in western Europe, the Ottoman empire, and the Far East, while they also forged ties with the surrounding peoples and cultures.
This book looks at many different aspects of this complex past. Its interdisciplinary approach allows a wealth of new information to be brought together to create a comprehensive picture. Part I sets the context, and also considers the relationship of Caribbean Jewry to European trading systems; its special ties to Amsterdam and Dutch-ruled Curaçao; and the role of Jewish merchants in Jamaica's commerce. Part II examines the material and visual culture of Jews in the British and Dutch Caribbean, while Part III looks at Caribbean Jewish identity and heritage and their modern manifestations. Part IV contains archival studies that illuminate other subjects of importance—adventure and piracy, Jewish participation in a nineteenth-century revolt of black slaves and in the first Jamaican elections after Jews were granted the right to vote, and questions of concubinage and sexual relations between Jews and blacks. Part V moves from the local to the international, in particular the connection with mainland America.
In their diversity, the contributions to this volume suggest the many ways in which the formation of the Caribbean Jewish diaspora can be understood today: as a Jewish diaspora dispersed under different European colonial empires; as a Jewish cultural entity created by a set of shared traditions and historical memories; and as one component in a web of relationships that characterized the Atlantic world. Defining it is no simple matter: like all diaspora identities it was constantly in flux, reinventing itself under changing historical circumstances.
CONTRIBUTORS: Aviva Ben-Ur, Miriam Bodian, Judah M. Cohen, Eli Faber, Rachel Frankel, Noah L. Gelfand, Jane S. Gerber, Josette Capriles Goldish, Matt Goldish, Jonathan Israel, Stanley Mirvis, Gérard Nahon, Joanna Newman, Ronnie Perelis, Jackie Ranston, James Robertson, Jessica Roitman, Dale Rosengarten, Barry L. Stiefel, Hilit Surowitz-Israel, Karl Watson, Swithin Wilmot
Contents
List of illustrations
Note on Transliteration
Introduction
Jane S. Gerber
Part I
The Historical Background of the Caribbean Sephardi Diaspora
(1) The Formation of the Portuguese Jewish Diaspora
Miriam Bodian
(2) Curaçao, Amsterdam, and the Rise of the Sephardi Trade System in the Caribbean
Jonathan Israel
(3) To Live and to Trade: The Status of Sephardi Mercantile Communities in the Atlantic World during the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries
Noah L. Gelfand
Part II
Authority and Community in the Dutch Caribbean
(4) Amsterdam and the Portuguese Nação of the Caribbean in the Eighteenth Century
Gérard Nahon
(5) 'A flock of wolves instead of sheep': The Stch West India Company, Conflict Resolution, and the Jewish Community of Curaçao in the Eighteenth Century
Jessica Roitman
(6) Religious Authority: A Perspective from the Americas
Hilit Surowitz-Israel
Part III
Material and Visual Culture
(7) Jonkonnu and Jew: The Art of Isaas Mendes Belisario (1794-1849)
Jackie Ranston
(8) Testimonial Terrain: The Cemeteries of New World Sephardim
Rachel Frankel
(9) Counting the 'Sacred Lights of Israel': Synagogue Construction and Architecture in the British Caribbean
Barry L. Stiefel
Part IV
Jews and Slave Society
(10) The Cultural Heritage of Eurafrican Sephardi Jews in Suriname
Aviva Ben-Ur
(11) Shifting Identities: Religion, Race, and Creolization among the Sephardi Jews of Barbados, 1654-1900
Karl Watson
(12) Sexuality and Sentiment: Concubinage and the Sephardi Family in Late Eighteenth-Century Jamaica
Stanley Mirvis
(13) The 'Confession made by Cyrus' Reconsidered: Maroons and Jews duing Jamaica's First Maroon War (1728-1738/9)
James Robertson
(14) Jewish Politicians in Post-Slavery Jamaica: Electoral Politics in the PArish of St Dorothy, 1849-1860
Swithin Wilmot
Part V
Reassessing the Geographical Boundaries of Caribbean Jewry
(15) The Borders of Early American Jewish History
Eli Faber
(16) Port Jews and Plantation Jews: Carolina-Caribbean Connections
Dale Rosengarten
Part VI
Personal Narratives
(17) The Strange Adventures of Benjamin Franks, an Ashkenaz Pioneer in the Americas
Matt Goldish
(18) Daniel Israel López Laguna's Espejo fiel devidas and the Ghosts of Marrano Autobiography
Ronnie Perelis
(19) 'My heart is grieved': Grace Cardoze—A Life Revealed through Letters
Josette Capriles Goldish
Part VII
The Formation of Contemporary Caribbean Jewry
(20) Refugees from Nazism in the British Caribbean
Joanna Newman
(21) Inscribing Ourselves with History: The Production of Heritage in Today's Caribbean Jewish Diaspora
Judah M. Cohen
Notes on the Contributors
Index
