Strangers in the Land: Blacks, Jews, Post-Holocaust America

By Eric J. Sundquist

Book Overview

In a culture deeply divided along ethnic lines, the idea that the relationship between blacks and Jews was once thought special - indeed, critical to the cause of civil rights - might seem strange. Yet the importance of blacks for Jews and Jews for blacks in conceiving of themselves as Americans, when both remained outsiders to the privileges of full citizenship, is a matter of voluminous but perplexing record. It is this record, written across the annals of American history and literature, culture and society, that Eric Sundquist investigates. A monumental work of literary criticism and cultural history, Strangers in the Land draws upon politics, sociology, law, religion, and popular culture to illuminate a vital, highly conflicted interethnic partnership over the course of a century. Sundquist explores how reactions to several interlocking issues - the biblical Exodus, the Holocaust, Zionism and the state of Israel - became critical to black-Jewish relations.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0674019423
• ISBN13: 9780674019423
• Release Date: November 2005
• Publisher: Belknap Press
• Length: 672 Pages
• Weight: 2.30 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.5" x 1.5" x 6.8"

Customer Reviews

David Green's harangue has little to do with the book

Reading David Green, one of those self-confessed Jews, who feel obligated to trash Jews, Jewish culture, and Israel at every opportunity, my thought is that his unqualified rage and nasty vituperation have less to do with the book itself and its massive achievement than with Mr. Green's desire for a soapbox on which to proclaim his self-righteousness. He claims to have studied the Arab-Israeli conflict intensively for 9 years, but that's not what this book is about, and the problems between blacks and Jews have very little to do with that part of the world.