DOCSLIB.ORG

The Zacuto Complex: on Reading the Jews in South Africa

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
The Zacuto Complex: on Reading the Jews in South Africa Richard Mendelsohn, Milton Shain. The Jews in South Africa: An Illustrated History. Johannesburg: Jonathan Ball, 2008. x + 234 pp. $31.95, cloth, ISBN 978-1-86842-281-4. Reviewed by Jonathan Judaken Published on H-Judaic (August, 2009) Commissioned by Jason Kalman (Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of Religion) While the frst Jews to officially settle in South hand, Europeans colonized him in the name of Africa did so in the early nineteenth century, the the same basic ideas that justified European ex‐ history of their antecedents is much longer. They pansion and exploitation, notions that we can include Abraham ben Samuel Zacuto, distin‐ name in one word: racism. The "Zacuto complex," guished astronomer and astrologist at the Univer‐ as I want to call it, has played out through most of sity of Salamanca prior to the expulsion of the the history of Jews in South Africa, as this won‐ Jews from Spain in 1492. His astrological tables derful book demonstrates. were published in Hebrew, and then translated The Jews in South Africa, by two of the lead‐ into Latin, and then into Spanish. They were used ing living historians of South Africa’s Jewish past, by Christopher Columbus, and more importantly is the frst general history of South African Jewry by Vasco da Gama, for whom he also selected the in over ffty years. It is written in lively prose, scientific instruments and joined on his voyage to sumptuously illustrated, and includes rare photo‐ Africa.Zacuto, thereby, “was probably the frst Jew graphs as well as documents culled from the ar‐ to land on South African soil when, in mid-No‐ chives, which are inserted into offset “boxes” that vember 1497, the Da Gama party went ashore at help illuminate the forces at work in South St Helena Bay on the Cape west coast” (p. 4). By African Jewish history. this time, he was likely a “New Christian,” himself The book “is not a narrow institutional histo‐ a victim of the limpieza de sangre (blood purity) ry of a community,” as Mendelsohn and Shain laws enacted in Spain. rightly claim. “Rather it attempts to encompass a Zacuto is thus symbolic of a double legacy at broad swathe of Jewish life, from the bimah and the heart of the history of Jews in South Africa: on the boardroom to the bowling green.” Nor is it a the one hand, his knowledge and actions were in‐ Whiggish history. Instead, “it depicts the fragility trinsic to European colonialism. But on the other H-Net Reviews of the early foundations, the oscillating fortunes episodes as a means to render what the broader of the community as it matured amidst turbulent work offers. currents, both domestic and international, and its After the Portuguese explorers like Zacuto, latter-day challenges and responses” (p. ix). As Jews were among the frst Dutch travelers to such, it offers gems from the past that are touch‐ round the Cape of Good Hope. But they were not stones for the big questions we should all think allowed to step onto the land of the new Dutch about as scholars of Jewish history. settlements that began after 1652. Things changed To this end, unlike its historiographic prede‐ when the British began to compete with the Dutch cessors (see the box, “Constructing a Usable Past,” for the Cape Colony in the late eighteenth century. pp. 136-137), the Jewish community is not repre‐ The principles of Lockean and deistic tolerance sented as monolithic, but as segregated along permitted individual Jews of English, Dutch, and lines of class, ideology, and religiosity, not to men‐ German origin to begin to arrive in South Africa, tion separated in numerous ways from the larger with the frst official minyan praying together on British and Afrikaner white communities, and, of Yom Kippur in 1841. This small group of Anglo- course, from the Blacks, Asians, and Coloreds who German Jewish pioneers was highly acculturated, today might be their neighbors. South African following English norms and habits, which they Jews thus lived in ghettos akin to those of their insisted upon maintaining when they created the early modern predecessors, sometimes with invis‐ first Jewish institutions in South Africa. ible walls and sometimes with diamond studs on The example of Nathaniel Isaacs, “a young the gateposts. Jewish adventurer and trader” who lived among The book is divided chronologically into four the Zulus in the late 1820s, shows how these pio‐ broad periods, each of which had a distinctive neers were Zacuto’s descendents. In 1836, Isaacs character. First is the “age of pioneers” (1800-80), published Travels and Adventures in Eastern defined by Anglo-German Jewish immigrants who Africa, Descriptive of the Zoolus, their Manners, established the Jewish community in South Africa. Customs, etc., etc., a seminal text on Shaka Zulu. Second is the "age of the Litvaks" (1880-1930), the But as the extracts included by Shain and Mendel‐ immigrants who arrived in the late nineteenth sohn make plain, it was a work that helped to jus‐ and early twentieth centuries. They consolidated tify the colonial expansion of South Africa by de‐ Jewish life in South Africa. After the Shoah wiped picting Shaka as bellicose and barbaric. Not with‐ out 90 percent of their brethren in der heim (the out interest, though, is the fact that Isaacs occa‐ Old Country), they constituted the largest surviv‐ sionally played the role of the doctor. Amongst his ing community of Lithuanian Jews. The third peri‐ remedies was the use of “chicken soup” (see the od is that of the “South African Jews” (1930-1970) box, “Chicken Soup and the Zulus,” p. 7). who instituted themselves into the lineaments of These pioneers trailing in Zacuto’s wake apartheid South Africa. Finally is our epoch of would eventually follow the British into the interi‐ “Jewish South Africans,” (1970-present), one of the or of South Africa in search of the wealth that diverse communities of the new multi-ethnic came from the discovery of diamonds and gold. South Africa. Some came as prospectors, but most created sub‐ Given the format of the book, Mendelsohn sidiary enterprises catering to the needs of those and Shain are able to tell not only a grand narra‐ digging the earth. Aptly summing up this period, tive, but also countless petite histoires that pro‐ Mendelsohn and Shain write, “Their comfortable vide a multifaceted rendition of this past that is integration into the wider white community, their not over. I will focus in on some these smaller small numbers, the gender imbalance [since most 2 H-Net Reviews were men], and the assimilatory impulses of a town and city, storekeepers, and sometimes pri‐ frontier society, all pointed towards the eventual mary producers in niche markets, like the ostrich disappearance of this infant Jewish community” feather boom of the decades before the First (p. 27). World War. By 1911, 46, 919 Jews were recorded Two proximate events resulted in their efflo‐ in the frst census of the new Union of South resce rather than their disappearance. The frst Africa, making Jews 3.68 percent of the white pop‐ was the pogroms that began after the assassina‐ ulation and .79 percent of the total population. tion of Tsar Alexander II. The second was the dis‐ Most who left Lithuania were not religiously covery of the largest gold reef ever found in the observant. They were feeing stifling conditions in South African interior. The result was that among search of a better life. They found it in the relative the three million Jews who emigrated from east‐ tolerance of South Africa. By 1909, there were six ern Europe between 1880-1914, forty thousand Jewish mayors of cities big and small. Compare ended up in South Africa, the majority from the this to the same period in Vienna where Karl Kovno province of Lithuania. Mendelsohn and Lueger was elected mayor on an antisemitic plat‐ Shain wonderfully reconstruct the immigration form. Cape Town had its own version of the Low‐ chain that brought them from the nether reaches er East Side or the East End, called District Six. It of the east to the southern tip of Africa. Dragging created institutions of Jewish learning, a Yiddish- the baggage of Litvak life with them, they general‐ language press, and adherents of both socialism ly stopped in London, with half of them staying a and Zionism. So by the time that Ghandi began his fortnight in the Jews Temporary Shelter in the nonviolent agitation in South Africa, he was “sur‐ East End. They made their way from there to rounded by Jews” (p. 98), mostly Litvaks, who by Southampton and then on to Cape Town. There then had become South African Jews. they would be aided by formal and informal But South African Jews could hardly rest easi‐ landsmannschaften (immigrant fraternal soci‐ ly on their laurels. In 1930, a Quota Act was eties), starting a new life, often as smous (itiner‐ passed that “ushered in a decade of profound dif‐ ant traders), but some even fnding their way into ficulty and discomfort for South African Jewry. A the underworld. ‘Jewish Question’ emerged against a backdrop of As was the fate of their fellow travelers in economic depression and a burgeoning and exclu‐ France and America, the newcomers were as‐ sivist Afrikaner nationalism that was struggling to saulted not only with the challenges of their new capture the political high ground. The Act herald‐ terrain, but also with a discursive onslaught. It ed what the historian Todd Endelman, writing in was characterized by an anti-Jewish idiom that the European context, terms the transformation fused together social pathologies, criminology, eu‐ of ‘private’ into ‘public’ or ‘programmatic’ anti‐ genics, and social hygiene, all focused on the pur‐ semitism--the shift from ‘expressions of contempt portedly degenerate bodies of the as-yet unaccul‐ and discrimination outside the realm of public turated and perhaps unassimilable so-called Peru‐ life’ to the ‘eruption of antisemitism in public life'" vian Jews, who were actually what was referred (p.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Can Money Whiten? Exploring Race Practice in Colonial Venezuela and Its Implications for Contemporary Race Discourse
    Michigan Journal of Race and Law Volume 3 1998 Can Money Whiten? Exploring Race Practice in Colonial Venezuela and Its Implications for Contemporary Race Discourse Estelle T. Lau State University of New York at Buffalo Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.law.umich.edu/mjrl Part of the Comparative and Foreign Law Commons, Law and Race Commons, Law and Society Commons, and the Legal History Commons Recommended Citation Estelle T. Lau, Can Money Whiten? Exploring Race Practice in Colonial Venezuela and Its Implications for Contemporary Race Discourse, 3 MICH. J. RACE & L. 417 (1998). Available at: https://repository.law.umich.edu/mjrl/vol3/iss2/4 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals at University of Michigan Law School Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Michigan Journal of Race and Law by an authorized editor of University of Michigan Law School Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. CAN MONEY WHITEN? EXPLORING RACE PRACTICE IN COLONIAL VENEZUELA AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR CONTEMPORARY RACE DISCOURSE Estelle T. Lau* The Gracias al Sacar, a fascinating and seemingly inconceivable practice in eighteenth century colonial Venezuela, allowed certain individuals of mixed Black and White ancestry to purchase "Whiteness" from their King. The author exposes the irony of this system, developed in a society obsessed with "natural" ordering that labeled individuals according to their precise racial ancestry. While recognizing that the Gracias al Sacar provided opportunities for advancement and an avenue for material and social struggle, the author argues that it also justified the persistence of racial hierarchy.
    [Show full text]
  • Historical Origins of the One-Drop Racial Rule in the United States
    Historical Origins of the One-Drop Racial Rule in the United States Winthrop D. Jordan1 Edited by Paul Spickard2 Editor’s Note Winthrop Jordan was one of the most honored US historians of the second half of the twentieth century. His subjects were race, gender, sex, slavery, and religion, and he wrote almost exclusively about the early centuries of American history. One of his first published articles, “American Chiaroscuro: The Status and Definition of Mulattoes in the British Colonies” (1962), may be considered an intellectual forerunner of multiracial studies, as it described the high degree of social and sexual mixing that occurred in the early centuries between Africans and Europeans in what later became the United States, and hinted at the subtle racial positionings of mixed people in those years.3 Jordan’s first book, White over Black: American Attitudes Toward the Negro, 1550–1812, was published in 1968 at the height of the Civil Rights Movement era. The product of years of painstaking archival research, attentive to the nuances of the thousands of documents that are its sources, and written in sparkling prose, White over Black showed as no previous book had done the subtle psycho-social origins of the American racial caste system.4 It won the National Book Award, the Ralph Waldo Emerson Prize, the Bancroft Prize, the Parkman Prize, and other honors. It has never been out of print since, and it remains a staple of the graduate school curriculum for American historians and scholars of ethnic studies. In 2005, the eminent public intellectual Gerald Early, at the request of the African American magazine American Legacy, listed what he believed to be the ten most influential books on African American history.
    [Show full text]
  • Racial Migration and the One-Drop Rule, 1600–1860
    SHARFSTEIN_4FMT 2/22/2007 10:11:09 AM Article Crossing the Color Line: Racial Migration and the One-Drop Rule, 1600–1860 Daniel J. Sharfstein† “It ain’t no lie, it’s a natural fact, / You could have been colored without being so black . .” —Sung by deck hands, Auburn, Alabama, 1915–161 “They are our enemies; we marry them.” —African Proverb2 INTRODUCTION: THE BRIDE WORE BLACK In 1819 a Scotsman named James Flint crossed the Atlan- tic Ocean, made his way from New York to Pittsburgh, sailed down the Ohio, and settled for eighteen months in Jefferson- ville, Indiana, just opposite Louisville, Kentucky. His letters † Samuel I. Golieb Fellow in Legal History, New York University School of Law. J.D. 2000, Yale Law School. Special thanks to R.B. Bernstein, Steven Biel, Paulette Caldwell, Kristin Collins, Daniel Coquillette, Christine Desan, Charles Donahue, Mary Dudziak, Crystal Feimster, Harold Forsythe, Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Glenda Gilmore, Robert W. Gordon, Jonathan Hanson, Paul Heinegg, Helen Hershkoff, Carissa Hessick, Morton Horwitz, Daniel Hulse- bosch, Jane Kamensky, J. Andrew Kent, Harold Hongju Koh, Matthew Lind- say, Kenneth Mack, Ann Mikkelsen, William E. Nelson, Kunal Parker, Nicho- las Parrillo, Joseph Pearce, Jr., Seth Rockman, Carol Rose, Peter Schuck, David Seipp, Jed Shugerman, Werner Sollors, Simon Stern, Diana Williams, and Michael Willrich. The Legal History Colloquium at New York University School of Law and the Harvard Legal History Colloquium provided invaluable feedback. This Article would not have been possible without the hard work of Ashley Ewald, Sara Youn, and the staff of the Minnesota Law Review, as well as the generous support of the Raoul Berger-Mark DeWolfe Howe Fellowship at Harvard Law School and the National Endowment for the Humanities.
    [Show full text]
  • Free People of Color and Blood Purity in Colonial Spanish American Legislation
    SLAVE BUT NOT CITIZEN: FREE PEOPLE OF COLOR AND BLOOD PURITY IN COLONIAL SPANISH AMERICAN LEGISLATION ESCLAVO PERO NO CIUDADANO: LIBRES DE COLOR Y PUREZA DE SANGRE EN LA LEGISLACION COLONIAL EN LA AMERICA HISPANA ALINE HELG Université de Genève Resumen En 1946 el sociólogo Frank Tannenbaum ofreció una imagen positiva de la esclavitud en América Latina. Desde entonces, sus consideraciones respecto a la esclavitud han sido replanteadas. Sin embargo, se ha prestado poca atención a su afirmación de que una vez emancipados, los antiguos esclavos se convirtieron en ciudadanos. En este artículo analizamos la posición de la gente libre de color en la legislación colonial en la América hispana que les discriminaba y les impedía la posibilidad de ocupar un cargo en las instituciones civiles, militares y eclesiásticas mediante el requisito legal de la pureza de sangre. Este tipo de exclusiones raciales fueron suprimidas en los inicios del proceso de independencia de la América hispana continental pero se mantuvieron vigentes en Cuba y en Puerto Rico hasta la década de 1880. Palabras clave: Esclavitud, pureza de sangre, ciudadanía, América Latina. Abstract In 1946, sociologist Frank Tannenbaum offered a positive image of Latin America’s sla- ve. Since then, his views on slavery have been revised, but little attention has been paid to his claim that once freed, former slaves became citizens. This article focuses on the position of free people of color in colonial Spanish American law, which discriminated against them and barred them from civil, military and church positions through the legal requirement of blood purity. Such racial exclusions were lifted at the onset of continental Spanish America’s independence process, but were in force in Cuba and Puerto Rico until the 1880s.
    [Show full text]
  • Old Comrade Crafts a Fine Memory of Our Past
    Old comrade crafts a fine memory of our past Memory against Forgetting: Memoirs Now he re-visits us, ever the ana­ Govan Mbeki and others, stood ac­ from a Life in South African Politics lyst, theoretician, activist, the stimu­ cused at the Rivonia Trial. Following 1938-1964 lating and helpful companion. Again the petty-minded and vindictive fic­ by Rusty Bernstein (Viking) R128 he fires my insurrectionary imagi­ tions presented by the prosecution, nation, as, surely, he will ignite those he alone among his comrades was Review: Alan Lipman who treat themselves to this quietly acquitted. Isolated and depressed he didactic book. bowed to the now urgent need for es­ Among the facets of a sustained cape into exile with his family. his is a finely crafted vol­ political life which Bernstein illumi­ If there is a need for the feminist ume: the lucid, analytic nates, the most constant is his contention that “the personal is po­ record of someone who propensity for incisive analysis, for litical” to be affirmed, this book does was engaged, who was em­ epitom ising EM Forster’s memo­ so. Despite the author’s reticence beddedT in the politics of South rable invitation, “only connect”. about such matters, one is reminded African resistance from the late- This is a pervasive thread, repeatedly, and always poignantly, of 1930s to the 1960s. If on entering a through events leading to and sur­ the effects of his wife’s and his en­ new century, you wish to touch the rounding the post-1948 Votes for All forced separations from their four core of those momentous decades, assembly and the Suppression of children, from each other.
    [Show full text]
  • Unsuspecting
    UNSUSPECTING DAVID SCHRAUB* INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................... 362 I. SUSPECT STASIS .................................................................................. 366 A. The Indicia of Suspectness ........................................................... 367 B. The Indicia’s Impermanence ....................................................... 372 1. The Carolene Factors ............................................................ 372 2. The Rodriguez Factors ........................................................... 376 3. Immutability and Irrelevancy ................................................ 378 a. Immutability .................................................................... 378 b. Irrelevancy ...................................................................... 381 II. TRANSIENT IN THEORY, CONCRETE IN FACT: WHY HAVEN’T CLASSES BEEN UNSUSPECTED? ........................................................... 383 A. Lack of Opportunity ..................................................................... 384 B. Lack of Incentive .......................................................................... 389 C. Lack of Clarity ............................................................................. 393 III. AGAINST PERPETUAL SUSPECT CLASSES ............................................ 396 A. Democratic Tensions ................................................................... 396 B. Suspect Classification as Zero-Sum ...........................................
    [Show full text]
  • The Night Watchman
    3/16/2021 The History and the Literature: The Night Watchman Diane and Stan Henderson OLLI at the University of Cincinnati March 16, 2021 For a PDF of these slides, please email [email protected] 3/16/2021 The History OVERVIEW • A Grim Reckoning • The Land Was Already Occupied • Land and Purity of the Blood • Early America: Treaties and Conflict • The American Origin Story • Jackson: The Indians Must Go • War or Policy: It’s All the Same • Termination: The Final Solution • A New Reckoning 3/16/2021 • “Our nation was born in genocide.… We are perhaps the only nation which tried as a matter of national policy to wipe out its indigenous population. Moreover, we elevated that tragic experience into a noble crusade. Indeed, even today we have not permitted ourselves to reject or feel remorse for this Martin Luther King, Jr. shameful episode.” Settler Colonialism • Increasingly, historians are seeing the growth of the US as a kind of colonialism, specifically, settler colonialism • The hordes of settlers who moved west from the Atlantic—whether immigrants or people seeking better circumstances—were—colonizing, making the land their own • Indigenous peoples already there were not a part of the colonists’ plans: they were “others” who needed to move or be moved or worse 3/16/2021 Quick Test • Envision the map of the US at the time of independence • Most likely you thought of an approximation of the US as it looks today • A Rorschach of unconscious “manifest destiny” • Implication that America was terra nullius, a land without people and
    [Show full text]
  • Painting Outside of the Lines: How Race Assignment Can Be Rethought Through Art
    Gettysburg Social Sciences Review Volume 5 Issue 1 Article 10 2021 Painting Outside of the Lines: How Race Assignment can be Rethought Through Art Giovanni Mella-Velazquez Emory University Follow this and additional works at: https://cupola.gettysburg.edu/gssr Part of the African American Studies Commons, American Art and Architecture Commons, Caribbean Languages and Societies Commons, Contemporary Art Commons, Ethnic Studies Commons, Latina/o Studies Commons, Modern Art and Architecture Commons, Painting Commons, and the Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons Share feedback about the accessibility of this item. Recommended Citation Mella-Velazquez, Giovanni (2021) "Painting Outside of the Lines: How Race Assignment can be Rethought Through Art," Gettysburg Social Sciences Review: Vol. 5 : Iss. 1 , Article 10. Available at: https://cupola.gettysburg.edu/gssr/vol5/iss1/10 This open access article is brought to you by The Cupola: Scholarship at Gettysburg College. It has been accepted for inclusion by an authorized administrator of The Cupola. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Painting Outside of the Lines: How Race Assignment can be Rethought Through Art Abstract For centuries art has been used to make us think about our own human experiences. Unfortunately, works usually reflect the era which they were painted in; this has led to various artists showing, maintaining, and therefore reinforcing racist thoughts in our cultures. Art can be used to create a new narrative for our race assignments and their meanings. The idea of loving one's roots has been prevalent in many cultures, but in art form a disconnect between history and the everyday experience can arise which could miss the mark in helping us redefine our own ace.r Therefore, artwork which empowers the present identity of marginalized people’s own race will have a greater appeal and connection to these people.
    [Show full text]
  • 1 SPANISH HISTORIOGRAPHY on the QUESTION of RACE, 1940S-2010: HOW HAVE HISTORIANS APPROACHED PURITY of BLOOD? by Fernanda Quinta
    Spanish Historiography on the Question of Race, 1940s-2010: How Have Historians Approached Purity of Blood? Item Type text; Electronic Thesis Authors Quintanilla, Fernando Publisher The University of Arizona. Rights Copyright © is held by the author. Digital access to this material is made possible by the University Libraries, University of Arizona. Further transmission, reproduction or presentation (such as public display or performance) of protected items is prohibited except with permission of the author. Download date 25/09/2021 11:26:20 Item License http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/ Link to Item http://hdl.handle.net/10150/271939 1 SPANISH HISTORIOGRAPHY ON THE QUESTION OF RACE, 1940s-2010: HOW HAVE HISTORIANS APPROACHED PURITY OF BLOOD? By Fernanda Quintanilla ____________________ A Thesis Submitted to The Honors College In Partial Fulfillment of the Bachelor’s Degree With Honors in History THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA August 2012 Approved by: ________________________________________ _______________________ Dr. David Graizbord Date Department of History 2 STATEMENT BY AUTHOR This thesis has been submitted in partial fulfillment of requirements for a degree at The University of Arizona and is deposited in the University Library to be made available to borrow under rulers of the Library. Signed:______________________________________ 3 Abstract The concept of “purity of blood” in fifteenth and sixteenth century Iberia is one that has given rise to many historical interpretations throughout the decades. The way that race is conceptualized and understood by both the historians who interpret it, and by the society in which in functioned, has shaped the way in which modern historians have approached the study of race.
    [Show full text]
  • La Limpieza De La Sangre, Honor O Mácula En La Sociedad Novohispana. (1580-1620)
    Universidad Autónoma de Querétaro Facultad de Filosofía Licenciatura en Historia La limpieza de la sangre, honor o mácula en la sociedad novohispana. (1580-1620) Tesis Que como parte de los requisitos para obtener el grado de Licenciado en Historia Presenta: Tania Itzel Martínez Aldana Dirigido por: Dra. Juana Patricia Pérez Munguía Querétaro, Querétaro Septiembre 2012. 1 CONTENIDOS. INTRODUCCIÓN………………………………………………………………. 3 CAPÍTULO I. Una España, tres religiones: los antecedentes de la limpieza de sangre…………………………………………………………………………... 18 I.I) Los conversos: ―moriscos‖ y ―judaizantes‖.………………………… 22 I.2) La ―limpieza de Sangre‖, sus definiciones y antecedentes……… 28 I.3) Conclusión...………………………………………………………….. 39 CAPÍTULO II. La limpieza de la sangre y su transferencia al Nuevo Mundo……………………………………………………………………………….. 42 II.I) La limpieza de la sangre a través del Tribunal del Santo Oficio... 51 II.2) El origen social de los conquistadores y colonizadores…………..78 II.3) Conclusión...…………………………………………………………. .87 CAPÍTULO IIII. La limpieza de sangre en la Nueva España, nuevos linajes maculados…………………………………………………………………………. 90 III.I) La situación de los indios…………………………………………... 93 III.2) Los mestizos y las castas, orígenes maculados……………….. 97 III.3) Conclusión….……………………………………………………… 103 REFLEXIONES FINALES…………………………………………………….. 107 ANEXOS………………………………………………………………………… 109 BIBLIOGRAFÍA………………………………………………………………… 116 2 INTRODUCCIÓN. La limpieza de la sangre es un concepto que surge en la España del siglo XV en un contexto histórico caracterizado por la presencia de tres religiones de vital importancia para la vida del reino. En primer lugar estaba la religión católica, en cuyos preceptos se fundamentaron las estructuras sociales y jurídicas del reino, por otro lado estaban los musulmanes, cuya presencia por ocho siglos sin duda le otorgó a España características y valores culturales que dejaron huella en su historia, por último aparecen los judíos, cuyas labores como administradores y recaudadores de impuestos les consiguieron la simpatía y los favores de la Corona.
    [Show full text]
  • The Dark Side of Democracy : Explaining Ethnic Cleansing
    P1: ICD 052183130XAgg.xml CY448B/Mann-II 052183130 X August 2, 2004 11:12 This page intentionally left blank ii P1: ICD 052183130XAgg.xml CY448B/Mann-II 052183130 X August 2, 2004 11:12 The Dark Side of Democracy This book presents a new theory of ethnic cleansing based on the most ter- rible cases – colonial genocides, Armenia, the Nazi Holocaust, Cambodia, Yugoslavia, and Rwanda – and cases of lesser violence – early modern Europe, contemporary India, and Indonesia. Murderous cleansing is modern – it is “the dark side of democracy.” It results where the demos (democracy) is confused with the ethnos (the ethnic group). Danger arises where two rival ethnonational movements each claims “its own” state over the same territory. Conflict esca- lates where either the weaker side fights rather than submit because of aid from outside or the stronger side believes it can deploy sudden, overwhelming force. But the state must also be factionalized and radicalized by external pressures like wars. Premeditation is rare, since perpetrators feel “forced” into escalation when their milder plans are frustrated. Escalation is not simply the work of “evil elites” or “primitive peoples.” It results from complex interactions among leaders, militants, and “core constituencies” of ethnonationalism. Understand- ing this complex process helps us devise policies to avoid ethnic cleansing in the future. Michael Mann is a professor of sociology at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is author of The Sources of Social Power (Cambridge, 1986, 1993) and Fascists
    [Show full text]
  • Rosh Hashanah 2016 Price R50,00 Incl
    J EEWISW I S H A F FA I R S SOUTH AFRICAN JEWRY – 175 Years Rosh Hashanah 2016 Price R50,00 incl. VAT • Registered at the GPO as a Newspaper ISSN 0021 • 6313 MISSION EDITORIAL BOARD In publishing JEWISH AFFAIRS, the SA EXECUTIVE EDITOR Jewish Board of Deputies aims to produce a cultural forum which caters for a wide David Saks SA Jewish Board of Deputies variety of interests in the community. The journal will be a vehicle for the publication of ACADEMIC ADVISORY BOARD articles of significant thought and opinion on Suzanne Belling Author and Journalist contemporary Jewish issues, and will aim to Dr Louise Bethlehem Hebrew University of Jerusalem encourage constructive debate, in the form of Marlene Bethlehem SA Jewish Board of Deputies reasoned and researched essays, on all matters Cedric Ginsberg University of South Africa of Jewish and general interest. Dr Elaine Katz University of the Witwatersrand JEWISH AFFAIRS aims also to publish essays Professor Marcia Leveson of scholarly research on all subjects of Jewish Naomi Musiker Archivist and Bibliographer interest, with special emphasis on aspects Isaac Reznik of South African Jewish life and thought. Gwynne Schrire SA Jewish Board of Deputies Scholarly research papers that make an original Dr Gabriel A Sivan World Jewish Bible Centre contribution to their chosen field of enquiry Professor Gideon Shimoni Hebrew University of Jerusalem will be submitted to the normal processes of academic refereeing before being accepted Professor Milton Shain University of Cape Town for publication. The Hon. Mr Justice Ralph Zulman JEWISH AFFAIRS will promote Jewish ADVERTISING AND SUBSCRIPTIONS – Shirley Beagle cultural and creative achievement in South ENQUIRIES [email protected] Africa, and consider Jewish traditions and 011 645 2583 heritage within the modern context.
    [Show full text]