Emerging Jewish Communities in an Era of Globalization
By Nathan P. Devir
Reviewed by Lior Shragg
Assured in tone and ambitious in scope, this volume on emerging Jewish communities signals the arrival of an important foray into the “new” global Jewish community. It is apparent within the first few pages that Nathan Devir has a sophisticated understanding of how his work fits in with existing scholarship. Through extensive fieldwork and research, New Children of Israel ambitiously tackles issues that so-called “emergent” Jewish communities face in a period of globalization. The book is organized into three captivating parts, each with its own case study as the lens for Devir’s arguments and observations.
The first section is titled Structuring Nostalgia in Akanland: The “House of Israel” of Ghana. In this part, Devir explores how memory and space contribute to developing Ghanaian Jewish identity, and what exactly it means to be a Jew in “Akanland.” Touching on important themes such as “lost-ness,” “normative Judaism,” and “inter-ethnic and religious relationships,” this primary case study is an excellent steppingstone to the rest of the book.
The second section, Online Spiritual Volition:The “Internet Jews” of Cameroon, offers a critical addition to prior scholarship on Afro-Judaic communities. Through Devir’s clever examination of the role of technology in emerging Jewish communities, we learn about the Beth Yeshourun of Cameroon and their chance discovery of Judaism through the internet in the late 1990s. In a departure from the previous chapter, Devir focuses on a Jewish community that does not claim ancestry from the Lost Ten Tribes of Israel. He shows the link between this new Cameroonian Jewish community and other African-Christian movements.
The last section is titled Political Revivalism as Religious Practice: The “Children of Ephraim” of India. In it, Devir explores the complex identity of the Bene Ephraim community in relation to other Indian Jewish communities, as well as to other ethnic and religious groups and their social place in India’s caste system.
This book is a must-have for anyone interested in global Jewish communities. Scholars as well as casual readers will delight in the personal ethnographic nature of Devir’s writing, along with citation of secondary sources and references to related fields. Devir’s case studies “dive right in,” so to speak, and some readers may find themselves disappointed in the lack of rudimentary surface-level information.
Readers seeking more in-depth information on the histories of these communities may also be disappointed. Nevertheless, Devir’s engaging and thoughtful treatises are of critical importance to the continued study of these communities. The field of Jewish studies is indebted to Devir for his contribution as the gateway to the next critical era of global Jewish study.
Lior Shragg is a Chicago-based ethnomusicologist, percussionist, and composer. His current research focuses on the musical practices of the Zimbabwean Jewish communities. He has conducted fieldwork in Ghana, Nigeria, and Jamaica.
Professor Nathan Devir is an expert on isolated and emerging Jewish groups from the developing world and is the chair of the Kulanu Academic Cohort (kulanu.org/kulanuacademiccohort). He teaches Jewish Studies at the University of Utah and is the director of the university’s Religious Studies program and the Middle East Center.