Details
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 512-534 |
| Number of pages | 23 |
| Journal | Atlantic Studies : Global Currents |
| Volume | 13 |
| Issue number | 4 |
| Early online date | 11 Jul 2016 |
| Publication status | Published - 1 Oct 2016 |
| Externally published | Yes |
Abstract
This article examines how Jewish immigrants of the so-called New Immigration (1880–1924) used the space of autobiography to symbolically “discover” and “possess” the New World and discusses this kind of narrative identity fashioning against the national debate over immigration restriction. Works such as Mary Antin’s The Promised Land (1912), Marcus E. Ravage’s An American in the Making (1917), Elizabeth Hasanovitz’s One of Them (1918), and Rose Cohen’s Out of the Shadow (1918) take up the El Dorado myth when describing America as a “land of gold” and thus appropriate a popular discourse pattern of Spanish explorers and conquistadores. They also appropriate discourses of wonder and taking possession that are prevalent in traditional European New World writing. Wonder – a direct reaction to the first encounter with unknown places, people, and objects – is omnipresent in these texts and conveyed by various linguistic and narrative strategies. Trading exotic Yiddish names for Americanized versions or entering American educational institutions constitute acts of taking possession, and are, in fact, modern variants of Spanish practices of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Jewish-American immigrant authors negotiated their narrative identities as model American citizens by adopting popular discourse patterns of Spanish discoverers and conquistadores, and by changing them according to their own political purposes, interests, and needs. Such narrative identities framed the immigrants’ transatlantic journey in ways that linked them with America’s mythical past and thus enabled the entire group to feel at home in the United States, to inscribe themselves into the nation’s origin stories, and to (re)negotiate the meaning of Americanness.
Keywords
- Christopher Columbus, European New World writing, Immigrant autobiography, immigration restriction debate, Jewish Americans, nativism, New Immigration
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Social Sciences(all)
- Cultural Studies
- Arts and Humanities(all)
- History
- Arts and Humanities(all)
- Literature and Literary Theory
Sustainable Development Goals
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In: Atlantic Studies : Global Currents, Vol. 13, No. 4, 01.10.2016, p. 512-534.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › Research › peer review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Jewish immigrants as New World explorers and conquistadores
T2 - narrative identity fashioning and political purpose in the early twentieth century
AU - Loock, Kathleen
PY - 2016/10/1
Y1 - 2016/10/1
N2 - This article examines how Jewish immigrants of the so-called New Immigration (1880–1924) used the space of autobiography to symbolically “discover” and “possess” the New World and discusses this kind of narrative identity fashioning against the national debate over immigration restriction. Works such as Mary Antin’s The Promised Land (1912), Marcus E. Ravage’s An American in the Making (1917), Elizabeth Hasanovitz’s One of Them (1918), and Rose Cohen’s Out of the Shadow (1918) take up the El Dorado myth when describing America as a “land of gold” and thus appropriate a popular discourse pattern of Spanish explorers and conquistadores. They also appropriate discourses of wonder and taking possession that are prevalent in traditional European New World writing. Wonder – a direct reaction to the first encounter with unknown places, people, and objects – is omnipresent in these texts and conveyed by various linguistic and narrative strategies. Trading exotic Yiddish names for Americanized versions or entering American educational institutions constitute acts of taking possession, and are, in fact, modern variants of Spanish practices of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Jewish-American immigrant authors negotiated their narrative identities as model American citizens by adopting popular discourse patterns of Spanish discoverers and conquistadores, and by changing them according to their own political purposes, interests, and needs. Such narrative identities framed the immigrants’ transatlantic journey in ways that linked them with America’s mythical past and thus enabled the entire group to feel at home in the United States, to inscribe themselves into the nation’s origin stories, and to (re)negotiate the meaning of Americanness.
AB - This article examines how Jewish immigrants of the so-called New Immigration (1880–1924) used the space of autobiography to symbolically “discover” and “possess” the New World and discusses this kind of narrative identity fashioning against the national debate over immigration restriction. Works such as Mary Antin’s The Promised Land (1912), Marcus E. Ravage’s An American in the Making (1917), Elizabeth Hasanovitz’s One of Them (1918), and Rose Cohen’s Out of the Shadow (1918) take up the El Dorado myth when describing America as a “land of gold” and thus appropriate a popular discourse pattern of Spanish explorers and conquistadores. They also appropriate discourses of wonder and taking possession that are prevalent in traditional European New World writing. Wonder – a direct reaction to the first encounter with unknown places, people, and objects – is omnipresent in these texts and conveyed by various linguistic and narrative strategies. Trading exotic Yiddish names for Americanized versions or entering American educational institutions constitute acts of taking possession, and are, in fact, modern variants of Spanish practices of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Jewish-American immigrant authors negotiated their narrative identities as model American citizens by adopting popular discourse patterns of Spanish discoverers and conquistadores, and by changing them according to their own political purposes, interests, and needs. Such narrative identities framed the immigrants’ transatlantic journey in ways that linked them with America’s mythical past and thus enabled the entire group to feel at home in the United States, to inscribe themselves into the nation’s origin stories, and to (re)negotiate the meaning of Americanness.
KW - Christopher Columbus
KW - European New World writing
KW - Immigrant autobiography
KW - immigration restriction debate
KW - Jewish Americans
KW - nativism
KW - New Immigration
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84978096901&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1080/14788810.2016.1192828
DO - 10.1080/14788810.2016.1192828
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84978096901
VL - 13
SP - 512
EP - 534
JO - Atlantic Studies : Global Currents
JF - Atlantic Studies : Global Currents
SN - 1478-8810
IS - 4
ER -