The rise and demise of Ashkenazi cuisine in Israel/Palestine

The marginalization of the foodways of a hegemonic ethnicity

Bibliographic Data

ID19005182
AuthorsR Grosglik (0000-0003-3510-1656, Sociology and Anthropology,Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer-Sheva, Israel, corresponding author), Nir Avieli (0000-0002-6575-0756, Sociology and Anthropology,Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer-Sheva, Israel)
Year2023
Volume36
Issue1
Pages122-142
Publication date2023-10-04
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueHistory and Anthropology (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0275-7206 • E-ISSN: 1477-2612
PublisherTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/02757206.2023.2261965
OpenAlexW4387340764
LanguageEN
References cited51

Food plays a central role in the construction of national and ethnic identities. This article examines the marginalization of Ashkenazi (Jews of European descent) cuisine in Israel/Palestine, despite the dominance and hegemonic status of Ashkenazi identity in Israeli society. By examining the foodways of a ‘hegemonic ethnicity’, we expand upon previous research on ethnic identities in migrant communities. By analyzing the culinary processes of adaptation, simplification, and vulgarization that East-European fare underwent in Israel/Palestine, as well as the social contexts of the centrality of the Holocaust in Israeli cosmology and the consolidation of Mizrahi identity, we explain the rise, demise (and, perhaps, revival) of Ashkenazi cuisine in this country. Drawing on ethnographic and primary historical sources, this socio-historical analysis uncovers the intermittent processes of marginalization and estrangement, as well as the dynamic and contingent nature of the de-ethnization and re-ethnization of hegemonic ethnicities’ cultural practices

Demise · Ethnic group · Ethnic history · Ethnology · Foodways · Hegemony · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Anthropology · Culinary Culture and Tourism · Gender Studies · History · Jewish and Middle Eastern Studies · Law · Migration, Ethnicity, and Economy

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