“Rather More than One-Third Had No Jewish Blood”: American Progressivism and German-Jewish Cosmopolitanism at the New School for Social Research, 1933–1939
Journal Title: Religions - Year 2012, Vol 3, Issue 1
Abstract
The New School for Social Research‘s University in Exile accepted more German and European exiled intellectuals than any other American institution of higher education. This paper argues that transnational, cosmopolitan ideological and interestbased affinities shared by left-leaning American progressives and German-Jewish intellectuals enabled the predominantly Jewish University in Exile to become a vibrant intellectual space accepted by the community of largely anti-Semitic American academics. These affinities also illuminate why, despite the fact that the émigrés‘ exile was in large part the result of National Socialist hatred of Jews, Alvin Johnson (the founder of the University in Exile) and the faculty members that comprised it seldom discussed the University‘s Jewish demographics. The Jewish faculty members ignored the relationship between their ethnicity and exile because to focus on it would have been to admit that the cosmopolitan project they had embraced in Central Europe had failed. Johnson ignored the faculty‘s Jewish heritage for two reasons. First, he endorsed a cosmopolitan American nationalism. Second, he understood that the generally anti-Semitic community of American academics would have rejected the University in Exile if he stressed the faculty‘s Jewishness. In ignoring the University in Exile‘s Jewish demographics, Johnson and the University‘s faculty successfully adhered to a strategy designed to foster the exiles‘ entrance into the American intellectual community. Thus, while cosmopolitanism failed in Germany and Central Europe, the exiles‘ later influence on the American academy indicates that it partially succeeded in the United States.
Authors and Affiliations
Daniel Bessner
Keywords
Related Articles
- EP ID EP25231
- DOI https://doi.org/10.3390/rel3010099
- Views 367
- Downloads 15
Typology and the Holocaust: Erich Auerbach and Judeo-Christian Europe
In response to Nazi exclusion of the Jews from German society on racial grounds, Erich Auerbach (1892–1957), a secular Jewish intellectual inspired by cultural Protestantism and Catholicism, formed a vision of a cosmop...
To Never See Death: Yeats, Reincarnation, and Resolving the Antinomies of the Body-Soul Dilemma
This essay addresses the ideas and schemas of reincarnation as used in the poetry and prose of William Butler Yeats, with particular focus on the two editions of A Vision. It contrasts the metaphysical system as given...
A Biblical Poetics for Filmmakers
In this paper, we present a poetics, or guide manual, for making narrative films that resemble biblical narratives. It is similar to Aristotle’s Poetics, only his was for creating drama (though it is of course often us...
Fighting Rage with Fear: The “Faces of Muhammad” and the Limits of Secular Rationality
In recent years, a number of incidents have pitted Islam against secularism and liberal democracy. This essay examines the Danish publication of the Prophet Muhammad cartoons in order to examine the deployment of ratio...
The Optimal Level of Strictness and Congregational Growth
Beginning with Kelley’s and Iannaccone’s foundational studies, scholars have examined how strictness impacts congregational outcomes. This paper seeks to further develop the strict church thesis by examining Iannaccone...