Sotomayor, pork and the meaning of Latino http://blogs.jta.org/ENTRY_PERMALINK_HERE/sotomayor-pork-and-the-meaning-of-latino/ JTA’s Ron Kampeas weighs in on the debate. en-us rkampeas@jta.org Copyright 2009 2009-05-27T;01:24:00-05:00 Comment by Aliza Hausman amhausman@gmail.com Thank you for this piece. I have been arguing with my Eastern European Jewish friends about ‘who is Latino’ ever since Sotomayor was nominated. I was glad to hear someone in the Jewish community come out and define Latino for the Jewish audience. This piece has been a great help. Thank you for this piece. I have been arguing with my Eastern European Jewish friends about ‘who is Latino’ ever since Sotomayor was nominated. I was glad to hear someone in the Jewish community come out and define Latino for the Jewish audience. This piece has been a great help.

]]> 2012-02-10T;00:53:00-05:00 Comment by Benjamin Goldberg bgoldberg@u.northwestern.edu This post is incredibly moving and Mr. Kampeas speaks with depth about this issue. Yesterday I decided that Cardozo was Hispanic, but this essay made me reconsider these categories. I’m an Ashkenazi Jew with roots in Poland, Russia, Hungary, Germany, etc. When I signed up to be a bone marrow donor recently, they asked me to indicate my specific ethnicity( to increase likelihood of a match) and I hesitantly put down Eastern European. This felt strange because I consider myself a Jew by both ethnicity and religion. This experience and Mr. Kampeas’ post bring up larger issues of Jewish identity: how do racial and national identities coincide with Jewish identity?  Are Jews “white”? Is a Jew with ancestral roots in the same Polish shtetle as mine but whose ancestors happened to immigrate to Argentina instead of the US “Hispanic”? What about Jews of African descent like the Ethiopians in Israel or the communities in Uganda and Nigeria? Or the Indian Jews of Mumbai or the Chinese Jews of Kaifeng? These are fascinating issues to probe in 21 century Jewish identity. Once again, thank you Mr. Kampeas for your enlightening and highly personal post. This post is incredibly moving and Mr. Kampeas speaks with depth about this issue. Yesterday I decided that Cardozo was Hispanic, but this essay made me reconsider these categories.

I’m an Ashkenazi Jew with roots in Poland, Russia, Hungary, Germany, etc. When I signed up to be a bone marrow donor recently, they asked me to indicate my specific ethnicity( to increase likelihood of a match) and I hesitantly put down Eastern European. This felt strange because I consider myself a Jew by both ethnicity and religion.

This experience and Mr. Kampeas’ post bring up larger issues of Jewish identity: how do racial and national identities coincide with Jewish identity?  Are Jews “white”? Is a Jew with ancestral roots in the same Polish shtetle as mine but whose ancestors happened to immigrate to Argentina instead of the US “Hispanic”? What about Jews of African descent like the Ethiopians in Israel or the communities in Uganda and Nigeria? Or the Indian Jews of Mumbai or the Chinese Jews of Kaifeng?

These are fascinating issues to probe in 21 century Jewish identity.

Once again, thank you Mr. Kampeas for your enlightening and highly personal post.

]]> 2012-02-10T;00:53:00-05:00 Comment by Leland Madearis leland@twinvalley.net Kinda like establishing the connection between “Medearis” and “Mereda” on the Catherine in 1654.  Very Sephardic and very doable, I hope. Kinda like establishing the connection between “Medearis” and “Mereda” on the Catherine in 1654.  Very Sephardic and very doable, I hope.

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