The Jews of Latin America

The Jews of Latin America examines the role played by Jewish communities in shaping the history of Latin America. It is an ambitious and groundbreaking work that analyzes and describes the varied ecology, ethnicity, traditions, and policies that characterize Jewish life in more than twenty Latin American nation-states. Inserting Latin America into Jewish history expands the traditional boundaries for surveying global Jewish diasporas. In counterpoint, as Professor Elkin writes, “....viewing Latin American societies from a Jewish perspective challenges the traditional notion of these societies as unalterably Hispanic and Catholic, a notion that perpetuates the nationalist view of Jews as disturbers of some ideal society. It is becoming more and more apparent that non-Latin, non-Iberian immigrants played a role in the evolution of the Latin American republics, and that their societies are increasingly pluralistic in reality if not in ideology. Jews are a part of this new reality, and uncovering their life stories reveals the modernizing dynamic they brought with them.”