Jews, God, and Videotape: Religion and Media in America (review)

Every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday evenings throughout the 1930s, American Jews could tune into WEVD and hear the "incomparable" Sheindele the Chazente give voice to some of Judaism's most cherished liturgy in a program underwritten by Planters Edible Oil Company. Elsewhere within the sonic landscape, a recording of Yossele Rosenblatt's fabled performance of "Eyli, Eyli" was sponsored by the Loose-Wiles Biscuit Company, the manufacturers of Sunshine Biscuits, a product that the renowned cantor credited with having saved his life while he was on tour. "In all the Jewish homes that I visit[ed] throughout the country they serve Sunshine Kosher Cookies," Rosenblatt told his fans, offering his own seal of approval on the tasty treat (23).

Tempting as it may be to roll one's eyes and cluck one's tongue at this union of consumerism and Judaism or to pass it off as a dark and dire consequence of Americanization, Jeffrey Shandler's new book takes an entirely different, and much welcome, tack. It situates these and dozens of other latter-day phenomena within a refreshingly new and eye-opening context: that of the relationship between religion and the media, both old and new. Although the field of media studies has had a lot to say about the Jews and Hollywood or the Jews and stand-up comedy, it has been insufficiently attentive to the impact of the media on the meanings and practices of modern Judaism. Jews, God, and Videotape intends to change all that. "Far from being incompatible or destructive, new media can enable a wealth of possibilities for enhancing religiosity," it ringingly affirms, suggesting through a series of closely considered case studies, the multiple ways in which modern Jewish life has been redefined, let alone enriched, through its encounter with sound recordings, film, photography, and the internet (12).

Casting a broad net and a sharp eye, Shandler's account opens with an analysis of how sound recordings of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries transformed liturgy into repertoire and would-be daveners (worshippers) into an audience, and concludes with a look at how Lubavitcher Hasidim at the dawn of this century presciently made use of the internet to nurture a global, if virtual, sense of community in the wake of its rebbe's death. The growing role that personal videography plays in marking rites of passage; the impact of interfaith greeting cards on the celebration of both Christmas and Hanukkah; and the relationship between cinematic evocations of the Old World and the pilgrimages to which they give rise are also given their due in this pioneering book. Putting it all together, Jews, God and Videotape makes a powerfully compelling case for integrating the study of media practices within that of modern Jewish history and ethnography.

Even so, this book is not without its shortcomings. For one thing, it tends to be much too fond of locutions such as "alterity," and "imbrication," those contemporary instances of academic-speak that camouflage rather than clarify. For another, the narrative is often crammed with dutiful citations from the extant literature, generating a kind of academic ventriloquism. A review of the literature is one thing; it's quite another to have Shandler's penetrating insights punctuated every other sentence by some one else's; I, for one, would be happier reading what he has to say. More pointedly still, Jews, God and Videotape has all of the virtues and all of the defects associated with its genre: each of the case studies contained within its pages could be more tightly woven together so that they add up, cumulatively, instead of leading somewhat independent lives. Toward that end, a stronger and more robust conclusion that pulled everything together would have brought this volume to a stunning close.

But these are quibbles. All I know is that after making my way through this wide-ranging and incisive book, I will never listen to music, surf the net, send a...