Staying on Board with Proper Course Adjustments: American Jewish History, 1993-2012

In 1993, at the conclusion of my centennial history of the American Jewish Historical Society's (AJHS) journal, I projected that "any future study of the next epoch in [its] history . . . undoubtedly" would begin with an evaluation of a relatively new feature of the scholarly periodical. A decade earlier, in 1982, with Marc Lee Raphael at the helm as editor and with me as his "second mate," we had introduced retrospectives on the most influential works in American Jewish history. Our thinking was that "our field thankfully had reached such a level of sophistication and maturity that we could now identify works that were 'classics' and that had influenced generations of students and scholars." So let me take my own advice and begin this "progress report" on American Jewish History (AJH), from 1993 to 2012, with a thought or two on the fate of the initiative that began when Deborah Dash Moore and Jenna W. Joselit joined senior leaders of our discipline—such as Arthur A. Goren and Selma Berrol—in starting us off by writing about Moses Rischin's The Promised City: New York's Jews, 1870-1914.¹

For the succeeding ten years—until Raphael and I retired from our posts in 2002—this feature of the journal surely had two friends at the editors' desks. Predictably, Irving Howe's best-selling The World of Our Fathers came under close scrutiny. Readers were afforded not only an evaluation of this magisterial volume, but also, through the reminiscence of Howe's research associate Kenneth Libo, a look inside the workings of a scholarly partnership. Most critically, this edition gave a younger colleague an opportunity to lament the paucity of work done on the saga of the Jewish left in America since The World of Our Fathers appeared, and to reset a research agenda for that field. As academics, Raphael and I were pleased that the journal was—as always —fully cognizant of the changing dimensions of research. Subsequently, Leon A. Jick's The Americanization of the Synagogue, 1820-1870 was both lauded for its pathbreaking treatment of how synagogues evolved denominationally in 19th-century America and critiqued for some noteworthy omissions. In one most revealing criticism, a historian who has deepened our understanding of women's roles in synagogue life has implicitly suggested that Jick's social history approach, which focused solely on men's experiences, engendered in her a desire to balance the record.²

Beyond these forays into looking at prior landmark works, our focus on advancing the horizons of scholarship also led us to tap into the work of those who were making their marks in new or underappreciated areas of research. Their guest-edited editions—a feature that our predecessor Henry L. Feingold introduced—continued to bring creative and often pathbreaking work to our readers. Thus, the journal was, for example, a forum for studies of "performance and Jewish cultural history" and Jewish engagement with American sports. In these two venues, those associated with us labored assiduously to entertain our general audience while publishing social history that fit within the boundaries of academic canons. We certainly stayed clear of lionizing Jewish chorus girls or glorifying "Jewish jocks." But as a membership organization with subscribers possessed of a variety of interests, we sometimes had to deal with those who wanted to popularize the journal's work out of proportion. Our answer was that we would endeavor to ensure that the best of scholarship was accessible to all readers.

Meanwhile, a warranted recognition of regionalism led to two special issues on the history of Jews south of the Mason-Dixon Line. In addition to refocusing attention away from the oft-considered sagas of Northeastern Jews (read: New York's Lower East Side, made famous by Rischin, Howe and so many others), this southern exposure sparked an ongoing debate about the uniqueness of Jewish existence in every section of America. Predictably, another guest issue focused on Jewish women's history. It was the journal's second such endeavor in this area. In addition to this explicit recognition of gender...