Inscribing Devotion and Death: Archaeological Evidence for Jewish Populations of North Africa (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9789004163706)

Reliance on essentialist or syncretistic models of cultural dynamics has limited past evaluations of ancient Jewish populations. This reexamination of evidence for Jews of North Africa offers an alternative approach. Drawing from methods developed in cultural studies and historical linguistics, this book replaces traditional categories used to examine evidence for early Jewish populations and demonstrates how direct comparison of Jewish material evidence with that of its neighbors allows for a reassessment of what the category of "Jewish" might have meant in different North African locations and periods and, by extension, elsewhere in the Mediterranean. The result is a transformed analysis of Jewish cultural identity that both emphasizes its indebtedness to larger regional contexts and allows for a more informed and complex understanding of Jewish cultural distinctiveness.

Author: Karen Stern
ISBN-10: 9004163700
ISBN-13: 9789004163706
Publisher: Brill
Language: English
Published: 12/26/2007
Pages: 342
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 1.58lbs
Size: 9.58h x 6.58w x 0.94d

Review Citation(s):
Reference and Research Bk News 05/01/2008 pg. 62