Revisiting History, Rethinking Identity: Some Cabo Verdean Profiles in Afro-Jewish Journeys

Abstract

ABSTRACTReligious diversity dates to the founding of Cabo Verdean society by Portuguese explorers in the mid-15th century. Increasing anti-Semitism that claimed Iberia beginning in the last decades of that century propelled a disproportionate number of Jews to join Catholic Portuguese migrants emigrating (for their own reasons) to the previously-unoccupied islands of Cabo Verde. Centuries later, another “wave” of Jews fleeing persecution—this time, in Morocco—reached Cabo Verde. In this article, I profile several living Cabo Verdeans with Jewish ancestry, to sample the variety of ways in which diasporic Cabo Verdeans themselves understand and experience their intriguing Afro-Jewish heritage.