The Vogue of Jewish Self-Hatred in Post-World War II America

Abstract

This article asks how and why concept of came into theoretical, social scientific, literary, and critical vogue in 1940s and 1950s America. It argues that proliferating public discourse on Jewish self-hatred grew out of three overlapping developments. First was influence of psychological experts on American public life. Second was influence of German Jewish emigre intellectuals like Kurt Lewin in giving social scientific legitimacy to idea of Jewish self-hatred. Third was polemical deployment of concept of Jewish self-hatred and idea of the authoritarian personality in Jewish Cold War—a contentious public debate among defenders of Jewish particularism and Jewish nationalism, on one hand, and proponents of liberal universalism, on other. This debate revolved around questions of Jewish group loyalty, survival, and belonging, and it included figures as diverse as Ludwig Lewisohn, David Riesman, Philip Roth, Clement Greenberg, and Harold Rosenberg.