You Don’t Have to be Jewish to Hate Levy’s Real Jewish Rye Bread

Abstract

ABSTRACT An assimilated, white body is disciplined and individualized. This body is forged through practices of eating, which can be found across anthropological research, advertisement campaigns, and my own queer, Southern, Jewish, narrative. This paper will critically examine the ‘Levy’s Jewish Rye Bread’ campaign and its emphasis on dissociation as a case study, exploring the ways in which invisibilizing the Jewish Body contributes to its assimilation. Ultimately, the Levy’s ad campaign highlights the question: What does fatphobia have to do with Ashkenazi Jewish assimilation into whiteness? What might embodied alternatives to assimilation look like? My analysis theorizes Jewish ritual as a practice of refusing fatphobia, rejecting compulsions of white-bodied discipline and celebrating a radiant, discordant belonging.