Philadelphia Jewish Life 1940 2000

In a city with a long history of high social barriers and forbidding aristocratic preserves, Philadelphia Jews, in the last half of the twentieth century, became a force to reckon with in the cultural, political and economic life of the region. From the poor neighborhoods of original immigrant settlement, in South and West Philadelphia, Jews have made, as Murray Friedman recounts, the move from "outsiders" to "insiders" in Philadelphia life. Essays by a diverse range of contributors tell the story of this transformation in many spheres of life, both in and out of the Jewish community: from sports, politics, political alliances with other minority groups, to the significant debate between Zionists and anti-Zionists during and immediately after the war.In this new edition, Friedman takes the history of Philadelphia Jewish life to the close of the twentieth century, and looks back on how Jews have shaped-and have been shaped by-Philadelphia and its long immigrant history. Author note: Murray Friedman is Middle-Atlantic Regional Director of the American Jewish Committee and Director of the Myer and Rosaline Feinstein Center for American Jewish History at Temple University. He is the author or editor of numerous books, including, most recently (with Albert D. Chernin), A Second Exodus: The American Movement to Free Soviet Jews.

In the 1950s and 1960s, as the white residents, real estate agents, and municipal officials of many American cities fought to keep African Americans out of traditionally white neighborhoods, Philadelphia’s West Mount Airy became one of the first neighborhoods in the nation where residents came together around a community-wide mission toward intentional integration. As West Mount Airy experienced transition, homeowners fought economic and legal policies that encouraged white flight and threatened the quality of local schools, seeking to find an alternative to racial separation without knowing what they would create in its place. In Making Good Neighbors, Abigail Perkiss tells the remarkable story of West Mount Airy, drawing on archival research and her oral history interviews with residents to trace their efforts, which began in the years following World War II and continued through the turn of the twenty-first century. The organizing principles of neighborhood groups like the West Mount Airy Neighbors Association (WMAN) were fundamentally liberal and emphasized democracy, equality, and justice; the social, cultural, and economic values of these groups were also decidedly grounded in middle-class ideals and white-collar professionalism. As Perkiss shows, this liberal, middle-class framework would ultimately become contested by more militant black activists and from within WMAN itself, as community leaders worked to adapt and respond to the changing racial landscape of the 1960s and 1970s. The West Mount Airy case stands apart from other experiments in integration because of the intentional, organized, and long-term commitment on the part of WMAN to biracial integration and, in time, multiracial and multiethnic diversity. The efforts of residents in the 1950s and 1960s helped to define the neighborhood as it exists today.

The Black Panther Party and Transformative Pedagogy: Place-Based Education in Philadelphia, by Omari L. Dyson,is the first scholarly text to detail the social relief efforts of the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Branch of the Black Panther Party. Through a postcolonial lens, this story captures the lived resistances, highlights the socio-historical context, and examines the discourse of former members of the Black Panther Party and local residents of Philadelphia from 1968-1974. Overall, this book provides insight from a multiplicity of sources to better capture the identity(-ies) and complexity of the organization. Not only does this text resolve a dearth in the literature that highlights the multiple facets of the Black Panther Party (especially at the local level), but it serves as a template on effective strategies for researchers, educators, and policymakers to implement on their quest for social and educational transformation.

Philadelphia is famous for its colonial and revolutionary buildings and artifacts, which draw tourists from far and wide to gain a better understanding of the nation’s founding. Philadelphians, too, value these same buildings and artifacts for the stories they tell about their city. But Philadelphia existed long before the Liberty Bell was first rung, and its history extends well beyond the American Revolution.In Philadelphia: A Narrative History, Paul Kahan presents a comprehensive portrait of the city, from the region’s original Lenape inhabitants to the myriad of residents in the twenty-first century. As any history of Philadelphia should, this book chronicles the people and places that make the city unique: from Independence Hall to Eastern State Penitentiary, Benjamin Franklin and Betsy Ross to Cecil B. Moore and Cherelle Parker. Kahan also shows us how Philadelphia has always been defined by ethnic, religious, and racial diversity—from the seventeenth century, when Dutch, Swedes, and Lenapes lived side by side along the Delaware; to the nineteenth century, when the city was home to a vibrant community of free Black and formerly enslaved people; to the twentieth century, when it attracted immigrants from around the world. This diversity, however, often resulted in conflict, especially over access to public spaces. Those two themes— diversity and conflict— have shaped Philadelphia’s development and remain visible in the city’s culture, society, and even its geography. Understanding Philadelphia’s past, Kahan says, is key to envisioning future possibilities for the City of Brotherly Love.

The racial and ethnic composition of Philadelphia continues to diversify as a new wave of immigrants—largely from Asia and Latin America—reshape the city’s demographic landscape. Moreover, in a globalized economy, immigration is the key to a city’s survival and competitiveness. The contributors to Global Philadelphia examine how Philadelphia has affected its immigrants’ lives, and how these immigrants, in turn, have shaped Philadelphia. Providing a detailed historical, ethnographic, and sociological look at Philadelphia’s immigrant communities, this volume examines the social and economic dynamics of various ethnic populations. Significantly, the contributors make comparisons to and connections between the traditional immigrant groups—Germans, Italians, the Irish, Jews, Puerto Ricans, and Chinese—and newer arrivals, such as Cambodians, Haitians, Indians, Mexicans, and African immigrants of various nationalities. While their experiences vary, Global Philadelphia focuses on some of the critical features that face all immigrant groups—intra-group diversity, the role of institutions, and ties to the homeland. Taken together, these essays provide a richer understanding of the processes and implications of contemporary immigration to the area.

This nuanced reassessment transforms our understanding of Horace Pippin, casting the artist and his celebrated paintings as more complex than has previously been recognized