“A French Jew emancipated the Blacks”: discursive strategies of French Jews in the age of transnational emancipations
“A French Jew emancipated the Blacks”: discursive strategies of French Jews in the age of transnational emancipations
This article examines the rhetorical strategies put in place by French Jewish activists to demand equal civil and political rights for Jews in southeastern Europe in the second half of the nineteenth century. It identifies the parallel they drew between the abolition of slavery and Jewish emancipation as a central plank in this campaign. Through references to the antislavery movement, French Jews sought to make Jewish emancipation a matter of international law and mobilize different constituencies at home and abroad. Drawing on the biblical story of the Exodus, this abolitionist rhetoric was an attempt to challenge the Christian nature of abolitionism and oppose exclusionary views of European society. The emergence of this new emancipatory discourse is analyzed within the national framework of France as well as in a broader eastern European and world context.
645–74
Duhaut, Noëmie
002ec880-ae5c-4552-82f8-bce3fe5bf41c
1 October 2021
Duhaut, Noëmie
002ec880-ae5c-4552-82f8-bce3fe5bf41c
Duhaut, Noëmie
(2021)
“A French Jew emancipated the Blacks”: discursive strategies of French Jews in the age of transnational emancipations.
French Historical Studies, 44 (4), .
(doi:10.1215/00161071-9248713).
Abstract
This article examines the rhetorical strategies put in place by French Jewish activists to demand equal civil and political rights for Jews in southeastern Europe in the second half of the nineteenth century. It identifies the parallel they drew between the abolition of slavery and Jewish emancipation as a central plank in this campaign. Through references to the antislavery movement, French Jews sought to make Jewish emancipation a matter of international law and mobilize different constituencies at home and abroad. Drawing on the biblical story of the Exodus, this abolitionist rhetoric was an attempt to challenge the Christian nature of abolitionism and oppose exclusionary views of European society. The emergence of this new emancipatory discourse is analyzed within the national framework of France as well as in a broader eastern European and world context.
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Published date: 1 October 2021
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Local EPrints ID: 486583
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/486583
ISSN: 0016-1071
PURE UUID: 06a81ab4-468f-4ff1-b7a9-1b3e1dddf3e2
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Date deposited: 26 Jan 2024 17:49
Last modified: 18 Mar 2024 04:17
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Noëmie Duhaut
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