Read more
"This unique book provides a critical perspective on identity to question how Israeli Jews manage and manifest their concern for the Palestinian Other, eschewing presenting identities as concrete and, rather, examining their creation through discourse. Considering the construction of Israeli Jewish national identity in the context of a state that has institutionalized a ressentiment discourse, this book examines how alternative discourses try, and sometimes fail, to re-imagine Israeli Jewish national identity in non-oppressive forms. It combines a rigorous theoretical analysis of nationalism and an engaging examination of the identifications and contradictions of eleven Israeli Jewish individuals. Featuring, among others, high profile journalist Gideon Levy, veteran maverick Uri Davis and literary novelist Dorit Rabinyan, Attwell provides a revealing insight into national identity, political dissent, conflict and resistance"--
List of contents
Preface Introduction PART I: CONTEXT 1. Ressentiment and the State 2. Ressentiment Zionism 3. The Dissidents' Context PART II: DISSENT 4. Meet the Dissidents 5. The Themes of Dissident Dissonance: Historicisation and Identification 6. The Themes of Dissident Dissonance: Zionism and the Self 7. Dissident Discourses 8. Conclusion
About the author
Katie Attwell works in the Sir Walter Murdoch School of Public Policy and International Affairs at Murdoch University, Australia. She has a background as a practitioner of activism, community development and advocacy. She is interested in 'middle spaces' in social movements and discourses, and her research interests include nationalism, ethnic conflict, sex and gender, identity politics and the teaching of critical approaches to identity.
Additional text
"Attwell sets to uncover, interpret and reconstruct the ways in which Jewish-Israeli dissidents negotiate some apparent (even if unnamed or incapable of being named) dilemmas in their very identities. She convincingly delineates the parameters of the construction of reality by the Zionist discourse. Attwell's empirical work is a tour de force of narrative analysis, demonstrating independence, insight and thoughtfulness. Her honest and sensitive writing handles the nuances of her subjects, managing to see them much more clearly than they view themselves. This book is a valuable contribution to our understanding of one of humanity's most powerful inventions, namely nationalism." - Dr Yaacov Yadgar, author of Secularism and Religion in Jewish Israeli Politics: Traditionists and Modernity
"Katie Attwell has written a highly original, methodologically sophisticated exploration of just how deep are the rifts in Israeli identity, chiefly through extended interviews of 11 'dissident' Israelis in order to understand in depth the logic of their protests. A fascinating look at the pathology of living in the 'Jewish State' and the internal limits to its reform." - Professor Joel Kovel, author of Overcoming Zionism: Creating a Single Democratic State in Israel/Palestine
Report
"Attwell sets to uncover, interpret and reconstruct the ways in which Jewish-Israeli dissidents negotiate some apparent (even if unnamed or incapable of being named) dilemmas in their very identities. She convincingly delineates the parameters of the construction of reality by the Zionist discourse. Attwell's empirical work is a tour de force of narrative analysis, demonstrating independence, insight and thoughtfulness. Her honest and sensitive writing handles the nuances of her subjects, managing to see them much more clearly than they view themselves. This book is a valuable contribution to our understanding of one of humanity's most powerful inventions, namely nationalism." - Dr Yaacov Yadgar, author of Secularism and Religion in Jewish Israeli Politics: Traditionists and Modernity
"Katie Attwell has written a highly original, methodologically sophisticated exploration of just how deep are the rifts in Israeli identity, chiefly through extended interviews of 11 'dissident' Israelis in order to understand in depth the logic of their protests. A fascinating look at the pathology of living in the 'Jewish State' and the internal limits to its reform." - Professor Joel Kovel, author of Overcoming Zionism: Creating a Single Democratic State in Israel/Palestine
