Make yourself at home: Jewish belonging and sociability in Berlin, Paris and St. Petersburg, 1890--1950s

This dissertation examines how Jews constructed and articulated their self-identification in Berlin, Paris and St. Petersburg/Leningrad in the first part of the twentieth century. It contends that the nature of belonging to these Jewish communities was fundamentally reformulated as communal adherence based on religious definitions gave way to voluntary, individual membership. Throughout the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, the Jews of the three cities reconstructed their sense of Jewish self-identification on the basis of a network of social, cultural, ethnic, linguistic, and also but not exclusively religious connections. As legal and social boundaries crumbled in the post-emancipation era, the search for meaningful expressions of self- identification fell not onto the shoulders of the religious community but onto those of the individual, even as this search was largely redirected back to the group. Above all, personal prerogative increasingly came to characterize Jewishness. This redefinition of Jewish self-identification did not happen solely or even predominantly in synagogues. Rather, this dissertation argues that sites of sociability (including cafes, restaurants, clubs, libraries, etc) served as central places for gathering, celebration and the (re-)formulation of what it meant to be Jewish in the modern era.The dissertation concludes that these spaces allowed Jews to expand the array of Jewish expressions and to build vibrant communities. Jews gathered as Jews in a growing number of spaces, sometimes in ways that disregarded religious injunctions. By carrying out these activities in semi-public spaces, Jews were able to perform new modes of self-identification, which became part of the Jewish cultural vocabulary. This spatial transformation radically changed the face of the Jewish community, as individuals were able, more than ever before, to establish and maintain Jewish affiliation that was neither dependent upon nor limited to the demands of the official religious community.