Narratives of Dissent: War in Contemporary Israeli Arts and Culture
Explores cultural responses to war in Israeli society since 1978.

The year 1978 marked Israel's entry into Lebanon, which led to the long-term military occupation of non-sovereign territory and the long, costly war in Lebanon. In the years that followed, many Israelis found themselves alienated from the idea that their country used force only when there was no alternative, and Israeli society eventually underwent a dramatic change in attitude toward militarization and the infallibility of the IDF (Israel Defense Forces). In Narratives of Dissent: War in Contemporary Israeli Arts and Culture editors Rachel S. Harris and Ranen Omer-Sherman collect nineteen essays that examine the impact of this cultural shift on Israeli visual art, music, literature, poetry, film, theatre, public broadcasting, and commemoration practices after 1978.

Divided into three thematic sections-Private and Public Spaces of Commemoration and Mourning, Poetry and Prose, and Cinema and Stage-this collection presents an exciting diversity of experiences, cultural interests, and disciplinary perspectives. From the earliest wartime writings of S. Yizhar to the global phenomenon of films such as Beaufort, Waltz with Bashir, and Lebanon, the Israeli artist's imaginative and critical engagement with war and occupation has been informed by the catalysts of mourning, pain, and loss, often accompanied by a biting sense of irony. This book highlights many of the aesthetic narratives that have wielded the most profound impact on Israeli culture in the present day.

These works address both incremental and radical changes in individual and collective consciousness that have spread through Israeli culture in response to the persistent affliction of war. No other such volume exists in Hebrew or English. Students and teachers of Israeli studies will appreciate Narratives of Dissent.

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Narratives of Dissent: War in Contemporary Israeli Arts and Culture
Explores cultural responses to war in Israeli society since 1978.

The year 1978 marked Israel's entry into Lebanon, which led to the long-term military occupation of non-sovereign territory and the long, costly war in Lebanon. In the years that followed, many Israelis found themselves alienated from the idea that their country used force only when there was no alternative, and Israeli society eventually underwent a dramatic change in attitude toward militarization and the infallibility of the IDF (Israel Defense Forces). In Narratives of Dissent: War in Contemporary Israeli Arts and Culture editors Rachel S. Harris and Ranen Omer-Sherman collect nineteen essays that examine the impact of this cultural shift on Israeli visual art, music, literature, poetry, film, theatre, public broadcasting, and commemoration practices after 1978.

Divided into three thematic sections-Private and Public Spaces of Commemoration and Mourning, Poetry and Prose, and Cinema and Stage-this collection presents an exciting diversity of experiences, cultural interests, and disciplinary perspectives. From the earliest wartime writings of S. Yizhar to the global phenomenon of films such as Beaufort, Waltz with Bashir, and Lebanon, the Israeli artist's imaginative and critical engagement with war and occupation has been informed by the catalysts of mourning, pain, and loss, often accompanied by a biting sense of irony. This book highlights many of the aesthetic narratives that have wielded the most profound impact on Israeli culture in the present day.

These works address both incremental and radical changes in individual and collective consciousness that have spread through Israeli culture in response to the persistent affliction of war. No other such volume exists in Hebrew or English. Students and teachers of Israeli studies will appreciate Narratives of Dissent.

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Overview

Explores cultural responses to war in Israeli society since 1978.

The year 1978 marked Israel's entry into Lebanon, which led to the long-term military occupation of non-sovereign territory and the long, costly war in Lebanon. In the years that followed, many Israelis found themselves alienated from the idea that their country used force only when there was no alternative, and Israeli society eventually underwent a dramatic change in attitude toward militarization and the infallibility of the IDF (Israel Defense Forces). In Narratives of Dissent: War in Contemporary Israeli Arts and Culture editors Rachel S. Harris and Ranen Omer-Sherman collect nineteen essays that examine the impact of this cultural shift on Israeli visual art, music, literature, poetry, film, theatre, public broadcasting, and commemoration practices after 1978.

Divided into three thematic sections-Private and Public Spaces of Commemoration and Mourning, Poetry and Prose, and Cinema and Stage-this collection presents an exciting diversity of experiences, cultural interests, and disciplinary perspectives. From the earliest wartime writings of S. Yizhar to the global phenomenon of films such as Beaufort, Waltz with Bashir, and Lebanon, the Israeli artist's imaginative and critical engagement with war and occupation has been informed by the catalysts of mourning, pain, and loss, often accompanied by a biting sense of irony. This book highlights many of the aesthetic narratives that have wielded the most profound impact on Israeli culture in the present day.

These works address both incremental and radical changes in individual and collective consciousness that have spread through Israeli culture in response to the persistent affliction of war. No other such volume exists in Hebrew or English. Students and teachers of Israeli studies will appreciate Narratives of Dissent.


Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780814338032
Publisher: Wayne State University Press
Publication date: 12/17/2012
Pages: 384
Product dimensions: 6.90(w) x 10.00(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

Rachel S. Harris is assistant professor of Israeli literature and culture in the Department of Comparative and World Literature and the Program in Jewish Culture and Society at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. She has published articles on Israeli literature in The Journal of Modern Jewish Studies and Israel Studies. She is also the series editor for the Dalkey Archive Press series Hebrew Literature in Translation.

Ranen Omer-Sherman is professor of English and Jewish studies at the University of Miami. He is the author of Israel in Exile: Jewish Writing and the Desert and Diaspora and Zionism in Jewish American Literature and editor of The Jewish Graphic Novel. He lived in Israel for thirteen years as a founding member of a desert kibbutz and served in the IDF as a paratrooper.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Zionism and the Culture of Dissent Ranen Omer-Sherman 1

I Private and Public Spaces of Commemoration and Mourning

1 "Music of Peace" at a Time of War: Middle Eastern Music Amid the Second Intifada Galeet Dardashti 25

2 Privatizing Commemoration: The Helicopter Disaster Monument and the Absent State Michael Feige 44

3 "Cyclic Interruptions": Popular Music on Israeli Radio in Times of Emergency Danny Kaplan 65

4 Consuming Nostalgia: Greeting Cards and Soldier-Citizens Noa Roei 78

5 The Photographic Memory of Asad Azi Tal Ben Zvi 99

6 "We Shall Remember Them All": The Culture of Online Mourning and Commemoration of Fallen Soldiers in Israel Liav Sade-Beck 117

II Poetry and Prose

7 Bereavement and Breakdown: War and Failed Motherhood in Raya Harnik's Work Esther Raizen 135

8 From IDF to .PDF: War Poetry in the Israeli Digital Age Adriana X. Jacobs 153

9 "Unveiling Injustice": Dahlia Ravikovitch's Poetry of Witness Ilana Szobel 167

10 War at Home: Literary Engagements with the Israeli Political Crisis in Two Novels by Gabriela Avigur-Rotem Shiri Goren 187

11 Forcing the End: Apocalyptic Israeli Fiction, 1971-2009 Adam Rovner 205

12 Oh, My Land, My Birthplace: Lebanon War and Intifada in Israeli Fiction and Poetry Glenda Abramson 221

13 Vexing Resistance, Complicating Occupation: A Contrapuntal Reading of Sahar Khalifeh's Wild Thorns and David Grossman's The Smile of the Lamb Philip Metres 241

14 Gender, War, and Zionist Mythogynies: Feminist Trends in Israeli Scholarship Esther Fuchs 264

III Cinema and Stage

15 Representations of War in Israeli Drama and Theater Dan Urian 281

16 From National Heroes to Postnational Witnesses: A Reconstruction of Israeli Soldiers' Cinematic Narratives as Witnesses of History Yael Munk 300

17 A Woman's War: The Gulf War and Popular Women's Culture in Israel Rachel S. Harris 317

18 Beaufort the Book, Beaufort the Film: Israeli Militarism under Attack Yaron Peleg 336

19 Shifting Manhood: Masculinity and the Lebanon War in Beaufort and Waltz with Bashir Philip Hollander 346

List of Contributors 365

Index 369

What People are Saying About This

Associate Professor of Hebrew Literature and Culture, University of Michigan - Shachar Pinsker

Narratives of Dissent is a groundbreaking volume, unprecedented in its breadth and depth. It promises to be the most comprehensive and up-to-date multidisciplinary volume on this subject for now and in the foreseeable future. The fascinating, wide-ranging discussions assembled in the volume by the two editors are a real contribution to many fields of studies: Israeli history, politics, society, literature, film, theatre, and music.

Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Author of Booking Passage: Exile and Homecoming in the Modern Jewish Imagination - Sidra DeKoven Ezrahi

When a book like Narratives of Dissent appears, we realize that we have been waiting for it for years. This collection of essays explores not only the many obvious representations of war and conflict in Israel but also those that tend to fall under the radar of scholarly studies. In focusing on music, film, theatre, photography, monuments, internet sites, and other material artifacts of a culture of commemoration and dissent, as well as on the more canonic fiction and poetry, this volume demonstrates that nothing in Israeli society lies outside of the war culture. It also seeks to replace insularity and the dialectics of exclusion with a dialogue between the Israeli and Palestinian/Arab war narratives. While specific to the Israeli and Palestinian context, it also uncovers some of the internal contradictions within cultures fashioned as democracies and constituted and punctuated by wars and ethnic cleansing-from the Athenian Polis to the American Republic.

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