You Never Call! You Never Write! A History of the Jewish Mother

by Antler, Joyce

• ISBN13: 9780195147872
• ISBN10: 0195147871
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2007-04-02
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

In You Never Call, You Never Write , Joyce Antler provides an illuminating and often amusing history of one of the best-known figures in popular culture--the Jewish Mother. Whether drawn as self-sacrificing or manipulative, in countless films, novels, radio and television programs, stand-up comedy, and psychological and historical studies, she appears as a colossal figure, intensely involved in the lives of her children. Antler traces the odyssey of this compelling personality through decades of American culture. She reminds us of a time when Jewish mothers were admired for their tenacity and nurturance, as in the early twentieth-century image of the "Yiddishe Mama," a sentimental figure popularized by entertainers such as George Jessel, Al Jolson, and Sophie Tucker, and especially by Gertrude Berg, whose amazingly successful "Molly Goldberg" ruled American radio and television for over 25 years. Antler explains the transformation of this Jewish Mother into a "brassy-voiced, smothering, and shrewish" scourge (in Irving Howe's words), detailing many variations on this negative theme, from Philip Roth's Portnoy's Complaint and Woody Allen's Oedipus Wrecks to television shows such as "The Nanny," "Seinfeld," and "Will and Grace." But she also uncovers a new counter-narrative, leading feminist scholars and stand-up comediennes to see the Jewish Mother in positive terms. Continually revised and reinvented, the Jewish Mother becomes in Antler's expert hands a unique lens with which to examine vital concerns of American Jews and the culture at large. A joy to read, You Never Call, You Never Write will delight anyone who has ever known or been nurtured by a "Jewish Mother," and it will be a special source of insight for modern parents. As Antler suggests, in many ways "we are all Jewish Mothers" today.

Author Biography

Joyce Antler is the Samuel Lane Professor of American Jewish History and Culture at Brandeis University. She is the author or editor of nine books, including The Journey Home: How Jewish Women Shaped Modern America and Talking Back: Images of Jewish Women in Popular Culture. She lives in Brookline, Massachusetts, with her husband, and is the mother of two daughters.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	p. ix
Introduction	p. 1
The Nagging Stereotype
"My Yiddishe Mama": The Multiple Faces of the Immigrant Jewish Mother	p. 15
Molly Goldberg: "The Prototype of the Jewish Mother" in the Twentieth Century	p. 47
Margaret Mead and Ruth Benedict: Social Science Uncovers the Jewish "Family Plot"	p. 73
From Marjorie Morningstar to Jennie Grossinger: The Suburbs, the Catskills, and the Jewish Mother Joke	p. 101
"American Mother of the Year" Versus Monster Mothers: Will the Real Sophie Portnoy Please Stand Up?	p. 123
The New Face of the Jewish Mother
The Mother and the Movement: Feminism Constructs the Jewish Mother	p. 149
Roseanne and The Nanny: The Jewish Mother as Postmodern Spectacle	p. 169
From Second-Generation Memoirs to Women's History: Reclaiming the Missing Mother	p. 193
"They Raised Beautiful Families": Jewish Mothers Narrate Their Lives	p. 215
We Are All Jewish Mothers: Mothering in the New Millennium	p. 233
Epilogue	p. 257
Notes	p. 259
Archival Sources	p. 301
Index	p. 303
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