A melting pot is a monocultural metaphor for a heterogeneous society becoming more homogeneous, the different elements "melting together" with a common culture; an alternative being a homogeneous society becoming more heterogeneous through the influx of foreign elements with different cultural backgrounds, possessing the potential to create disharmony within the previous culture. It can also create a harmonious hybridized society known as cultural amalgamation. In the United States, the term is often used to describe the cultural integration of immigrants to the country. A related concept has been defined as "cultural additivity."
Nathan Glazer was an American sociologist who taught at the University of California, Berkeley, and for several decades at Harvard University. He was a co-editor of the now-defunct policy journal The Public Interest.
Israel Zangwill was a British author at the forefront of cultural Zionism during the 19th century, and was a close associate of Theodor Herzl. He later rejected the search for a Jewish homeland in Palestine and became the prime thinker behind the territorial movement.
The Kishinev pogrom or Kishinev massacre was an anti-Jewish riot that took place in Kishinev, then the capital of the Bessarabia Governorate in the Russian Empire, on 19–21 April [O.S. 6–8 April] 1903. During the pogrom, which began on Easter Day, 49 Jews were killed, 92 were gravely injured, a number of Jewish women were raped, over 500 were lightly injured and 1,500 homes were damaged. American Jews began large-scale organized financial help, and assisted in emigration. The incident focused worldwide attention on the persecution of Jews within the Russian empire and led Theodor Herzl to propose the Uganda Scheme as a temporary refuge for the Jews.
Yiddish theatre consists of plays written and performed primarily by Jews in Yiddish, the language of the Central European Ashkenazi Jewish community. The range of Yiddish theatre is broad: operetta, musical comedy, and satiric or nostalgic revues; melodrama; naturalist drama; expressionist and modernist plays. At its height, its geographical scope was comparably broad: from the late 19th century until just before World War II, professional Yiddish theatre could be found throughout the heavily Jewish areas of Eastern and East Central Europe, but also in Berlin, London, Paris, Buenos Aires and New York City.
Jewish culture is the culture of the Jewish people, from its formation in ancient times until the current age. Judaism itself is not simply a faith-based religion, but an orthoprax and ethnoreligion, pertaining to deed, practice, and identity. Jewish culture covers many aspects, including religion and worldviews, literature, media, and cinema, art and architecture, cuisine and traditional dress, attitudes to gender, marriage, family, social customs and lifestyles, music and dance. Some elements of Jewish culture come from within Judaism, others from the interaction of Jews with host populations, and others still from the inner social and cultural dynamics of the community. Before the 18th century, religion dominated virtually all aspects of Jewish life, and infused culture. Since the advent of secularization, wholly secular Jewish culture emerged likewise.
The Jewish Territorial Organisation, known as the ITO, was a Jewish political movement which first arose in 1903 in response to the British Uganda Scheme, but only institutionalized in 1905. Its main goal was to find an alternative territory to that of Palestine, which was preferred by the Zionist movement, for the creation of a Jewish homeland. The organization embraced what became known as Jewish Territorialism also known as Jewish Statism. The ITO was dissolved in 1925.
The melting pot is an analogy for the way in which heterogeneous societies become more homogeneous.
Herman Bernstein was an American journalist, poet, novelist, playwright, translator, Jewish activist, and diplomat. He was the United States Ambassador to Albania and was the founder of Der Tog, the Jewish daily newspaper.
The Potting Shed is a 1957 play by Graham Greene in three acts. The psychological drama centers on a secret held by the Callifer family for nearly thirty years.
Harold Chapin was an American-born English actor and playwright. He served in the British Army during World War I.
Walker Whiteside (1869–1942) was an American actor who had played Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, and Shylock while still in his teens.
Katherine Chrystal Herne was an American stage actress. She was the daughter of actor/playwright James A. Herne and the younger sister of actress and Hollywood talent scout Julie Herne. Her stage credits include creating the title role in the original Broadway production of George Kelly's Pulitzer Prize–winning play, Craig's Wife (1925).
The Melting Pot is a lost 1915 silent film drama based on the novel and 1909 Broadway play by Israel Zangwill. The film starred stage actor Walker Whiteside reprising his role from the Broadway play.
Ashkenazi Jews in Israel refers to immigrants and descendants of Ashkenazi Jews, who now reside within the state of Israel, in the modern sense also referring to Israeli Jewish adherents of the Ashkenazi Jewish tradition. As of 2013, they number 2.8 million and constitute one of the largest Jewish ethnic divisions in Israel, in line with Mizrahi and Sephardi Jews. Ashkenazim, excluding those who migrated from the former USSR, are estimated to be 31.8% of the Israeli population in 2018.
Henry Vogel was an American actor and bass-baritone singer who originated several roles on the Broadway stage during the first two decades of the Twentieth Century.
The Industrial Removal Office (IRO) was an agency assisting European Jewish immigrants to the United States in the early 20th century. It was formed in 1901 by the Jewish Agricultural Society. The Jewish Immigrant Information Bureau was founded in 1907 as an offshoot of the IRO. The IRO also had an uncertain relationship with the Jewish Territorial Organization, led by Israel Zangwill.
The King of Schnorrers is Israel Zangwill's 1894 picaresque novel, a collection of amusing tragicomic episodes of schnorring by "Manasseh Bueno Barzillai Azevedo da Costa, thenceforward universally recognised, and hereby handed down to tradition, as the King of Schnorrers", in England on the break of 18th/19th centuries, illustrated by Jewish prints and caricatures of the period.
Children of the Ghetto is an 1899 play written by British author Israel Zangwill. It is loosely based on Zangwill's 1892 novel of the same name. It is a drama in four acts, each with a subtitle and its own setting. The play is set around 1874, within the Jewish Quarter of London. The main plot centers on the love-affair of a young couple, thwarted from marrying by an obscure religious law and an unfortunate joke. The action of the play spans a hundred days time starting at Hanukkah.
Edna Nahshon is professor of Jewish theater and drama at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. Her interests include Yiddish and Israeli theater and drama. She is also and a senior fellow at Oxford University's Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies.
