The ‘end of diaspora’ is just the beginning: music at the crossroads of Jewish, African, and Ethiopian diasporas in Israel

ABSTRACT

The ‘return’ of Ethiopian Jews to Israel in the last three decades provides an alternative case. In this presentation, I focus on the prominent role of music as ethno-racial information for Ethiopian Israelis as they engage with the process of homing and integrating in Israel. I explore their experience as black Jews through the musical tastes of young Ethiopian Israelis. For these youths, far from leaving their Ethiopianness behind, music is the fodder for actively reinventing it. I explore how they claim their place as Jews in Israel through participation in the musical communities of Ethiopian and African diasporas.

KEYWORDS:

• Race
• Israel
• music
• Ethiopian

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 The overlapping themes of belonging, integration, religion, and race have been the subject of many studies about Ethiopian Jews in Israel and their connection to music (see Djerrahian 2010, 2015a, 2015b; Korat 2007; Shabtay 2003; Shelemay 1986; Webster-Kogen 2014, 2016, among others).

2 This is also true for the process of musical creativity and (non-Jewish) Ethiopian diaspora communities in North America. See Shelemay and Kaplan (2006).

3 I do not wish to speak on behalf of all Ethiopian Israeli youths. When I was in Israel in 2008–2009 for doctoral field research, I interviewed mainly Ethiopians between the ages of 16 and 30 years from the initial cohort of the 1984 and 1991 airlifts. There are distinctions to be made between pre-1991 arrivals and the following wave of Ethiopian ‘returnees’.

4 Israel Central Bureau of Statistics, 2016. http://www.cbs.gov.il/www/hodaot2016n/11_16_134e.pdf. Consulted on April 24, 2017.

5 They are also black in a way that is different than non-Jewish African migrants are, Palestinians living inside and outside of Israel, Arabs in general, and other subaltern populations associated with the label ‘black’.

6 I am a Canadian.

7 Indeed, at the end of our conversation, his friends were calling out to him using another name and not ‘Gaby’ like he had said.

8 There is a distinction to be made between the ways in which American black struggles and music were being appropriated. On the one hand, there were Ethiopian Israeli kids who used references from hip-hop America without necessarily knowing the historical context that gave rise to them. Older participants, on the other hand, were historically informed. They aligned themselves with African-American struggles and emancipation rather than mimic the external styles and gestures they index.

9 In future research, it would be critical to explore the impact of the events that lead to the creation of the ‘Black Lives Matter’ movement in the United States in 2012.

10 Jordana Horn, ‘Pale Dreadlock Sabra’, published in the online magazine Forward The Jewish Daily on March 20, 2009: http://forward.com/articles/104147/pale-dreadlock-sabra/. The title of the article is a play on the Bob Marley song ‘Buffalo Soldiers’ where he tells the story of a ‘Dreadlock Rasta’.

11 See Webster-Kogen (2014).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by a post-doctoral fellowship (2014–2016) awarded from the Fonds de recherche du Québec – société et culture (FRQSC).