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Nationalities Papers
The Journal of Nationalism and Ethnicity
Volume 29, 2001 - Issue 3
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Original Articles

"The mythical jew": Antisemitism, intellectuals, and democracy in post-communist Romania

Pages 419-439 | Published online: 19 Aug 2010

References

  • Volovici , Leon . "Antisemitism in Post-Communist Eastern Europe: A Marginal or Central Issue?" . ACTA (The Vidai Sassoon International Center for the Study of AntisemitismThe Hebrew University of Jerusalem) , 3
  • 1995 . "Mit si realitate," ["Myth and Reality"] . Sfera Politicii , : 4
  • Sebastian , Mihail . 1996 . Jurnal 1935-1944, Preface and notes by Leon Volovici, text editor Gabriela Ornat , 316 – 17 . Bucharest : Humanitas . This citation is from 26 March 1941. Unless otherwise stated, all the translations from Romanian are mine
  • Lendvai , Paul . 1971 . Antisemitism without Jews: Communist Eastern Europe , Garden City : Doubleday .
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  • Shafir , Michael . 2000 . "But What About 2004?" . RFE/RL Newsline , 13 December
  • 2000 . RFE/RL Newsline , 27 November
  • Codrescu , Andrei and Tismaneanu , Vladimir . 2000 . "A Frightful Candidate Rising in Romania" . The Inquirer , 9 December
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  • 1999 . "Radical Politics in Post Communist East Central Europe. Part I: 'Reds,' 'Pinks,' 'Blacks,' and 'Blues'" . East European Perspectives , 1 ( I ) November
  • Boia , Lucian . 1997 . Istorie si mit in constiinta romaneasca [History and Myth in the Romanian Consciousness] , 280 – 81 . 290 – 91 . Bucharest : Humanitas .
  • Boym , Svetlana . 1999 . "From the Toilet to the Museum: Memory and Metamorphosis of Soviet Trash" ” . In Consuming Russia. Popular Culture, Sex, and Society since Gorbachev , Edited by: Barker , Adele M. 384 – 85 . Durham : Duke University Press .
  • 1999 . Verdery, The Political Lives of Dead Bodies. Reburial and Postsocialist Change , New York : Columbia University Press .
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  • Voicu , George . 2000 . "Terne antisemite in discursul public, II" ["Antisemite Themes in Public Discourse, II"] . Sfera Politicii , : 52 – 57 . For a detailed account of Romanian post-communist extremist publications, see
  • Eskenazy , Victor . 2001 . "Antisemitic Rhetoric and Propaganda on the Web" . Der Fall Antonescu-Cazul Antonescu , 14 February at http://home.t-online. de/home/totok/ion2f.htm
  • Surprisingly, Gazeta de Vest's first legionary website in 1996 and the Bucharest-based extremist virtual "db Journal" were either financed or indirectly supported by George Soros' Open Society Foundation in Romania. See Eskenazy's "Antisemitic Rhetoric and Propaganda on the Web."
  • King , Robert R. 1980 . A History of the Romanian Communist Party , 33 – 38 . Stanford : Stanford University Press . particularly the relationship between the RCP and minorities
  • Braham , Randolph L. 1998 . Romanian Nationalists and the Holocaust: The Political Exploitation of Unfounded Rescue Accounts , 61 – 70 . New York : The Rosenthal Institute for Holocaust Studies . On the post-communist revaluation of Ion Antonescu see
  • Ioanid , Radu . 2000 . The Holocaust in Romania. The Destruction of Jews and Gypsies Under the Antonescu Regime, 1940-1944 , Chicago : Ivan R. Dee .
  • Volovici , Leon . 1991 . Nationalist Ideology and Antisemitism. The Case of the Romanian Intellectuals in the 1930s , Edited by: Kormos , Charles . 134 – 37 . Oxford : Pergamon Press . Regarding the spiritual and ethico-mystical, rather than political or criminal, affiliation of Mircea Eliade, Emit Cioran, and Constantin Noica to the legionary movement
  • Voicu , George . 1995 . "Rechizitoriu cu tile" ["Inquiry with a Twisted Meaning"] . Sfera Politicii ,
  • Zolotov , Andrei . 1998 . "Russia's Patriarch Condemns Communist's Antisemitic Statements" . Ecumenical News International ENI News Service , 11 November
  • Bohlen , Celestine . 1998 . "Where Russians are Hurting, Racism takes Root" . The New York Times , 15 November
  • Crainic , Nichifor . Ortodoxie si etnocratie [Orthodoxy and Ethnocracy] , Bucharest : 1937 .
  • Moroianu-Zlatescu , Irina and Oancea , Loan . 1994 . The Legislative and Institutional Framework for National Minorities from Romania , Bucharest : The Romanian Government-The Council for Ethnic Minorities . According to the last census from 1992, today there are less than 9,107 Jews, that is 0.3 of the total population
  • Florian , Radu . 1994 . Criza unei lumi in schimbare [The Crisis of a Changing World] , 118 – 129 . Bucharest : Editura Noua Alternative .
  • Oisteanu , Andrei . 1998 . "'Evreul imaginar' vs. 'evreul real'" ['The Imaginary Jew vs. The Real Jew"] . Sfera Politicii , : 34 – 40 .
  • Zub , Al. , ed. 1996 . "The 'Imaginary Jew' vs. the 'Real Jew' in Romanian Folklore and Mythology" ” . In Identitate si alte rit ate in spatiul cultural romanesc [Identity and Alterity in the Romanian Cultural Space] , 266 – 92 . Iasi : Editura Universitatii "Alexandra loan Cuza" .
  • Volovici , Leon . "Notes on Latent Antisemitism" . The Vidai Sassoon International Center forthe Study of Antisemitism. Annual Report , 16 – 18 . 1997
  • Volovici . "Antisemitism in Post-Communist Eastern Europe" ” . 7 – 8 . and "Mit si realitate," p. 6
  • Volovici . "Antisemitism in Post-Communist Eastern Europe" ” . 19
  • Rosenthal , Denise . 2000 . "Les angoisses fin-de-siècle des intellectuels roumains: démocratie, conservatism et antisémitisme" ["Fin-de-siècle Anxieties of Romanian Intellectuals: Democracy, Conservatism, and Antisemitism"], translated by Yves Tomic . Balkanologie (Paris) , IV ( 1 ) : 105 – 29 .
  • 1998 . Reflectii pe marginea unei polemici" ["The Prestige Reaction. Reflections on the Borders of a Polemic"] . Sfera Politicii , The essence of this debate can be found in an article signed by George Voicu and entitled "Reactia de prestigiu
  • Calinescu , Matei . 1995 . "Ionesco and 'Rhinoceros:' Personal and Political Backgrounds" . East European Politics and Societies , 9 ( 3 ) : 393 – 432 . On Emit Cioran's public regrets regarding his youth "transfiguration," see Volovici, Nationalist Ideology and Antisemitism and
  • Volovici . Nationalist Ideology and Antisemitism 145 – 46 . For a subtle analysis of Eliade's approach to the legionary movement, correctly doubting the alleged "right" character of Eliade's conception of myths, see
  • Jacquart , Emmanuel . 1995 . Commente Rhinocéros d'Eugène Ionesco , 21 – 33 . Paris : Gallimard-Foliothèque . Rhinocéros refers to French-Romanian author Eugène Ionesco's internationally acclaimed play bearing the same title and published in 1957. As was also revealed by Mihail Sebastian's journal, Ionesco makes indirect, metaphoric remarks on his own Romanian experiences with the rise of the legionary movement and the way many famous Romanian intellectuals would succumb to it. He termed the process "rhinoceritis." Thus, in his The Rhinoceros, Ionesco shows influences from his past in inter-war Romania, as well as Denis de Rougemont's witnessing a Hitlerite adulating mob in his Journal d'une époque; Kafka's human-insect metamorphosis; Gustave le Bon's ideas of mental contagion, return to instincts, gregarious spirit, and renunciation in front of desires and dreams; and Romanian authors Urmuz and Caragiale; and Matei Calinescu, "Ionesco and 'Rhinoceros'."
  • Volovici . 1990 . Nationalist Ideology and Antisemitism and Radu Ioanid, The Sword of the Archangel. Fascist Ideology in Romania , Edited by: Heinegg , Peter . New York : East European monographs . On Eminescu's general anti-foreignness and economic, rather than genuine antisemitism, see
  • Voicu . "Rechizitoriu cu tile" ” . 18 – 21 . For a chronology of the initiatives to raise Ion Antonescu's bust in various cities from Romania since early 1990s, such as Slobozia, Tirgu-Mures, Piatra Neamt, or the Lugoj military garrison, together with debates from the press and governmental and judicial resolutions, see
  • Volovici . "Antisemitism in PostCommunist Eastern Europe" ” . 12 – 14 . Randolph L. Braham, Romanian Nationalists and the Holocaust
  • Andreescu , Gabriel . 1998 . "Rosu, negru: Memorialul Signet" ["Red, Black: The Sighet Memorial"] . 22 ( 38 ) See for example, Shafir, "O tragicomedie in desfasurare;" Adamesteanu and Palade, "Fascism si communism;"
  • Reichmann , Edgar . 2000 . "Contre les purificateurs de l'Histoire en Hongrie et en Roumanie" . Le Monde , 15 January
  • Liiceanu , Gabriel . 2000 . "L'Antisemitisme en Roumanie" . Le Monde , 15 February
  • Braham's , Randolph L. 1999 . "Offensive contre l'Histoire: les nationalists hongrois et la Shoah" and George Voicu's French translation of his "Reactia de prestigiu" as "L'honneur national roumain en question," translated by Sandra Dumitrescu . Les Temps Modernes , November-December : 123 – 52 .
  • Voicu's , George . 2000 . "Indecenta comparative" ["The Comparative Indecency"] . 22 ( 11 ) See the series "Un text din Le Monde si replici la el" ["A Text from Le Monde and Reactions to It"], I-VII, 22, Nos. 5, 6, 7, 11, 12, 14, and 16, 2000. For a better understanding of this new shift
  • Stan , Lavinia . 1999 . "Romanian Political Science Since 1989" . European Journal of Political Science , : 507 – 32 .
  • 2000 . "The Man They Love to Hate: Norman Manea's 'Snail House' Between Holocaust and Gulag" . East European Jewish Affairs , 30 ( 1 ) : 60 – 81 . On this debate, see also Michael Shafir, Radical Politics in Post-Communist Central and Eastern Europe (forthcoming), hereby cited with the author's personal permission, and
  • Cornea , Andrei . 2000 . "Holocaustul Ia tribunal" ['The Holocaust on Trial"] . 22 ( 21 )
  • Voicu, "Reactia de prestigiu."
  • Shafir, "Radical Politics in East-Central Europe."
  • Voicu , George . 2000 . "Terne antisémite in discursul public, I" ["Antisémite Themes in Public Discourse, I"] . Sfera Politicii , : 53 – 54 .
  • Calinescu , Matei . 1998 . "How Can One Be?" and "Despre culturile mici" ["On Small Cultures"] . Dilema , "Ionesco and 'Rhinoceros'."
  • Florian , Alexandra . 1994 . "The Holocaust in Romanian textbooks" ” . In The Tragedy of Romanian Jewry , Edited by: Braham , Randolph L. 237 – 86 . New York : The Rosenthal Institute for Holocaust Studies-The City University of New York .
  • Volovici . "Antisemitism in Post-Communist Eastern Europe" ” . 13
  • Rorty , Richard . 1989 . Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity , 73 New York : Cambridge University Press .
  • Foucault , Michel . 1991 . "Politics and the Study of Discourse" ” . In The Foucault Effect. Studies in Governmentality , Edited by: Burchell , Graham , Gordon , Collin and Miller , Peter . 53 – 72 . Chicago : The University of Chicago Press .
  • ChabonisChafee , Theresa . 1999 . "Communism as Kitsch: Soviet Symbols in Post-Soviet Society" ” . In Consuming Russia. Popular Culture, Sex, and Society Since Gorbachev , Edited by: Barker , Adele M. 362 – 82 . Durham : Duke University Press . For a similar use of the Rortian paradigm in the Russian case
  • Tamás , G. M. 2001 . "Scrisoare cat re prietenii mei romani" ["Letter to My Romanian Friends"] . Dilema , G. M. Tamás makes a similar point regarding the connection between the duplicitous silence of the Romanian democratic intellectuals with regards to intolerant, nationalist discourses, both before and after 1989, and the rise to power of C. V. Tudor and PRM. See
  • 2000 . Elet es Irodalom , 15 December
  • Lavinia Stan, "Do Ut Des: Political Clientelism and Corruption in the Balkans" (mimeo).
  • Niessen , James P. 1995 . "Romanian Nationalism: An Ideology of Integration and Mobilization" ” . In Eastern European Nationalism in the Twentieth Century , Edited by: Sugar , Peter F. 273 – 304 . Washington : The American University Press .
  • Shafir, "But What About 2004?"

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