Joshua Sloan

Being a religious Jew and maintaining the appearance of a religious Jew – wearing a yarmulke – I constantly feel the societal pressure to conform. Although there is always an undercurrent of tension when I’m walking the streets of New York City and bearing the yoke of representing the Jewish people, there are certain situations where the pressure to be more “American” is palpable.

Considering that I grew up going to religious, private schools, a large portion of my friends also grew up in the parochial milieu of religious Jewry. Despite the predominance of my friends maintaining religiosity throughout high school and into the year abroad in Israel following high school, the collegiate life told a different story; a story almost diametrically opposed.

As my friends went their separate ways to various different colleges, they also escaped the emersion of orthodoxy. As winter break was approaching, I began to make plans with my friends about what to do for the extended vacation. After much debate, a small group of friends and I decided to go to California to spend our vacation. I was expecting a religiously observant vacation involving kosher food and the observance of the Sabbath, although my expectations were wrong.

After the first day in California, my two friends insisted on eating at the local Subway – a store that doesn’t have the proper certification to be deemed kosher by a religious Jew. It was at that moment that I veritably felt the pressure to abandon my religion and become more “American.” I never believed that my previously religious friends would be the ones attempting to influence me, which made the tension that much more prodigious.

The indescribable pressure I felt is captured and exemplified in the cartoons depicting the Yiddish and American theatres. I too was left in that position of carefully negotiating the line between preserving my identity as a religious Jew and being an American. There is constant influence surrounding every Jew in modern society – which is analogous to the representation of the Jews in the American theatre – but the necessity to establish an enduring Jewish identity is inexorably needed as well and ostensibly more enjoyable; clearly represented by the boisterous and beatific ambiance of the Yiddish theatre.

As I sat in the Subway watching my friends devour their foot-longs and listening to their groans of sheer bliss, I experienced the joviality of upholding my identity: a gratification that transcends any corporeal pleasure. By comparing the countenances of the Yiddish theatre and those of the American theater, it is impossible to deny that there is something profound of resisting societal pressures of conformity and being not only an American, but also yourself.

Josh Sloan