It is extremely surprising that one of the densest Jewish neighborhoods in NYC still possess a 60 percent population of blacks. It is still shocking to me that two groups of people who live extremely close to each other can be viewed as two separate communities. The obvious differences in culture, food, and race are obvious but there has to be some similarity between the two groups that may allow them to interrelate with each other in order to bridge this wide gap. One similarity though, can be the stubbornness of both communities in integrating with each other.
It is interesting that Goldschmidt made a distinction between the two words: “integration” and “intergration”. I googled intergration and it is not a word. Honestly, it threw me off. But, it made me think about this specific distinction. Integration is the assimilation of two groups, and the prefix of “inter-“ means “mutual or between”. This distinction goes to illustrate the difference between assimilation of culture within both groups as integration while intergration is the existence of a relationship between the two groups. Neither assimilation nor a relationship is present between both groups.
Being that I have never really been exposed to religion or culture of Judaism, I found the story about the Hasidic woman who had to indirectly ask a black boy outside her house to help turn off the radio since religious law forbids orthodox Jews from turning electricity on or off during Shabbos, very interesting. This example not only showed the very distinct differences between the Jews and blacks, but also the evidence of the close proximity of a black person to a Jewish house. This showed how extremely close Jews and blacks lived next to each other because when this woman walked out of her house, she saw a young black boy immediately.
Goldschmidt provides a reason to the Hasidic insularity, which is the fact that the religious law does not allow interaction with the “Gentiles”. This has caused the blacks to see the segregation to be racial because of their ignorance of the religion. This preconceived notion that the blacks have then leads to a greater separation between the two. Although this is a valid reason, there is also the possibility of using the religious law as an excuse of not wanting to integrate. The Jews may fear racial interaction due to the fear of losing their culture or religious identity among the younger generations such as the young Italian immigrants in the domus. This fear of racial integration seems to be a common theme among all the groups of immigrants or ethnicities in this country.
Goldschmidt also makes a very valid point about the common anonymity of New Yorkers, which show why these two groups of individuals do not interact. The fact that the neighborhood of Crown Heights is so focused on may be due to the large distinct differences between the Jews and blacks. The fact that such varying cultures can coexist makes this a very unique neighborhood.
Because of the denseness of both groups in this community, it will not be for a while will one of the groups move away and the other will take over. Or will this separation last forever?
