Buy Me a Mink: Jews, Fur, and Conspicuous Consumption
Document Type
Book Chapter
Publication Date
2022
Department 1
German
Department 2
Judaic Studies
Abstract
Kerry Wallach explores how Jews interacted with fashionable luxury objects made from fur. She draws on cultural discourses and historical research to engage questions about material culture, links between production and consumption, and different forms of representation. Cultural texts (literary works, films, television shows) produced in Europe and the United States shed light on the gendered elements of depicting Jews and fur, with Jewish women often shown as social-climbing, selfish, voracious consumers. Wallach also looks at stereotypes that rendered Jewish fur wearers ostentatious and especially visible. Motifs from an era of peak fur production and key fashion trends (1890s to 1930s) recurred in the 1950s. More recent debates illustrate the persistence of allegations of Jewish and especially Jewish women’s conspicuous consumption.
DOI
10.1007/978-3-030-88960-9_6
Recommended Citation
Wallach, K. (2022). Buy Me a Mink: Jews, Fur, and Conspicuous Consumption. In: Lerner, P., Spiekermann, U., Schenderlein, A. (eds) Jewish Consumer Cultures in Nineteenth and Twentieth-Century Europe and North America. Worlds of Consumption. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-88960-9_6
Comments
The book containing this chapter is available from the publisher's website.