Review: Joshua Shanes. Diaspora Nationalism and Jewish Identity in Habsburg Galicia. New York: Cambridge University Press. 2012. Pp. xiv, 320.

Joshua Shanes has written an important, engaging study of Jewish politics and society in Habsburg Galicia that fills a number of scholarly lacunae regarding the history and culture of Jews in Galicia, the study of modern Jewish politics, and the history of the Habsburg Empire. On the basis of Jewish newspapers (primarily in Yiddish), memoir literature, and other sources, Shanes examines what might be referred to as the mobilization of “the Jewish masses.” Scholars of nationalism will feel at home with his synthesis of the literature on nations and nationalism in the context of Jewish history.Much like the development of modern Jewish politics in the Russian Empire, Jewish political organization in Galicia began, according to Shanes, in the late nineteenth century in response to anti-Jewish violence and sentiments (pp. 46, 51, 55, 109). The early Jewish student organization Kadimah (Forward, or Eastward), which was founded by students at the University of Vienna in 1882, and the Jewish cultural association Mikra Kodesh (Holy Assembly), which had its origins in Lemberg (Lwów) in 1883, provided the institutional foundations for the development of national politics among Jews (p. 69). Mikra Kodesh, for example, “offered free Hebrew language courses, lessons in Jewish history and related subjects and weekly Saturday afternoon lectures” (p. 62).