Abstract
A history and periodization of American antisemitism that asks (1) whether to understand the phenomenon as grimly eternal, dependably cyclical, or just as an occasional and episodic factor in American history; (2) whether to interpret antisemitism as a “cultural code,” revealing less about Jews than about the culture that stigmatizes them; and (3) whether antisemitism is different in the United States than in other diaspora lands where Jews have lived.