American Shtetl: The Making of Kiryas Joel, a Hasidic Village in Upstate New York

Nomi M. Stolzenberg, Nathan and Lilly Shapell Chair in Law, USC Gould School of Law
‍David N. Myers, Distinguished Professor and Sady and Ludwig Kahn Chair in Jewish History, Department of History, UCLA

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Settled in the mid-1970s by a small contingent of Hasidic families, Kiryas Joel is an American town with few parallels in Jewish history—but many precedents among religious communities in the United States. Nomi M. Stolzenberg and David N. Myers have published a new book that tells the story of how this group of pious, Yiddish-speaking Jews has grown to become a thriving insular enclave and a powerful local government in upstate New York. While rejecting the norms of mainstream American society, Kiryas Joel has been stunningly successful in creating a world apart by using the very instruments of secular political and legal power that it disavows.

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Stolzenberg and Myers paint a richly textured portrait of daily life there, exploring the community’s guiding religious, social, and economic norms, as well as its historical roots. They show how constant legal and political battles defined and even bolstered the community, whose very success has coincided with the rise of political conservatism and multiculturalism in American society over the past forty years.