Skip to ContentSkip to Navigation
About us Latest news News News articles

Patria ed Affetti. Jewish identity and risorgimento nationalism in the oeuvres of Samuel Luzzatto, Isaac Reggio and David Levi

08 November 2012

PhD ceremony: Mr. A. Grazi, 16.15 uur, Academiegebouw, Broerstraat 5, Groningen

Dissertation: Patria ed Affetti. Jewish identity and risorgimento nationalism in the oeuvres of Samuel Luzzatto, Isaac Reggio and David Levi

Promotor(s): prof. W.J. van Bekkum, prof. P.H. Bossier

Faculty: Arts

Alessandro Grazi investigated the Jews' approach to modernity in nineteenth-century Italy and aims to verify to what extent their reactions were the result of different geographic, social and political environments. Two strongly contrasting tendencies emerged as far as Jewish identity and relation between Judaism and modernity are concerned. Samuel David Luzzatto and Isaac Samuel Reggio, who lived and worked in the Italian portion of the Habsburg Empire, are good examples of the first tendency. They both developed, albeit on different levels, an adaptation strategy to modernity which allowed them to remain faithful to Jewish religious tradition and to a certain form of orthodoxy. Their approach consisted more of a modernization of the educational tools for the contemporary Jew, rather than major modifications of Judaism and Jewish identity. An alternative strategy was formulated by David Levi, born and raised in the milieus of Piedmont´s Judaism. His encounter with modernity led to secularization. Unlike Luzzatto and Reggio, Levi abandoned traditional and religious Judaism, yet kept a strong attachment to his Jewish identity. These two dissimilar approaches to modernity also resulted in different attitudes towards Italian identity, the Risorgimento and the nation-building process.

Last modified:13 March 2020 12.59 a.m.
Share this Facebook LinkedIn
View this page in: Nederlands

More news

  • 06 June 2025

    India-Netherlands Hydrogen Valley Fellowship Programme announced

    To coincide with World Environment Day, 5 June 2025, the Indian Department of Science and Technology and the University of Groningen yesterday announced a Hydrogen Valley Fellowship Programme Partnership, allowing talented Indian scholars working on...

  • 13 May 2025

    European security: opportunity and threat to democracy

    How strong is our democracy? This will be determined by what is currently happening on the world stage, argues Pieter de Wilde, Professor of European Politics & Society at the University of Groningen.

  • 08 May 2025

    Prof. Petra Hendriks elected member Academia Europaea

    Prof. Petra Hendriks, professor of Semantics and Cognition at the Faculty of Arts and director of the Center for Language and Cognition Groningen (CLCG), has been elected a member of the prestigious Academia Europaea.