Found this incredibly strange description in The Scotsman, which is often an anti-Israel propaganda rag. My great-grandfather settled in Glasgow after he escaped from Latvia (and being impressed in the Czar’s army), and my grandfather was born and lived the first fourteen years of his life there. My family left when the U.K. went into WWII on the side of the Soviet Union, which my great-grandfather loathed. Count me as extremely happy he emigrated to Brooklyn. Here’s the story:
THE city’s Jewish community have praised a German baker for producing kosher food for one of the faith’s weekly traditions.
Since Edinburgh’s last kosher bakery closed on East Cross Causeway over a year ago, Edinburgh Jews have been forced to either produce their own kosher bread or visit the nearest bakery in Manchester.
However, thanks to Bruntsfield baker Falko Burkert, who has worked with local Rabbi David Rose, they are now able to enjoy the traditional Jewish plaited loaf “challah” – which forms the centrepiece of the shabbat dinner, consumed every Friday evening.
Okay. It’s a puff piece on a good German baker offering kosher challahs. Good for him, and yay, and all that. But here’s the jaw-dropper.
Jewish woman [name redacted], who works at Edinburgh University, praised the baker for his help.
WTF? WTF? WT effing F? Jewish woman [name redacted]? What, that’s a description, like, “Member of Parliament John Smith”?
I’m absolutely stunned. Did a quick Google News search to see if I could find a similar label for, say, a Christian woman. Nope. Muslim woman? Nuh-uh.
The other thing I am at a loss about is exactly how to interpret this. It’s just wrong on so many levels, that I am flummoxed.
I am tempted to put it off on Jew Cooties. But I’m really not sure what to do with it.
Suggestions?
At least it wasn’t “Jewess [name redacted].”
Or “Daughter of pigs and dogs…”
Or imagine if it had been a man. “The Jew [name redacted].”
After all, it is so unusual for a Jew to praise someone for providing kosher food. She should have refused the challah and insisted on eating traif bread (or boycotted the bakery because it is owned by a German)
Meryl should be on a dictionary usage panel: http://www.answers.com/-ess
I dunno. Otherwise being redundant, repetetive and repetitious, it doesn’t really jog the needles on my meter. It SHOULD be obvious from the context that Ms. [name redacted] is Jewish, but I don’t think it’s anything but overkill in this case.
It’s sort of like saying, “Catholic woman Mary McGillicuddy was happy about the new rosary shop in her neighborhood.”
No? Nu?
Frankly, it sounds like it’s translated from a foreign language! Is the author a native speaker of English?
…Or maybe the original writer left it out because it was obvious from the context, but the editor thought it should be stated. But since the usual template wouldn’t work (“[name redacted], who is Jewish, said…”), they just tacked on this epithet. Either way, I agree it’s bizarre.
As someone who has written about kosher supply for a readership (Irish) that knows next to nothing about Jews, I’d forgive the reporter for this. Jews are pretty exotic in this part of the world, so identifying them as such in order to highlight the significance of a quoted source is good journalistic practice. A less jarring formulation could have been found, though: “[name redacted], who is now able to buy the kosher bread she needs, praised the baker…” Anyway a lot of the things that would signal to a Jew that [name redacted] is Jewish would be lost on most Scottish readers.
Sabba is absolutely right, btw. http://www.tribune.ie/2007/04/01/84287.html