Transgender Jews May Be Nothing New
Was Gender-Bending an Accepted Part of Life in the Old Country?
By Eddy Portnoy
Published October 19, 2011, issue of October 28, 2011.
http://www.forward.com/articles/144546/Bands like Schmekel, which uses Yiddish as an alternative culture to help bulk up their Jewish identities, are part of a phenomenon dubbed "Queer Yiddishkeit," by Rutgers University scholar Jeffrey Shandler, in which queerness is juxtaposed with elements of Yiddish in order to upend the status quo.
While the state of the Jewish status quo is always in some sort of hysterical flux, evidence would seem to indicate that it's come a long way, baby, when transgender masters of folk-punk-snark, Schmekel, play a show at an American Jewish community center.
