Israélite and Juif : A Linguistic Revision of a Sociohistorical Paradigm

Abstract: This essay analyzes the meaning and usage of the word Israelite in France over the past three centuries. The scholarly consensus is that Israelite became the dominant term used by Jews to designate themselves after the emancipation, to acknowledge their assimilation and show their support for the Republican design, which enjoined them to turn Judaism into a religious affair. By combining methodologies in history and discourse analysis, as well as examining previously neglected sources, this essay establishes that Israelite was mostly used as a synonym of Juif or as a euphemism to avoid the pejorative connotations of the latter. These results considerably qualify the notion that the usage of Israelite mirrored the emergence of a new Jewish identity after the Revolution and shed new light on the sensibilities of French Jews in the late modern period.