Hishtaknezut: Ethnic Performance and Its Failure

This article offers a critical analysis of the ethnic structure in Israel through a study of a specific ethnic performance: hishtaknezut, meaning the passing from a marked (Mizrahi) ethnic identity to an unmarked, seemingly non-ethnic and privileged (Ashkenazi) identity. We examine the practices of hishtaknezut and their significance in light of the denial of ethnic inequality in Israel, the national discourse of the “ingathering of the exiles,” and the neo-liberal demand for identities devoid of ethnic markers as a precondition for economic mobility. On the basis of qualitative research we argue that hishtaknezut signifies a performance that is an “appropriate response” to the national and neo-liberal discourses. However, in terms of identity politics, the concept of hishtaknezut contains the inevitable failure of the act of mimicry, because it always alludes to the ethnic past of the individual trying to pass. Therefore, hishtaknezut involves a twofold sense of shame – over one’s ethnic origin and over the concealing of that origin by mimicking another group. The prevalence of the use of the term hishtaknezut, along with its signification of imperfection, attests to the perpetuation of the ethnic order in Israel.