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How the California Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum Teaches that Jews Oppress non-Jewish Minorities

byMark L. Javitch
Last Updated:  February 23, 2025

The California Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum (“MC”) teaches that Jews are dominant oppressors of other non-Jewish minorities.

But MC proponents say that the MC “doesn’t actually say that Jews are bad.” 

True, Ethnic Studies does not outright say “Jews are bad” or even “Jews are oppressors.”  But an argument can imply a conclusion without stating it directly. In this case, even though the curriculum never explicitly says “Jews are bad,” it presents two key ideas:

  • Premise One: Ethnic Studies teaches that the dominant group is bad.
  • Premise Two: The curriculum asserts that Jews, once an oppressed minority, became part of this dominant group by abandoning their traditional practices.

By combining these premises, the argument leads to the unstated but inevitable conclusion that because Jews are now in the dominant group—and that group is portrayed negatively—they must also be considered “bad.” This is a classic example of an enthymeme, where a critical premise (that being in the dominant group makes one bad) is left unstated yet expected to be understood by the audience.

I will start from the plain text of the MC. This is a screenshot of the relevant sections of the model curriculum at pages 380-381. Ethnic Studies explains that Jews joined the dominant group at some period in American history.

 

Reprinted in full, this section of the Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum says:

In the decades after the Holocaust, American attitudes toward Jews gradually changed, and overt anti-Jewish discrimination decreased. Descendants of light-skinned Jewish immigrants were able to acculturate or assimilate, which brought gains and losses.

Acculturation refers to the adoption of many of the practices and values of the majority or dominant culture while still retaining a connection to one’s culture of origin, or a balance between cultures.

Assimilation is a process by which a minority group or culture comes to resemble that of the majority culture.

Assimilation allowed the children of Jewish immigrants to change their position on the racial hierarchy from that of their immigrant parents, though they remained vulnerable to antisemitism. Assimilation also brought loss of community, identity, and cultural traditions and practices.

While anti-Jewish prejudice became less socially accepted over time, antisemitism persisted and persists in various forms today.

While it used to be common to say as a compliment that Jews generally assimilated well in America, in Ethnic Studies, the idea of “joining the dominant group” has a loaded meaning, and Jews are the only ethnic group in the model curriculum to be accused of this heresy. The condemnation of Jews takes place when defining “assimilation” and “acculturation.” The MC defines both terms nearly in the same manner — to describe the way Jews gave up their unique culture to join the dominant group.

Acculturation is defined as the “adoption of many of the practices and values of the majority or dominant culture.” Assimilation is defined as “the process by which a minority group or culture comes to resemble that of the majority culture.”

Inserting these definitions and summing up what the MC is saying about the descendants of light-skinned Jewish immigrants, they:

  • changed their position on the racial hierarchy from that of their immigrant parents;
  • came to resemble the majority or dominant culture by adopting their practices and values by losing their community, identity, and cultural traditions and practices. 

Next, by going back to what the MC teaches about dominant groups, we recall that the dominant groups: 

  • “harm oppressed groups” through “oppression,” which is “unjust treatment of and control.” (P. 98).
  • benefit themselves by telling narratives “in service of the dominant social group’s interests and ideologies” (P. 98)
  • “target nonwhite ethnic groups who face oppression at the hands of the dominant social group.” (P. 104).
  • “achieve[] dominance through [narrative] repetition, the apparent authority of the speaker (often accorded to speakers who represent the dominant social groups), and the silencing of alternative accounts.” (P. 98)

Summing up what is being said about Jews adopting the practices of the dominant group and what the practices of the dominant group are taught to be, the MC teaches that:

While once a minority culture, the descendants of light-skinned Jewish immigrants joined the dominant group by:

  • abandoning Jewish traditions and adopting the dominant culture’s practices and values;
  • targeting, harming and controlling oppressed non-Jewish ethnic groups;
  • telling self-serving narratives in favor of Jewish people while silencing alternative accounts;
  • misleading about the authority of Jewish narrative tellers based on the false perception of a Jewish person inherently having authority.

These allegations about Jews are offensive and false. Portraying Jews in a false and negative manner is antisemitism even if it is taught in the context of Ethnic Studies. Many people who say that Ethnic Studies doesn’t teach anything negative about Jews are saying we shouldn’t believe what we read with our own eyes. But it is not that complicated, and we can read the plain text to see what it says. It clearly says that Jews joined the dominant group and the dominant group is bad for oppressing minorities. This is merely a simplistic and false distortion of history that is obviously contributing to antisemitism. To say that it must be taught that Jews are in the “dominant group” is a plainly classic antisemitic trope contained squarely in California Ethnic Studies Curriculum.

For more, read Ethnic Studies Teaches Antisemitism in 3 Simple Steps.

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