“They Have Eyes and See Not”

Abstract

An analysis of the display of gender in an Israeli museum of social history decodes the practices by which the museum constructs gender and uses gender difference in the display of Jewish life to construct male dominance and to marginalize women. It reinforces a stereotypical world in which women remain nameless and voiceless and have no contribution to show for themselves. Far from being a reflection of historical reality, women's marginalization is the erasure of women's contribution to Jewish survival. This trivialization of women goes unnoticed by the visitor, to whom the display seems perfectly natural and factually acceptable, and contributes to the preservation of gender difference and inequality in Israeli society. Thus, Beit Hatefusot can be seen as a metaphor for the nonconscious ideology that marginalizes women in Israeli culture and results in their exclusion from such activities that are honored or glorified or bring money or power.