Zohran Mamdani: Forms of erasure

Jews, of all people, should know that bureaucratic categories rarely capture the truth of identity – not the Ashkenazim when asked to conditionally flatten into whiteness, nor the Mizrahim, when forced to fold into Ashkenazi identity. We have a long history of being forced to declare an identity, under limited terms, to satisfy a structure that has rarely meant us well. And yet, there’s been a flurry of outrage on social media following the recent publication of The New York Times article on Zohran Mamdani’s application to Columbia University and the boxes he checked within the racial demographics section.

Mamdani, an applicant born in Uganda to Indian immigrant parents, selected “Asian” and “Black or African American.” The Times clarifies, quoting Mamdani:

“[…] he did not consider himself either Black or African American, but rather ‘an American who was born in Africa.’ He said his answers on the college application were an attempt to represent his complex background given the limited choices before him, not to gain an upper hand in the admissions process.”

When given space to be more specific, Mamdani wrote in: “Ugandan.”

Naturally, his critics are having a field day, and predictably, a segment of American Jews have joined in with particular zeal, driven less by a concern for demographic integrity, and more by political anxiety concerning Mamdani’s mayoral run and his Pro-Palestinian platform.

Israeli American journalist Avi Mayer posted an Instagram story with the caption: “I grew up in Israel, I guess that makes me Asian American in Mamdaniland.”

Actually, yes. And not just in the realm of public identity, but in the confusing, complicated world of being a new American.

We can write volumes critiquing Mamdani’s politics, but mocking the terrain of demographic self-categorization within the context of the American racial schema is perhaps not the battle American Jews want to enter. If anything, we should understand the tensions in those forms most intimately.

Twenty years ago, I sat in a race studies class and watched a documentary about Black identity in America. Even then, the question of who gets to claim “Black” or “African American” in an academic setting was under scrutiny. Does being North African count? Or is “African American” reserved for those with ancestral ties to sub-Saharan Africa? What about recent African immigrants? Is it racist to separate North Africans from the rest of the continent? What about white individuals from Zimbabwe or South Africa – are they “African American”? Do we distinguish between Black identity and “African American” as a way of signaling a specific historical and relational context? Do Americans even realize that they have reduced an entire continent and its diasporas to one American experience?

To be considered “Black” or “African American” on academic demographic forms was never clearly defined – codifying Blackness in America is as nationally fraught as defining Jewishness in Germany. These bureaucratic labels are not neutral; they are performances under surveillance – acts of self-declaration constrained by the gaze of a system that demands clarity where there is none, for its own ends.

Further, these forms were never structured to hold the complexity of the continent, because in America, Africa is synonymous with slavery. Elsewhere, it’s an origin story, a site for medical training, a university appointment, or a business hub – a continent that generates identity through presence, not just trauma.

Mamdani’s lived experience involves a birth and childhood in Uganda, a move to South Africa, and an eventual settlement in New York City. It does not map neatly onto the box assigned to most Indian Americans, nor does it align with the African American experience. His background sets him apart from the broader Asian applicant group – one that has faced structural disadvantages in elite college admissions (see Students for Fair Admission vs. Harvard). Most charitably, his selections are not a calculated attempt to game the system, but a subjective response to an imperfect form in a stacked process.

In that same documentary, university professors with Egyptian or Moroccan roots were touted as “African American” by their institutions – locationally accurate, but socially incoherent. After all, identity is not simply a single fact point – it’s a story of people, community, religion, and perception. And if any group should be sensitive to how identity and perception collide, it’s American Jews.

Imagine a first-generation American Jew whose family immigrated from Morocco in the late 20^th century. If their skin tone doesn’t read as “white,” they’ll navigate both Jewish spaces and American society through a different lens than their Ashkenazi peers. Their parents contended with language, cultural, social and racial barriers. They may be asked if they’re bi-racial: the American gaze sees ambiguous brownness and often asks, “Black-ish?” Even within Jewish spaces, they may find themselves treated like outsiders in their own tradition.

So when it comes time to check a box on a college application, what box do they squeeze themselves into?

Review Columbia’s application demographics form and you’ll see the conundrum. The race options are: American Indian or Alaska Native, Asian, Black or African American, Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander, or White. None of these options reflect Mizrahi, Sephardi, and Ashkenazi identity – nor the many other groups of the Jewish diaspora. For a family that has lived in North Africa for generations, “African American” may not be sociologically accurate, but in its imperfect way, it might be the closest fit. And even when a subgroup selection is allowed, such as “Middle Eastern,” this framing is still erasure: Morocco is not the Middle East.

Modern forms may offer more descriptive categories – such as “West Asian” (an option that typically includes Israel, Lebanon, Syria, Iran and Türkiye) – the label still fails to capture the full identity narrative of many Mizrahim if they are further asked to select a country of origin. A Mizrahi Jew born and raised in America may not hold Israeli citizenship, but they may find it incoherent to ethnically identify with their family’s country of birth – especially in the wake of ethnic cleansing, or when that country achieved independence only after their family’s emigration. Their lived experience – culturally, racially, socially – does not fit neatly into a box. Neither does Mamdani’s.

I urge us to extend a bit of chesed, the kind of recognition for complexity that we, as Jews, often seek for ourselves. Mamdani does not claim to be African American in the political or cultural sense. He is an American whose parents immigrated across multiple continents during this upbringing. His answers were an attempt to represent that complexity.

And yes, Avi Mayer, if you’re an Israeli American and a form lets you mark “Asian” and specify, “West Asian,” go ahead. That’s not gaming the system; it’s simply honoring geography – if that speaks to you. Refusing to be held in a box that doesn’t represent your history is not manipulation; it’s a quiet rebellion – one our ancestors were denied.

We can debate Mamdani’s policies and express concern about his proximity to power – but deriding how others navigate identity in a system that was never built to mirror us? That’s not our battle.