The complex history of Jews, nose jobs and antisemitism - The Jewish Chronicle

Conversations around the so-called Jewish nose — and whether it is a feature in need of “correction” — have endured for decades, leading countless Jews to go under the knife in pursuit of a face less in danger of marking them out as “different”.

But is there even such a thing as a Jewish nose? And, if so, who decided it could be branded an imperfection in need of medical correction?

Rhinoplasty — commonly referred to as a nose job — supplanted breast augmentations as the most sought-after type of plastic surgery in the United States in 2019.

In particular, the number of Orthodox women undergoing the procedure has been on the rise, according to a leading New York surgeon. Among some Orthodox communities in the US, increasing numbers of young women are having this form of elective surgery before they begin dating in the hope that it will improve their chances of finding a partner.

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Adrien Brody has kept his nose as it is (Photo: Getty Images)

“A lot of younger women in the Orthodox community have been getting their nose done, rhinoplasty, pre-shidduch dating,” the plastic surgeon Dr Ira Savetsky told the Jerusalem Post earlier this year.

“There are many parents who bring in their daughters in the time period before they start dating and they usually want to get their noses done. I remember in high school people got their noses done in their senior year, but nowadays we see it a lot more as something that young Orthodox Jewish women get early in college or right before they begin dating.

"The interesting thing is that these procedures are totally supported by their parents who come with them.”

Where Jewish people are concerned, going to extreme lengths to change one’s nose has historically been linked to a desire to assimilate into wider society.

This was not necessarily an aesthetic choice but often a safety mechanism to protect oneself in a hostile environment.

The idea that a particular kind of distinctive nose is unmistakably Jewish, and therefore a “deformity”, dates back centuries.

In 1850, the Scottish anthropologist Robert Knox described the “Jewish” feature as “a large, massive, club-shaped, hooked nose, three or four times larger than suits the face”.

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Jennifer Grey has had surgery (Photo: Getty Images)

Thus, he concluded, “the Jewish face never can [be], and never is, perfectly beautiful”.

Physicians started to argue in the early 20th century, that fixing such “racial characteristics” could result in improved patient wellbeing, notes cosmetic surgeon Beth Preminger in a paper-published in a US medical journal, JAMA.

In this paper, entitled 'The Jewish Nose and Plastic Surgery: Origins and Implications', Preminger details how clinicians persistently used the term “Jewish nose” to denote “a standard physical deformity requiring surgical correction”.

The paper states: “In 1914, a young woman who had always been self-conscious about the appearance of her nose decided to seek the advice of a surgeon.

"Her physician, Jerome Webster, made the following diagnosis: 'The nose is fairly long, has a very slight hump, is somewhat broad near the tip and the tip bends down, giving somewhat the appearance of a Jewish nose. Echoing the perspective of a generation of surgeons, I think that there is sufficient deformity to warrant changing the nose'".

Reflecting on the “persistence of this charged category in the medical literature”, Preminger suggests the industry could be responsible for role “perpetuating racial and aesthetic prejudices."

She says: “By incorporating this term into their clinical vocabulary, early plastic surgeons unwittingly lent scientific credibility to popular stereotypes about beauty and ethnicity. In this way, the ‘Jewish nose’ was transformed from a facial variation into a specific, pathological condition for which there existed a medical protocol for correction.”

Rhinoplasty may be on the rise but there are dangers in seeking out a surgeon’s scalpel, beyond the normal risks that come with any surgery. That is, by emerging from surgery with an entirely unremarkable nose, the patient can be left with what is ultimately an unremarkable face.

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Natural option: Ruth Bader Ginsburg (Photo: Getty Images)

Many people express a form of buyer’s remorse years or decades after their surgery, as they come to regret banishing any hint of their Jewish ethnicity from their faces.

The actress Jennifer Grey, who shot to fame when, aged 27, she starred opposite Patrick Swayze in the 1987 box-office hit Dirty Dancing, is someone for whom the expression “cutting your nose off to spite your face” is extremely, well, on the nose.

Following the release of that film, Grey, now 63, had surgery on her nose to improve her future casting prospects. However, she found that by erasing the very “flaw” that helped to make her so recognisable, she became, in her words, “invisible”.

Speaking in 2022, Gray said: “In the world’s eyes, I was no longer me… Overnight I lost my identity and my career.”

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