The Southern Jewish experience is 19th century immigrant peddlers traveling unpaved roads, carrying hard-boiled eggs with them as they struggle to keep kosher in the land of pork. It’s small-town merchants keeping their stores open on Saturday, the Jewish Sabbath, because that’s the day everyone comes to town to shop. The Southern Jewish experience is driving your child from Natchez to Baton Rouge every Sunday for religious school because there is no religious school in Natchez. It’s taking Jewish athletes from across the country competing in the Birmingham Maccabi Games to visit the Civil Rights Museum, cheering for the local high school football team, even though Friday Night Lights has a very different meaning, and debating whether to have a bluegrass band or a klezmer band at your wedding. It’s Tulane, UNC, Texas, and Ole Miss students erecting sukkahs on the quad and bringing matzah to the cafeteria.

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Although representing less than 2% of Southern states’ population, Southern Jews make up 20% of America’s Jewish population. Southern Jews have made a substantial mark on the communities where they lived and the nation as a whole, serving as mayors, sheriffs, school board members, and civic and philanthropic leaders, in highly disproportionate numbers. And this occurred in the nation’s “Bible Belt,” a region steeped in deep Christian faith and a loyal grip on its distinctive ways.

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The Southern Jewish Experience shines a light on the experiences of strangers in a strange land—who must adapt, accommodate, conform to their surroundings, and at the same time embrace, sustain, and celebrate their unique history, culture, and religious practices. But it is also a great testament to the soul of the Southerner, who more often than not accepted their Jewish neighbors as members of the community: partners, leaders, and friends.