george--jewish?

I'd have to go on the record and say that George, the character is not Jewish, but that Jason Alexander is. In fact, in a recent article I read about Jason, he mentions visiting his parents, Alex and Ruth Greenspan, in Florida. Which is the more likely Jewish name--Greenspan or Costanza????

I've been Jewish for 26 years now, and I have no idea what wearing a blouse over a hospital gown has to do with being Jewish. Could someone enlighten me?

And--not all of George's friends are Jewish. Elaine is most certainly not Jewish--she didn't even no what a kosher meal was in the airplane episode.

Actually, I thought the funniest part of the Nazi episode was that Jerry was the Jewish one, not George.

That's my two cents, Larry.

[email] (Lawrence B Necowitz) writes:

Thank you. You seem to be the only other person besides me who thinks this way, but I am certain we are correct.

HEY! There *are* Italian Jews, you know. Anybody ever read The Merchant of Venice?

-Renee Cronk

In article [email] (Renee Cronk) writes:

it is also possible that Costanza is not italian, but lithuanian...

young-sup

ps. or maybe it is an ellis island name???

I don't know why, but I thought Costanza was Greek, too?

Kay Jones

I searched through the online directory of IBM employees and found several occurrences of the name Costanza -- some as first name and some as last name. Here's where they were located:

                 3 - Italy
                 1 - France
                 1 - California

I'd say Costanza is almost certainly an Italian name.

Robert Berry IBM PRGS Lab, Cary NC USA

I think the name George Costanza is a joke in itself. The character is obviously a Jewish stereotypical one. Costanza is an Italian name, a very old one and not common now according to an Italian friend of mine. But, jeez, how many Italian guys are named "George"? Come on, the name is just funny in itself!

Anne,

By your reasoning, how many Italian guys are named Arthur? My birth name is Arturo, as George could be Giorgio...

A little reinforcement on this point: My grandfather was born in Italy, and his name was Ralph. How many Italian guys do you know named Ralph? Of course, his given name was Raffaelo. Italian enough for you?

Robert

In article , [email] (Robert

My husband is Italian (don't look at my last name, it's different than his) and his uncle was named Ralph.

jan

I know a guy named Eugene Constanza, and he is definitely italian. How much more italian is Eugene than George?

*******************************************************************************
Shari Deiana                                                     |   ^
Open Systems Unix Environment Manager                  /   /   / |_/_/_/
Department of Computer Science                         \__/ __/
Ferguson 17C   472-9477                                 ..
University of Nebraska at Lincoln

Is this bait? OK. Two inches.

                  Please excuses this,
                                   dominc

Eugene=Eugenio, George=Giorgio...both could easily be Italian.

My point exactly. My original post was in reference to the poster who stated that the name George Costanza was a joke in itself (to paraphrase :-)

Here's a perfect example of how using a person's surname to establish if thier Jewish or not is foolish: I have a Jewish friend named Mark Mannera. And yes, he's an Italian Jew. Mannera, however, is *not* the name on his birth certificate, it's his *original* family name which he has re-adopted. During the war, his family (grandparents, I assume) changed thier name from Mannera to Greenberg, which is the name Mark was born with. Why did they do this? Because in Italy, Greenberg isn't looked upon as a Jewish name, while Mannera is. Obviously, quite the opposite is true here in North America.

Greg