The word ghetto began with Jewish history, yet by the late 20th century it was more commonly associated with Black urban life in America. That shift echoed a familiar urban pattern: neighborhoods once densely Jewish became overwhelmingly Black, and the term ghetto moved with them. What happens when a word so marked by one group’s past is taken up by another? How do shared words shape solidarity—or strain it? And what anxieties surface when communities feel their histories are being eclipsed, appropriated, or misunderstood?…