Abstract: In Hungary, during the decades of the communist regime, mentioning Jewish values or wounds would not have fit into the idealistic consensus (and uniformity, even more). So, virtually 100,000 Hungarian Jews tried to hide or forget their roots.
After the regime change in 1989, the Jewish revival progressed with tremendous force. The children and grandchildren of Holocaust survivors, who had hardly heard anything about Judaism or even about the history of their family at home, suddenly “reinvented” Jewish life. Institutions and grassroots places with an informal, but distinctly Jewish spirit, were born. For the new generations their Jewishness became a positive, almost “sexy” distinction from anybody else.
Interestingly, literature did not take over this vibrant revival. Despite the fact that the significant part of the Hungarian writers, especially the winners of international awards, are of Jewish descent. Thus, Jews are overrepresented in Hungarian literature. Nevertheless, this is a traditional tendency in Hungary that writers don’t really like to belong to minority groups. That’s why, Jewish themes or even the topics of the Holocaust and the representation of the life of the Second Generation, hardly fit into this mainstream perception. Recently, some of the Third and the Fourth Generation - mostly lesser-known, younger writers and especially women - have already begun to investigate the repressed memory of their families.
Abstract: This book focuses on the development of bilateral Jewish-Muslim relations in London and Amsterdam since the late-1980s. It offers a comparative analysis that considers both similarities and differences, drawing on historical, social scientific, and religious studies perspectives. The authors address how Jewish-Muslim relations are related to the historical and contemporary context in which they are embedded, the social identity strategies Jews and Muslims and their institutions employ, and their perceived mutual positions in terms of identity and power. The first section reflects on the history and current profile of Jewish and Muslim communities in London and Amsterdam and the development of relations between Jews andMuslims in both cities. The second section engages with sources of conflict and cooperation. Four specific areas that cause tension are explored: the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; antisemitism and Islamophobia; attacks by extremists; and the commemoration of wars and genocides. In addition to ‘trigger events’, what stands out is the influence of historical factors, public opinion, the ‘mainstream’ Christian churches and the media, along with the role of government. The volume will be of interest to scholars from fields including religious studies, interfaith studies, Jewish studies, Islamic studies, urban studies, European studies, and social sciences as well as members of the communities concerned, other religious communities, journalists, politicians, and teachers who are interested in Jewish-Muslim relations.
Abstract: This chapter highlights stories of women’s conversion in contemporary Western European contexts. Theorising the connections among religion, storytelling, identity, subject-formation, and conversion, the chapter conceptualises conversion stories as enabling individual subjects to negotiate a terrain of difference and transformation, including multiple dimensions of belonging. On the basis of a critical operationalisation of Wohlrab-Sahr’s (1999) analytical concepts of ‘syncretism’ and ‘symbolic battle’, the analysis focuses on four memoirs written by women who turn to Judaism and Islam, and looks at motivations for conversion, and understandings of the past and present and different selves. The case studies show that the memoirs construct lifeworlds and selves on a continuum of syncretic and symbolic battle scripts. They moreover demonstrate that converts’ experiences need to be situated within the respective religious traditions, as well as within larger discourses about Judaism and Islam in Western Europe. As such, the chapter contributes empirical insights into experiences of religious, social, and gendered trajectories of conversion/transformation. Moreover, it connects empirical converts’ experiences of becoming Jewish or Muslim to theorising the positions of Judaism and Islam as minoritised traditions and communities in Western Europe.
Abstract: This chapter analyses the intersections between Judaism, conversion, belonging, and gender, through the lived material practice of the tallit. Conversion to a religious tradition is not merely a change in mind set, but rather implies the learning, performance and negotiation of a religious habitus. This is especially the case with conversions to Judaism, or giyur, which focuses on the learning of practices and commitment to synagogue life. Such process of ‘self-making’ is directly related to questions of gender and the possibility of taking on certain objects and tasks. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork, this chapter traces how conversion materialises in daily ritual practice for women in various Jewish communities in the specific ritual use of the prayer shawl, or tallit. Gender equality has been one of the prime topics by which liberal Judaism came to distinguish itself from orthodoxy in the Netherlands. A symbol of this difference is the use of the tallit by women, both in the local Dutch context as well as internationally. Historically, women have been excluded from Shul life, and wearing a tallit, as is permitted in liberal synagogues, can be revolutionary as a marker of inclusion. For converted women in the Jewish diaspora of the Netherlands, wearing the tallit in service can be a confirmation of their Jewishness, but is more often met with ambivalence. Some don’t practice, because they do not want to disturb the status quo, or because they see value in gender segregation in shul. Others do, for equally varied reasons, from political quests for emancipation, to pious desires for submission and devotion. As a compromise, specific forms of ‘women’s tallit’ have entered the synagogues, worn by women who do so out of pious desire. This chapter starts from these various prayer shawl practices, to trace broader questions of belonging. It asks not only how this object is used, but also which types of gender discourses, pious desires, and notions of agency are expressed through the use (or lack thereof) of a tallit.
Abstract: With the breakdown of the Soviet Union, and with Mikhail Gorbachev’s politics of glasnost and perestroika, suppressed religious and national movements emerged as visible elements of political conflict in what once constituted the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). While in the former USSR this concerned the huge former “Turkestan” region with its religious roots in Islam, and the Orthodox denominations of Russia and the Ukraine, the post-USSR Eastern European satellite states saw an eruption of both nationalism and/or suppressed Catholicism. Mark Juergensmeyer (2008: 152) describes how in Russia, the Ukraine, and Poland “religion became the expression of a nationalist rejection of the secular socialist ideology.” Partly, the free expression of religion was a component of what could be termed a democratic “eruption,” and at the same time it created strong links to “nationalist and transnationalist identities of a bygone era” (Juergensmeyer 2008: 156). The role of right-wing extremism, xenophobia, and anti-Semitism ought to be assessed in the context of the transformation of the post-Stalinist political cultures of Eastern Europe and Russia. As much as religion and its institutions were indispensable for the opposition to the Stalinist state, they helped to recreate the old nationalisms of the 19th century (and earlier) of which anti-Semitism was often an integral component. Religious zeal combined with nationalistic patriotism contains ideologies of purity for which “others,” be they ethnic minorities or Jews, were the paramount danger and source of a feared “racial pollution” (cf. Douglas 1966/2007). In the early 1990s, after German re-unification, similar developments could be observed in parts of the former German Democratic Republic. Minkenberg (2002) sees the rehabilitation of the nation state (National-staat) in Eastern Europe in line with the spread of nationalistic rhetoric and the concept of a national ethnic identity. In the context of economic, and partly also cultural crisis, minorities are used as a scapegoat for the problems at hand. Combined with a rejection of internationalism, diversity, and European Union (EU) integration, such resentments seem like “natural” consequences of newly formed national identities (Thieme 2007a, 2007b). In the findings of the European Social Survey (2006), Polish, Hungarian, and Ukrainian populations frequently show more sympathy for conservative (right-wing) politics, gender inequality, and homophobia than Western European societies.
Abstract: Antisemitism and anti-Zionism are complex, delineable, yet inter-related social-psychological phenomena. While antisemitism has been described as an irrational, age-old prejudice, anti-Zionism is often represented as a legitimate response to a ’rogue state’. Drawing upon media and visual sources and rich interview data from Iran, Britain and Israel, Antisemitism and Anti-Zionism: Representation, Cognition and Everyday Talk examines the concepts of antisemitism and anti-Zionism, tracing their evolution and inter-relations, and considering the distinct ways in which they are manifested, and responded to, by Muslim and Jewish communities in Iran, Britain and Israel. Providing insights from social psychology, sociology and history, this interdisciplinary analysis sheds light on the pivotal role of the media, social representations and identity processes in shaping antisemitism and anti-Zionism. As such, this provocative book will be of interest to social scientists working on antisemitism, race and ethnicity, political sociology and political science, media studies and Middle Eastern politics.
Abstract: In the past twenty years almost three quarters of a million Russian Jews have emigrated to the West. Their presence in Israel, Europe and North America and their absence from Russia have left an indelible imprint on these societies. The emigrants themselves as well as those who stayed behind, are in a struggle to establish their own identities and to achieve social and economic security
In this volume an international assembly of experts historians, sociologists, demographers and politicians join forces in order to assess the nature and magnitude of the impact created by this emigration and to examine the fate of those Jews who left and those who remained. Their wide-ranging perspectives contribute to creating a variegated and complex picture of the recent Russian Jewish Emigration.
Part 1 The historical setting: "from northern country" - Russian and Soviet immigration to America and Israel in historical perspective, Zvi Gitelman.
Part 2 From emigration to absorption - policy formulation and implementation: Soviet policy towards Jewish emigration - an overview, Yaacov Ro'i; ethnic and related factors in soviet emigration policy, 1968-1989, Laurie Salitan; the impact of the United States on Soviet emigration policy, Richard Schifter; Israel's immigration policy and the dropout phenomenon, Yehuda Dominitz; the quandaries of an Israeli minister of absorption, Yair Tzaban; Israel's absorption policy since the 1970s, Shmuel Adler. Part 3 The social context of emigration: the interrelationship between emigration and the socio-demographic profile of Russian Jewry, Mark Tolts; Jewish emigration from the former USSR - who? why? how many? Robert J. Brym; does the country gain or lose from the Exodus of Jews? the discussion in Russian society, Eli Weinerman; attitudes of Russians towards Jews and their emigration, 1989-94. Part 4 Social and economic absorption in Israel and the US: Soviet Jews in the United States - language and labour market adjustments revisited, Barry R. Chiswick; community formation among Jews from the former Soviet Union in the US, Steven J. Gold; immigrants from the former USSR in Israel in the 1990s: - demographic characteristics and socio-economic absorption, Ari M. Paltiel et al. Part 5 Cultural change and identity dilemmas: Jewish identity among Russian immigrants in the US, Paul Ritterband; culture change, border crossings and identity shopping - Jewish teenagers from the CIS assess their future in Israel, Fran Markowitz; identity and language - the social insertion of Soviet Jews in Israel, Eliezer Ben-Rafael et al; motivation to serve in the Israeli Army - the gap between cultural involvement and cultural performance, Abraham Carmeli, Judith Fadlon; is living in Russia worthwhile? Leonid Gozman; the view from Kiev, Leonid Finberg; twenty years after, Alexander V. Voronel. Part 6 Impact on the receiving society.
