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Jews Of Indiscretion: American Jewish Screen Identity In The Age Of Streaming, Jordan Zachary Adler

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation explores televisual representations of Jewishness among the Millennial generation in the United States. During the 2010s, numerous television series embraced the specificities of Jewish culture and identity, including celebrations and spiritual beliefs. These programs played with dominant understandings of Judaism and Jewishness – confronting, deconstructing, and sometimes confirming some of these characterizations. In series such as Broad City, Difficult People, Russian Doll, and Transparent, Jewishness textured the characters’ sociopolitical consciousness and behavior. These programs also accentuated the distinctive concerns of a generation of American Jews, aligning with their economic anxieties and sociopolitical ideologies, which often veered left. Characters …

From The Lower East Side To "Seinfeld": The Radicalization And Corporatization Of American Jewish Identity, Louie Siegel

Tapestries: Interwoven voices of local and global identities

This essay details the vastly different public expressions of American Jewish identity in the twentieth century through the areas of entertainment and social activism. Critical to this study is a notion I call the Jewish Radical Tradition of Solidaric Jewishness - our culture’s historical legacy of aligning Jewish values with the fight to liberate all oppressed groups, supporting mutual emancipation from systems of social, political, and economic domination that elevate a few individuals at the expense of the collective. I argue that the twentieth century represented the ultimate battle within the American Jewish community to decide what form of Jewishness …

“The Cap’N Crunch Effect”: A Response To Blaire French’S Essay, Mark Leuchter

Journal of Textual Reasoning

No abstract provided.

The Book Of Ruth: Between Story And History, Between Sacred And Secular (Or, Scripture For The Pew’S Jews), Lesleigh Cushing

Journal of Textual Reasoning

No abstract provided.

“But Mordecai Bowed Not, Nor Did Him Reverence”: The Book Of Esther’S Challenge To ‘Secular’ And To ‘Religious’ Jewish Identities, Daniel H. Weiss

Journal of Textual Reasoning

No abstract provided.

A D’Var Torah For Beha’Alotcha: The Search For Evocative History, Blaire French

Journal of Textual Reasoning

No abstract provided.

Introduction, Mark Randall James

Journal of Textual Reasoning

No abstract provided.

Hochberg, Marc, Sophia Maier Garcia

Bronx Jewish History Project

Marc Hochberg was born 1949. He grew up with parents, both the children of immigrants, in a six story apartment building on Holland Avenue, off the south side of Pelham Parkway. The area is remembered as 90% Jewish, with one Italian friend from elementary school. He attended Castle Hill Junior High School in Parkchester, which still had few non-white students at the time, and the Bronx High School of Science. When he was in high school his parents moved to Grand Concourse and 165th Street. Bronx Science is remembered as a top education, and he would go to Franklin and …

Examining The Role Of Place Attachment In Climate Justice Engagement And Jewish Relationships To The Environment, Madeline Medina

Environmental Studies Honors Projects

It is critical that environmental justice and marginalized identities are the focus of climate-related discussions and research. Solutions must support the long-term wellbeing of people, especially and importantly those who are most vulnerable to the consequences of climate change. Psychological research suggests that place attachment–the meaningful bonds that occur between people and their environment (Scannell & Gifford, 2010)–is a key factor in motivating environmental behavior, but little research has examined its connection to environmental justice oriented behavior. This two-part exploration first evaluated the role of place attachment on engagement with both a typical climate change centered message and a climate …

Diversity, Equity, & Exclusion: Examining Jewish Identity & Antisemitism As Missing Pieces Of Dei And Ethnic Studies Education, Katie Meitchik

Pitzer Senior Theses

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) is a theory and practice that focuses on systemic structures, inequities, and social change by examining concepts such as race, gender, class, sexuality, ethnicity, ability, and religion. Incorporating DEI initiatives into learning spaces can lead to a deeper sense of self, stronger coalition building, increased civic engagement, and a sense of healing, resistance, and belonging. Although a nationwide criteria for using DEI practices in education has not yet been implemented as a key component to public school teaching, there are programs emerging with the intent to utilize the theory. This has led to a movement …

Jews And Science, Sander L. Gilman

The Jewish Role in American Life: An Annual Review

Jews and Science examines the complicated relationship between Jewish identities and the evolving meanings of science throughout the history of Western academic culture. Jews have been not only the agents for study of things Jewish, but also the subject of examination by “scientists” across a range of disciplines, from biology and bioethics to anthropology and genetics. Even the most recent iteration of Jewish studies as an academic discipline—Israel studies—stresses the global cultural, economic, and social impact of Israeli science and medicine.

The 2022 volume of the Casden Institute’s Jewish Role in American Life series tackles a range of issues that …

The Silent Holocaust And Other Myths: The Jewish Body And Intermarriage In The Fiction Of Saul Bellow And Philip Roth, Samuel Gold

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation concerns the legacy within the Jewish American imagination of two related ideas: the pseudoscientific belief in the Jewish body’s inherent physical difference, and the conviction, shared by rabbis, sociologists, and Jewish advocacy organizations in the second half of the 20th century, that Jewish-gentile intermarriage threatened Jewish survival in America. The Jew’s association with illness and debility is central to the Nazi race theories that undergird the Holocaust; the postwar American anxiety over intermarriage responds to that destruction. Fearing that intermarriage may yield a second, “silent” Holocaust through assimilation, American Jewish leaders metaphorically equate exogamy (out-marriage) with genocide.

I …

Jewish Conversion During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Victoria Davide

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

March 2020 saw a stark change to daily life and religious practices for many individuals because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Those converting to Judaism, or in the process of wanting to convert, found themselves physically isolated from their Jewish communities. This thesis dives into what aspects are important when creating a Jewish identity and how individuals circumnavigate these changes in crisis. Through the use of qualitative interviews this thesis illuminates the many different changes and experiences that individuals went through converting to Judaism during the COVID-19 pandemic. I bring many different groups for comparisons including different branches within Judaism and …

Triangulating Research That Focuses On Decolonizing And Race-Based Educational Theories, Beth Dotan

The Nebraska Educator: A Student-Led Journal

The normalization of white cultural and societal educational standards often produce uniform consumers of knowledge. In an effort to seek modification from conventional educational belief systems, this literature review looks at a collection of critical, race-based, and anti-/ de-colonial epistemologies and challenges traditions of inquiry. The research: 1) articulates how national culture perpetuates divisiveness through race and racism in colonized American society and institutions, 2) contemplates the amalgamation of Jewishness and whiteness, and 3) considers utilizing critical theory and social justice views to decolonize educational methodologies as a path to implement change. Historical context and the diverse array of scholarship …

Greater El Paso Jewish Demographic Study, Karla Martinez

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Although the history of the Jewish community in Greater El Paso has been documented, there is a lack of understanding of the basic demographic structure of the Jewish population in this region. This study aims to develop a demographic portrait of the local Jewish community through an online survey (n=448). The results show that the Jewish community in Greater El Paso (El Paso TX, and Las Cruces, NM) is experiencing population aging, and many community members have resided in the region for over twenty years. More than half of respondents self-identify as Reform. The Jewish community in Greater El Paso …

States And Laws, Jews And Palestinians: Yadgar's Traditionalist Alternative. A Reflection On Yadgar, Israel's Jewish Identity Crisis (Cambridge, 2020), James J. Friedberg

Law Faculty Scholarship

This essay reflects on issues raised by Yaacov Yadgar concerning a devil’s bargain made decades ago between secular Zionist Israeli governments and the country’s Orthodox religious establishment, in defining who is a Jew and, therefore, entitled to the most comprehensive benefits of citizenship. It seems that that very tensions inherent in this somewhat illogical, somewhat cynical bargain are quite relevant to an us-them mentality that makes peace with the Palestinians more difficult.

Jewish Racialization, The "Jewish Gene," And The Perpetuation Of Ashkenormativity In Direct-To-Consumer Genetic Ancestry Testing In The United States, Sabina Ali

Religious Studies Theses

Jewish identity has been defined and redefined, negotiated and renegotiated, among Jews and non-Jews in various parts of the world. The tensions around the ongoing question of “Who is a Jew?” arise from the fact that Jewish identity encompasses numerous combinations of religion, commitment, nation, kinship, peoplehood, culture, ethnicity, and memory. This thesis will examine the way Jewishness has been and continues to be racialized in the United States by Jews and non-Jews. Specifically, I look at how direct-to-consumer genetic ancestry testing companies, such as 23andMe and AncestryDNA, present a racialized view of Jewish identity to consumers and perpetuate the …

Jewish Identity On American Television And Viewer Attitudes In An Era Of Rising Anti-Semitism, Jacqueline Winters-Allen

Master of Arts in American Studies Capstones

Research in media and cultural studies have shown that viewers form opinions regarding Jewish identity based on how Jewish characters are presented on screen. American entertainment has struggled with accurate portrayals of Jewish culture and characters; negative Jewish stereotypes frequently appear and perpetuate these perceptions. Due to the current rise of anti-Semitism in the United States, it is important to consider how writers are defining Jewish identity by examining depictions of contemporary Jewish characters and assessing viewer attitudes toward those characters. Two long-running, popular American broadcast television shows that contain Jewish characters as part of the main cast – The …

Reconciling Apostasy In Genesis Rabbah 80: A Rabbinic Response To Intermarriage, Ethan Levin

Studies in Mediterranean Antiquity and Classics

In the beginning of the 5th century, Palestine saw an economic boom and an extensive cultural shift due to the Christianization of the Roman empire. Intermingling between Jews and Gentiles must have been at an all time high in the prospering cities of Palestine, so to cordon off the Jew from the Christianized world, the Palestinian rabbis turned towards the polemical tools of intermarriage and ethnicity. The legal restriction of intermarriage with Gentiles on the grounds of their abhorrent, yet enticing, sacreligious practices served as a concrete barrier to apostasy codified in Jewish practice. This legal thought has a long …

Antisemitism Today And Its Relationship To Jewish Identity And Religious Denomination, Michaela Ambrosius

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

The purpose of this research study was to answer the following three research questions: 1) What is the relationship between Jewish identity (religious and ethnic) and experiences of antisemitism? 2) What is the relationship between Jewish religious affiliation and experiences of antisemitism? 3) What, if any, type of antisemitism (e.g., ethnic or religiously based antisemitism or anti-Zionism) do Jewish individuals experience most often? Antisemitism continues to be a pervasive issue in the United States (U.S.) and can be based on ethnic prejudice, religious bias, or anti-Israel attitudes. The final sample for this study included 279 participants who self-identified as Jewish. …

Who Builds The Motherland?, Benjamin D. Goldman

Georges Lieber Essay Contest on Resistance

I was born in 2002 into a middle-class Jewish family, in a very Jewish town. The town was our Zion, our Mini-Israel, our bubble. It prided itself on being a sleepy town where any American can feel safe and comfortable. At the best of times, the town felt like a family; everyone knew your name and many children born in the town decided to live the rest of their adult lives there. It was a place where the support of Israel was of utmost importance. Although everyone prided themselves on the security, there was always this unease that our human …

In-Between Places, Jonah Fleeger

Masters Theses

I am an emerging artist originally from Northwest Indiana. I attended a small boarding school called Verde Valley School, in Sedona, Arizona, which is where my love for pottery first started. I received my BFA in ceramics from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. After college I was fortunate enough to find studio space and work at the Lillstreet Art Center, where I was a teacher, teaching assistant and glaze maker. Since then I have completed post-baccalaureate programs at The University of Colorado Boulder and Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, Arizona. This book is a presentation of myself …

Vicarious Victimhood As Post-Holocaust Jewish Identity In Erica Fischer's Auto/Biography Aimée And Jaguar, Anne Rothe

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In her article "Vicarious Victimhood as Post-Holocaust Jewish Identity in Erica Fischer's Auto/Biography Aimée and Jaguar" Anne Rothe reads the Austrian-Jewish journalist's interview-based dual biography in autobiographical terms. Taking recourse to such para-texts as the preface and epilogue, in which Fischer reflects on her own subject position, in addition to the auto/biographical narrative itself, Rothe critiques the notion of constructing secular Jewish identity based on the notion of vicarious or hereditary Holocaust victimhood. This provocative new reading reveals that the biography Fischer wrote constitutes a counter-narrative to the story her main collaborator, Lilly Wust, told the author about her …

Liminally White: Jews, Mormons, And Whiteness, Richard Benjamin Crosby

Faculty Publications

Jews and Mormons have pasts as racialized Others. Although they appear dissimilar, both groups have been inscribed historically as non-White. Both groups responded to these inscriptions by attempting to achieve Whiteness, making numerous and radical concessions to U.S. American culture. As a result, both groups became "liminally White". We argue that such liminal status demonstrates the fissures in Whiteness and provides creative new grounds for critiquing Whiteness as a rhetorical construct.

Na'aseh : Ritual In Practice, Anna Henrick Karpatkin Benjamin

Masters Theses

This body of work is an exploration of Jewish identity through pattern and ritual. Pattern is used as a tool to question and reinterpret these actions. Drawings, prints and papercuts are created through repetitive and evolutionary actions performed over time.

Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow: Upsherin, Alef-Bet, And The Childhood Navigation Of Jewish Gender Identity Symbol Sets, Amy K. Milligan

Women's & Gender Studies Faculty Publications

In this essay, I introduce the theoretical framework of hairlore, discussing its challenges when applied to the hair of infants and very young children. I contextualize the ritual of upsherin, reviewing its history, describing contemporary applications, and discussing variations of the practice. Finally, I offer an analysis of upsherin, considering its role in the shifting relationship between mother and son, as well as in the maintenance of a gendered Orthodox symbol set, and discuss the possibility of egalitarian parallels for young girls. I ultimately argue that upsherin is ripe for adaptation by liberal Jewish communities in its celebration of …

Two-Sided Healing : An Exploration Of Jewish Women Psychotherapists' Experience, Aviva Bellman

Theses, Dissertations, and Projects

This study examined the subjective identities of Jewish women psychotherapists, as well as the ways in which they give meaning to their psychotherapeutic practice. Twelve narratives by Jewish women psychotherapists were utilized as secondary data, originally published in an edited book by Greene and Brodbar (2010). The study used a Jewish feminist epistemological stance, an intersubjective understanding of the therapeutic relationship, and an interpretive (hermeneutic) phenomenological approach, which led the researcher to self-reflect over the course of the analytical process (Ginsberg, 2002; Lopez and Willis, 2004). Narratives were analyzed for recurrent themes and sub-themes (Smith, Flowers, & Larkin, 2009). Implications …

Constructing The Imaginative Bridge: Third-Generation Holocaust Narratives, Megan Reynolds

Undergraduate Student Research Awards

Holocaust survivor and second-generation writers like Primo Levi, Elie Wiesel, and Art Speigelman struggle with Holocaust trauma throughout their writing. Their writing includes certain distinctive characteristics like the hesitancy to speak at all, the “deep sense of moral urgency” to share the truth, and the utter sorrow of acknowledging Holocaust suffering (Teichman and Leder 4). While some survivors wrote to preserve the truth about the Shoah, others believe that the “most appropriate response…is silence” (Teichman and Leder 1). Words fall short, inadequately describe the horrors survivors faced, and seem to almost distort the truth about the Holocaust itself. Survivor silence …

Reform Judaism And Lgbtq Identity In Indiana: A Sociological Study Toward Greaterunderstanding And Inclusion, Gregory Ethan Zemtsov

Undergraduate Honors Thesis Collection

LGBTQ Jews are collectively an underrepresented population, and their identification with two minority groups exposes this group of individuals to a great deal of potential hardships. Jewish culture, the largely secular LGBTQ community, and the ever-present gaze of heteronormative Christian society at large unfortunately have the ability to permutate and coalesce in a myriad of destructive ways at the expense of LGBTQ Jews. While the media and academia largely ignore this community at the national level, LGBTQ Jewry in the Midwest is worse off still. Today, there has yet to be a single published article about LGBTQ Jews in the …

Being Different: The Life And Work Of Albert Memmi, Michael Jakob Lejman

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation is a study of the life and work of Albert Memmi, author of over twenty novels, essays, and other book length manuscripts as well as a constant public commentator on subjects related to colonialism, Jewish identity, the sociology of race and oppression, and the postcolonial world. His work includes the widely acclaimed novel The Pillar of Salt as well as The Colonizer and the Colonized - a canonical text in the history of colonial society and power relations. A Tunisian Jew who immigrated to France following his home country's independence in 1957, both Memmi's work and his complex …