Portrait Of American Jews

Has America been a place that has preserved and protected Jewish life? Is it a place in which a Jewish future is ensured? Samuel Heilman, long-time observer of American Jewish life, grapples with these questions from a sociologist’s perspective. He argues that the same conditions that have allowed Jews to live in relative security since the 1950s have also presented them with a greater challenge than did the adversity and upheaval of earlier years. The second half of the twentieth century has been a time when American Jews have experienced a minimum of prejudice and almost all domains of life have been accessible to them, but it has also been a time of assimilation, of swelling rates of intermarriage, and of large numbers ignoring their Jewishness completely. Jews have no trouble building synagogues, but they have all sorts of trouble filling them. The quality of Jewish education is perhaps higher than ever before, and the output of Jewish scholarship is overwhelming in its scope and quality, but most American Jews receive a minimum of religious education and can neither read nor comprehend the great corpus of Jewish literature in its Hebrew (or Aramaic) original. This is a time in America when there is no shame in being a Jew, and yet fewer American Jews seem to know what being a Jew means. How did this come to be? What does it portend for the Jewish future? This book endeavors to answer these questions by examining data gleaned from numerous sociological surveys. Heilman first discusses the decade of the fifties and the American Jewish quest for normalcy and mobility. He then details the polarization of American Jewry into active and passive elements in the sixties and seventies. Finally he looks at the eighties and nineties and the issues of Jewish survival and identity and the question of a Jewish future in America. He also considers generational variation, residential and marital patterns, institutional development (especially with regard to Jewish education), and Jewish political power and influence. This book is part of a stocktaking that has been occurring among Jews as the century in which their residence in America was firmly established comes to an end. Grounded in empirical detail, it provides a concise yet analytic evaluation of the meaning of the many studies and surveys of the last four and a half decades. Taking a long view of American Jewry, it is one of very few books that build on specific sociological data but get beyond its detail. All those who want to know what it means and has meant to be an American Jew will find this volume of interest.

This comprehensive look at the Jewish American community at the turn of the 21st century explores the many issues emerican Jews and their organizations are confronting, and shows how the Jewish community responds so as to remain a distinct entity while also becoming a part of the larger American culture. The contributors investigate the complex issues facing the American Jewish community in 12 areas that are at the heart of the Jewish communal enterprise. This work will be of interest to students and scholars of Jewish studies and interfaith studies, to professionals in social work and social services, and to anyone interested in American communal dynamics.

Donated by Sydney Harris.

A unique and vibrant portrait of 60 women, which explores how they blend their faith and/or sense of Jewishness with their lives, their families, their expectations, and their commitments. Includes 120 black and white photographs.

The major focus is on the who, when, and where of American immigration to Israel, but it is the "why" of this aliya which constitutes the core of the book. Waxman analyzes the relationship between Zionism, aliya, and the Jewish experience. Chapters include "Zion in Jewish culture," a synopsis of Zionism through the years, and "American Jewry and the land of Israel in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries," an account of proto-Zionist ideas and movements in early America. Chaim I. Waxman delivers a broad analysis of the phenomenon of American migration to Israel - aliya. Working within the context of the sociology of migration, Waxman provides primary research into a variety of dimensions of this movement and demonstrates the inadequacy of current migration theories to characterize aliya.

"From its beginnings, America, founded on religious freedom, has been a land of opportunity for Jews, socially, economically, and spiritually", writes Rabbi Malka Drucker in introducing twenty compelling individuals who have enriched our country by t