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56
FRIDAY, JANUARY 5, 1990
Changed Family
Continued from preceding page
volunteer work is severely
limited.
In Baltimore, one re-
sponse to the working moth-
er trend was the establish-
ment last year of the Kids'
Center at the Jewish Com-
munity Center, an agency of
the Associated Jewish Char-
ities, for after-school care.
A third reason for the
changed family is the rising
rate of divorce in the Jewish
community although, ac-
cording to Fishman, a trend
she noticed in studying the
divorce data was that Jews
tend to remarry quickly.
That sometimes affected re-
spondents' answers to popu-
lation study survey ques-
tions.
"We should be asking,
'Have you ever been di-
vorced?' rather than Are
you now divorced?' " Fish-
man remarks, pointing out
that the level of those who
have been divorced at one
time in their life is two to
three times higher than
those who are currently di-
vorced. "One-fifth to one-
quarter of the American
Jewish population has had
to deal with divorce at some
point. - she estimates.
The rising divorce rate has
led to single-parent and
blended families. As a
group, single-parent
mothers remain the least af-
fluent members of the Jew-
ish community, even when
they are working full-time.
Fishman says that Jewish
schools and institutions
must increase their sensitiv-
ity to the special problems
these households face.
The fourth, and perhaps
most important. reason for
the changed Jewish family is
feminism. Says Fishman,
who has just published an-
other study devoted to this
issue, feminism has affected
not only the Jewish family
but the entire American
Jewish community.
"Feminism has complete-
ly transformed the Ameri-
can Jewish community.
There is no wing that has
been unchanged. Those
changes didn't come easily,
though. There's been a lot of
fighting along the way:* she
remarks.
Feminist attitudes are
prevalent among Jewish
women. even those who
claim not to be feminists.
Indeed, Fishman says, "a
broad spectrum of general
feminist and Jewish femi-
nist goals have been absorb-
ed and domesticated within
the public and private lives
of mainstream American
Jewry. Parents value for
their daughters the inde-
pendence that a career can
bring, more so than working
for the community or for the
family."
Fishman touches on the
changes feminism has
brought to Jewish religious
and communal life, including
female cantors and rabbis.
participation of women in
prayer services, and the ele-
vation of women to positions
of real power and authority.
Fishman observes, "When
Jews immigrated to this
country, although women
had prayers in the home it
was basically the men who
retained the ties with the re-
ligion. Jewish women were
divested of those ties. Femi-
nism has allowed Jewish
women to re-empower them-
selves and their spiritual
Feminism has
affected not only
the Jewish family
but the entire
American Jewish
community.
life. - As with the general
population, however, femi-
nism has not completely
eradicated all barriers faced
by women, she stresses.
"Within Jewish commu-
nal organizations, for exam-
ple, despite the presence of
qualified women in the field.
very few are promoted to
executive positions. Those
who do achieve executive
positions frequently earn
salaries far lower than those
of their male colleagues.
Similarly, women ordained
as rabbis are far less likely,
so far, to attain the most
prestigious and lucrative
rabbinical positions in major-
metropolitan areas. They are
far more likely to find em-
ployment as Hillel rabbis,
hospital chaplains, assistant
rabbis or rabbis in less
prominent pulpits. - In the
non-sectarian professional
realm, career paths and
salaries of Jewish women
still often lag far behind
those of Jewish men. Says
Fishman, "The fight isn't
over yet. -
Currently, Fishman is in-
volved in a study of the Jew-
ish community's reponse to
changes now and in the fu-
ture. She expects to finish
this study by the end of the
year.
Despite the upheaval the
American Jewish communi-
ty has undergone in the past
few decades, Fishman
herself is optimistic about
the future. "There is a hun-
ger to explore all things Jew-
ish, she says. "And the
level of Jewish self-esteem
and pride is much higher
now than it was 30 years
ago.''