This Week
The Journey Within
A landmark new study shows
American Jews increasingly looking within for meaning.
J.J. GOLDBERG
Special to the Jewish News
T
hree in five Jewish adults
report that their level of
Jewish involvement has
changed substantially over the
course of their adult lives. Remarkably,
their involvement is nearly as likely to
have increased as to have declined.
What's constant is change.
American Jews continually adapt and
reinvent their identities throughout
their adult lives.
Those are the most important find-
ings in "Connections and Journeys," a
landmark study of Jewish identity sched-
uled for release next week by UJA-
Federation of New York. Four years in
the making, it's one of the most comb
plex looks ever at how American Jews
form and re-form their Jewish identities.
"The perspective taken in this
study is that identity is the result of an
ongoing process, rather than an entity
that is fully acquired at some point in
a person's lifetime," writes the author,
Brandeis University social psychologist
_
Bethamie Horowitz.
The study suggests that Jewish
attachment is subject to many influ-
ences, from family attitudes to Jewish
schooling, teenage programs and adult
relationships.
One of the most important, startling-
ly, is family stability; strained childhood
relations with parents point strongly to
declining adult Jewish attachment.
Startling Results
Some of Horowitz's findings will cause
fireworks. Only 5 percent of respon-
dents report being positively influ-
enced by rabbis; 10 percent say rabbis
have turned them off.
As for Jewish schooling, it's decisive
only among Orthodox Jews. For oth-
ers, crucial influences come later:
youth groups, Israel visits, relation-
ships, childbirth.
Most troubling, increases are main-
ly in feelings of Jewish attachment.
What's declining is Jewish practice.
For traditionalists, at least, that's what
counts.
But most of all, Jews are in continu-
al flux. "A person constructs a sense of
Jewishness from his/her own mix of
experiences, engagements, interactions
and contexts," Horowitz writes. "We
see evidence of a more pliable, 'person-
alized' Jewish identity, which for many
has more to do with personal meaning
and expression than with communal
expression." A useful metaphor, she
suggests, is "a salad bar."
To capture that dynamism, the
study works in two dimensions. First,
it "explores people's current connec-
tions to Jewishness," including what
they do and how they feel. Second, it
"examines people's journeys — how
people's Jewish identities change and
are influenced throughout the life
course."
The study combined tele-
phone surveys with one-on-
one interviews and focus
groups. In all, 1,504 subjects
were included, all born in America
after World War II. Ages ranged
from 22 to 52.
All lived in the New York
area, which could skeW the
findings. As a metropolitan
area that's 13 percent
Jewish — and home to
one-fourth of all American
Jews — New York,
Horowitz writes, "can serve as both an
exception and a rule about American
Jewish identity."
Horowitz begins by dividing her
subjects into three basic "modes" of
Jewish identity: assimilated (she
politely calls them "Otherwise
Engaged"), "Intensively Engaged," and
"Mixed Engagement." Each "mode"
comprises almost exactly one-third of
the population.
Divisions are based on survey
responses in three categories:
"Subjective Jewish Centrality" (pride
in Jewishness, sense of belonging);
"Ritual Practice" (candle-lighting, sep-
arate dishes), and "Cultural-
Communal Behavior" (owning Jewish
books, attending Jewish lectures).
What Horowitz does next is one of
her most important innovations. She
divides her three "identity modes" into
seven subgroups, a Jewish equivalent
of market segments. These become the
building blocks for all that follows.
The "Otherwise Engaged" subdivide
into "Really Indifferent" (9 percent of
the total population, mainly young,
male and single) and those "With Some
Jewish Interest" (24 percent). Both show
low involvement by every measure.
The "Intensively Engaged" break
down into Orthodox (16 percent) and
Non-Orthodox (18 percent, mainly
Conservative).
The "Mixed" group divides in
three: "Subjectively Engaged" (7 per-
cent), "Tradition-Oriented" (18 per-
cent) and "Cultural-Communal
Involvement" (14 percent). Each com-
bines a high score in one
engagement type — sub-
jective feeling, ritual or
cultural-communal
_activity — with a low
score in other areas.
Some subvidisions were
a surprise, Horowitz writes.
The Tradition-Oriented,
with .high ritual involve-
ment, tend to be young,
fourth-generation
Americans. This suggests a quiet
resurgence of religiosity.
Then again, the most assimilated
had been expected to subdivide into a
group that was "outright hostile" and
another that was essentially passive.
Instead, Horowitz found, only 1
percent showed outright hostility,
while fully 63 percent were "very posi-
tive." Hence the division into "Really
Indifferent" and "Some Interest."
This led to one of her most important
conclusions about contemporary
Jewish identity: In contrast to past
generations, "the range of emotion
about being Jewish has shifted, from
acceptance versus rejection to mean-
ingfulness versus indifference." Jews
aren't running away anymore. They
just aren't being drawn in.
Horowitz's most ingenious
advance, and her riskiest, is her analy-
sis of types of changes Jews undergo.
Using survey data asking how subjects
acted and felt in childhood, she picks
two indicators — Sabbath candle-
lighting and Jewish pride — to com-
pare individual Jewish "journeys."
If the subjects' memories are to be
trusted, two-fifths haven't changed
much since they were 12. One-fifth
maintain a "steady, low-intensity
Jewish involvement" in attitude and
behavior. Another fifth show a "steady,
high-intensity" involvement.
The other 60 percent show clear
movement. For one-sixth, 17 percent,
involvement "lapses or decreases" in at
least one dimension, with the other
either lapsing or low. Another 10 per-
cent show increasing involvement in
one measure, with the other high or
increasing.
The largest group, one-third of the
population, showed an "Interior" jour-
ney: rising subjective Jewish involve-
ment, coupled with low or declining
ritual practice.
Journeys were closely linked to
Jewish denomination. Three-fourths
of those raised Orthodox followed
Steady-High or Increasing Journeys.
Among those raised Conservative,
one-fourth had High or Increasing
journeys, while 44 percent were
Interior. Among Reform Jews, one-
tenth had High or Increasing jour-
neys, 36 percent Interior and 55 per-
cent Steady-Low or Lapsing journeys.
This is risky stuff. We could be
looking at nothing more than Jews
who've stopped lighting Sabbath can-
dles, but think it's OK. Pessimists will
look at this and see confirmation of a
disintegrating Jewish community.
But Horowitz could be onto some-
thing big. Fully 70 percent of her sub-
jects report low or declining ritual
observance. Yet nearly as many, 63
percent, report high or increasing lev-
els of subjective Jewish attachment.
American Jewish identity "isn't neces-
sarily declining," Horowitz writes. But
it is changing, becoming more person-
al and more, well, Interior.
The challenge for the Jewish com-
munity is to begin understanding those
market segments, to find ways of help-
ing Jews grow. "Although people have
journeys which can be very idiosyncrat-
ic," Horowitz writes, "the Jewish com-
munity can develop pathways to help
bolster people along the way" ❑
6/16
2000
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