scholarly journals Revival? Rebirth? Renaissance?

2020 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 65-75
Author(s):  
Konstanty Gebert
Keyword(s):  
Identity Formation ◽  
Jewish Community ◽  
Jewish Identity ◽  
Personal Experience ◽  
Political Transformation ◽  
Polish Society ◽  
General Lesson ◽  
Role Of Religion

Drawing on personal experience, the author discusses the vicissitudes of Jewish identity formation in the last two decades of Communist Poland and the first two decades which followed. He addresses the role of religion in the Jewish revival which occurred in that period, and sets it against other models of Jewish identity – Zionist, Yiddishist and assimilationist - on one hand, and the twin pressures of anti- and philosemitism in Polish society at large. This discussion is placed within the broader framework of the Polish political transformation. He finally suggests that the survival and revival of the Jewish community in Poland offers a more general lesson for the continuation of Jewish peoplehood.

scholarly journals Sport and British Jewish identity

2020 ◽  
pp. 101269022095862
Author(s):  
Jon Dart
Keyword(s):  
South Asian ◽  
Jewish Identity ◽  
Jewish People ◽  
Historical Research ◽  
Minority Communities ◽  
Sports Clubs ◽  
Role Of Religion ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Sports Activities

This article examines the relationship between sport and Jewish identity. The experiences of Jewish people have rarely been considered in previous sport-related research which has typically focused on ‘Black’ and South Asian individuals, sports clubs, and organisations. Drawing on data generated from interviews ( n = 20) and focus groups ( n = 2) with individuals based in one British city, this article explores how their Jewish identity was informed, and shaped by, different sports activities and spaces. This study’s participants were quick to correct the idea that sport was alien to Jewish culture and did not accept the stereotype that ‘Jews don’t play sport’. The limited historical research on sport and Jewish people and the ongoing debates around Jewish identity are noted before exploring the role of religion and the suggestion that Jewish participation in sport is affected by the Shabbat (sabbath). Participants discussed how sports clubs acted as spaces for the expression and re/affirmation of their Jewish identity, before they reflected on the threats posed to the wider Jewish community by secularism, assimilation, and antisemitism. The article concludes by discussing how the sporting experiences of the study’s British Jewish participants compare with the experiences of individuals from other ethnic minority communities.

Unpacking the role of religion in political transnationalism: the case of the Shi'a Iraqi diaspora since 2003

2020 ◽  
Vol 96 (2) ◽  
pp. 305-322 ◽  
Author(s):  
Oula Kadhum
Keyword(s):  
Identity Formation ◽  
Identity Politics ◽  
Cultural Production ◽  
International Politics ◽  
National Unity ◽  
Civic Activism ◽  
Political Transnationalism ◽  
Role Of Religion

Abstract This article explores the role of religion in political transnationalism using the case of the Shi'a Iraqi diaspora since 2003. The article focuses on three areas that capture important trends in Shi'a transnationalism and their implications for transnational Shi'a identity politics. These include Shi'a diasporic politics, transnational Shi'a civic activism, and the cultural production of Iraqi Shi'a identity through pilgrimages, rituals and new practices. It is argued that understanding Shi'a Islam and identity formation requires adopting a transnational lens. The evolution of Shi'a Islam is not only a result of the dictates of the Shi'a clerical centres, and how they influence Shi'a populations abroad, but also the transnational interrelationships and links to holy shrine cities, Shi'i national and international politics, humanitarianism and commemorations and rituals. The article demonstrates that Shi'a political transnationalism is unexceptional in that it echoes much of the literature on diasporic politics and development where diaspora involve themselves from afar in the politics and societies of their countries of origin. At the same time, it shows the exceptionalism of Shi'a diasporic movements, in that their motivations and mobilizations are contributing to the reification of sectarian geographical and social borders, creating a transnationalism that is defined by largely Shi'a networks, spaces, actors and causes. The case of Shi'a political transnationalism towards Iraq shows that this is increasing the distance between Shi'is and Iraq's other communities, simultaneously fragmenting Iraq's national unity while deepening Shi'a identity and politics both nationally and supra-nationally.

Epilogue

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ellie R. Schainker
Keyword(s):  
Jewish Identity ◽  
Soviet Period ◽  
East European ◽  
Late Imperial ◽  
Imperial Russia ◽  
Imperial Period ◽  
Cultural Mobility ◽  
Role Of Religion ◽  
Revolutionary Period

The epilogue summarizes how the phenomenon of Russian Jewish conversion, though marginal in number, left an outsized imprint on the cultural map of East European Jews who grappled with questions of Jewish identity and the role of religion in the increasingly powerful Jewish secular nationalist ideologies of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The epilogue explores evolving Jewish attitudes towards baptism, interfaith sociability, and cultural mobility in the late-imperial period, and it puts conversions from Judaism in imperial Russia in conversation with conversions from Judaism in the modern period more broadly. Finally, the epilogue looks ahead to the inter-revolutionary period (1906-1917) and the Soviet period when conversions from Judaism accelerated, accompanied by a growing ethnic conception of Jewish identity whereby national Jewishness found explicit harmony with Christian religious adherence.

scholarly journals The Role of Religion in Shaping Ethnic Identity in Jewish Children of Contemporary Russia

2020 ◽  
Vol 20 ◽  
pp. 285-295
Author(s):  
Marina Davydova ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Ethnic Identity ◽  
Religious Education ◽  
Jewish Identity ◽  
Personal Development ◽  
Significant Part ◽  
Jewish Tradition ◽  
Russian Jews ◽  
Jewish Children ◽  
Role Of Religion

It is commonly believed that for the majority of the Soviet-raised Russian Jews, Judaism and its practices have not played a significant part in shaping their Jewish identity. For today’s Russian Jewish children, however, the personal development is mainly defined by their families, so the religious education and practical observance of Jewish rites and customs form the very basis for their identity. Studying the specifics of this mechanism in Russian Jewish children also reveals a correlation between the parents’ religious views and their determination to raise their offspring within the Jewish tradition.

scholarly journals Religious Risks as a Threat to State Security in Interconfessional Regions

2017 ◽  
Vol 6 (5) ◽  
pp. 403
Author(s):  
Zoya V. Silayeva
Keyword(s):  
Religious Identity ◽  
Explanatory Models ◽  
Synthetic Approach ◽  
Political Transformation ◽  
Political Processes ◽  
Religious Conflicts ◽  
Religious Factor ◽  
External Forces ◽  
Role Of Religion

<p>This paper is devoted to the study of religious risks, which create a direct or indirect possibility of inflicting damage to both an individual and a multi-confessional state. Particular attention is paid to the crisis of religious identity and the growth of proselytism. The paper involves analysis of the consequences of globalization, religious conflicts and religious migration. Various technologies used by external forces to form new values amid complex socio-political processes were also considered. To study the stated topic, a synthetic approach was used to identify the most significant directions of socio-political changes through studying the shifts in the system of value and behavioral patterns of both believers and neophytes that can cause an increase in religious tension. In the course of the research, the author came to the conclusion that religious risks develop under the influence of certain conditions and factors often created and used purposefully to demonstrate the religious diversity of the internally contradictory integrity of a multi-confessional state, deepen social inequality and exacerbate socio-political tensions caused by a political-ideological confrontation and identity differences. The success of external forces in the situation destabilization is largely due to an incorrect assessment of threats. In order to prevent this, it is necessary to rethink the role of religion in the context of globalization and rapid socio-political transformation, as well as the religious factor in explanatory models of social development. </p>

The Role of Religion in Establishing Peaceful Coexistence in Society

2018 ◽  
Vol 08 (02) ◽  
pp. 163-182
Author(s):  
Muhammad Zaman Nazi ◽  
◽  
Farman Ali ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Peaceful Coexistence ◽  
Role Of Religion
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