Engaging the Next Generation of American Jews: Distinguishing the In-Married, Inter-Married, and Non-Married

Publication Date: January 2005

Publisher: Jewish Communal Service Association of North America

Author(s): Steven M. Cohen

Research Area: Culture and religion; Social conditions

Keywords: Family; Jewish Identification; Jewish Outreach

Type: Report

Coverage: United States

Abstract:

As the Jewish engagement agenda has come to occupy center stage in the organized Jewish community, we would do well to distinguish more sharply than we do among young Jews who are in-married, inter-married, and not married. For these three groups — with vastly different rates of institutional affiliation, informal connections, ritual observance, and simple Jewish passion — pose quite different challenges to the efforts of organized Jewry to engage them and demand quite distinctive strategies and practices. Indeed, although not denying the diversity within these groups, they still generally have very different approaches to the very meaning of these terms: Jewish, Jewish identity, Jewish community, and Jewish peoplehood.