Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Center for Studies in Jewish Education

My research continues; however, I took on a new research project on October 12 to channel my obsessive energy towards Israel into something more productive. 

פִתְאוֹם זֶה הִכָּה בִּי: הַתְּרוּמָה שֶׁלִּי לַמַּאֲמָץ הַיְּהוּדִי תִּהְיֶה לָקַחַת עַל עַצְמִי לִבְחֹן אֶת הַזָּוִית הַחִנּוּכִית בְּרֶגַע הַמַּשְׁבֵּר הַזֶּה, לְהִתְחַבֵּר וּלְהָבִין לְעֹמֶק אֶת הַחֲוָיָה שֶׁל מוֹרִים וְתַלְמִידִים בְּיִשְׂרָאֵל בִּתְקוּפַת הַמַּשְׁבֵּר וּלְסַפֵּר אֶת סִפּוּרָם בְּכֵנוּת, בִּרְגִישׁוּת וּבְאֹמֶץ. לְשִׂמְחָתִי, הָאוּנִיבֶרְסִיטָה תָּמְכָה בַּמֶּחְקָר בְּצוּרָה בִּלְתִּי רְגִילָה, ומֵאָז הַ12 לְאוֹקְטוֹבֶּר הִתְחַלְנוּ לְרַאֲיֵן מוֹרִים בְּיִשְׂרָאֵל

- Ziva Hassenfeld

I have been interested in studying the experience of American Jewish emerging adults who take a gap year to study in Israel. But this idea took on new urgency this year after October 7, so I quickly developed a project and submitted a proposal for the IRB. I’ll be conducting interviews in February. Of course, some of what we learn will be specific to the extraordinary circumstances of this year—how the students experienced 10/7 and the war, and how they are thinking about their next step at college campuses in the US. But this is exactly what I want to understand better, namely, how these students think about being away, in a different country with its own intense political and religious dynamics, and how they think about coming back.

- Jon Levisohn

In the wake of the attack I've pivoted my research agenda in order to respond to the present moment. In the past month I've launched a qualitative study of Jewish college students to gauge the impact of the October 7 attack and the war in Gaza on their attitudes about the conflict, antisemitism, and the climate on their campuses. Based on the interviews I've conducted so far, the findings will be fascinating and will defy the binary thinking that we've seen dominate the media conversation.

- Jonathan Krasner

I had started data collection for my current research about members of traditionally-Jewish fraternities and sororities in summer 2023. About a quarter of the campus educators participating in my study had their interviews after October 7. All of a sudden, the questions that I was asking these (mostly non-Jewish) professionals had extra weight and significance to them. Then I launched the student phrase of the study, and I wondered if the events in Israel and on college campuses since then would cloud the students' responses to all of my questions. I learned I had to reassure them at the beginning of our conversations that I would ask about October 7 toward the end, to free them to think about what their lives were like both before and after that day.

- Jenny Small

When we designed the Teaching and Learning about What Matters Project, in a pre-October 7th world, we hoped to capture Jewish children and their teachers' beliefs about a range of contemporary issues. When we actually interviewed teachers in Jewish supplementary and day schools, we quickly realized that making sense of Jewish life in a post-October 7th world is so omnipresent in the minds of educators in Jewish institutions that it was a major focus of their reflections in response to broad, open-ended questions. Children, on the other hand, talked to us about a broad range of issues that included the events of October 7th, the Israel-Gaza war, the ongoing hostage situation, and rising antisemitism, but also a range of other social issues that matter to children: pollution, homelessness, hunger, the Russia-Ukraine war, and more.

- Sivan Zakai and Lauren Applebaum

I am currently in the write-up phase for two research projects. One analyzes the role of Hebrew in the American context and the second explores Jewish learning through cultural arts. Since the attack, I have had to grapple with how to write about data, which were collected prior to Oct. 7, at a time in which American Jews are confronting profound challenges. The complexity of this task became abundantly clear recently when a woman I interviewed in spring 2023 about her experiences seeing two theatrical performances - Leopoldstadt and Parade - recently contacted me and asked if she could be interviewed again. It turns out that she had a very different perspective about the themes of Jewish precarity centered in both of these shows and wanted to update her interview. This woman’s request raised methodological and personal questions for me, as I continue to think about what it means to study American Jews when so much feels unsettled and is undergoing change in real time.

- Sharon Avni

When you're a social science researcher you need to allow the world to impact your research agenda. It's important not be too rigid. This project was entirely created because I couldn't think or focus on anything else besides Israel. And yet, instead of losing 4-6 weeks to Telegram, watching videos that simply hurt the soul, I turned my attention to learning about Israeli teachers' experiences. I produced important research that has been highlighted in Israel, in Jewish media, in Brandeis, and soon will appear in a general education journal. Yes, we have particular research interests, but we also have a set of tools that can be used beyond our research interests in times that call for it.

- Ziva Hassenfeld

Rahm Emanuel famously said that you should never let a crisis go to waste. I've certainly taken that advice to heart, even as I remain committed to my long-term historical research projects, particularly my history of American Jewish day schools. Honestly, I've been a little dismayed at how shrill and reactive the public conversation has been. But I can't say that I'm surprised. I hope that my study contributes more light than heat. In an indirect way, the current crisis encourages me to devote more attention to the role of Zionism and Zionist ideology in my day school research.

- Jonathan Krasner

I already knew this lesson, but October 7 brought it home for me once again: Context is hugely influential. You can't separate research participants from the world they live in. In order to be an effective researcher, you have to bring the real world into your study, from formulating your methodology through finalizing your analysis.

- Jenny Small

We're currently trying to make sense of the ways that the events of October 7th and the Israel-Gaza war are situated in Jewish day and supplementary schools. Based on the data we've collected so far, we think we can make a compelling case that the ways children and their educators in Jewish institutions situate the current situation in Israel and Gaza much as they would any traumatic current event—analogous to thinking about gun violence in schools, the Russia-Ukraine War, and other recent events that we've heard children reflect on as part of this study. But we also think we can make a compelling case that children and their educators in Jewish institutions are thinking about October 7th and the current war in ways that are substantively different from how they talk about other violent current events—a case unlike any other in the ways that it is currently framed in Jewish classrooms.

- Sivan Zakai and Lauren Applebaum

It feels too early to have a sense of what lessons I have taken away from this experience. However, my intuition is telling me to lean into and recommit to ethnography as a methodology in my future projects. Trying to understand what it means to be Jewish in modern society has always been an exercise fraught with complexity. Now more than ever, it seems that scholarship on American Jews will require in-depth explorations that can reveal the inconsistencies, nuance, and variation in what Jews think, do, and say.    

- Sharon Avni