Here’s a roundup of JewDub’s favorite recent media and scholarly publications surrounding the role of religion and gender in Israeli society. For more commentary, see Sarah Zaides‘ post on Israel’s Rosa Parks Moment.

 

Media:

Israeli’s Facing a Seismic Shift Over Role of Women (New York Times) New York Times’ coverage of the Channa Maayan case. While Professor Maayan “bit her tongue…others have not.”

Lechery, Immodesty, and The Talmud (New York Times Op-Ed) Rabbi Dov Linzer argues that gender segregation actually hyper-sexualizes and objectifies women, and argues that the Talmud “places the responsibility for controlling men’s licentious thoughts about women squarely on the men.”

Exclusion of Women in Israel-Significant Trend? (www.Jewdub.org) University of Washington’s Professor Noam Pianko poses several questions, urging us to be critical consumers of all the available information surrounding the recent events in Israel.

 

Academic Press:

Being Israeli: The Dynamics of Multiple Citizenship (Gershon Shafir and Yoav Peled) Critical Sociologists Gershon Shafir and  Yoav Peled offer an excellent, historically-grounded  examination of the Israeli state-building project and the consequences of citizenship and identity among the diverse social groups coming to live in Israel.

Judicial Power and National Politics: Courts and Gender in the Religious-Secular Conflict in Israel (Patricia J. Woods) Professor Patricia J. Woods’ monograph is a legalistic history of the state-religion relationship in Israel after Independence in 1948.

Women in Israel: Race, Gender, and Citizenship (Nahla Abdo-Zubi) An important contribution to the gender/citizenship debate in Israel vis-a-vis a comparative study of Palestinian, Ashkenazi, and Mizrahi women in Israel.

No Room of Their Own: Gender and Nation in Israeli Women’s Fiction (Yael S. Feldman) This study traces the emergence of women’s writing in Israeli public discourse, using a combination of gender and psychological theories. A comprehensive introduction to Israeli female writers and the complex role of gender in Zionist thought.

 

Women’s Voices:

The Jewish Daily Forward’s Sisterhood Blog check what actual women have to say about these issues and others!

Lilith Magazine “Independent, Jewish, and Frankly Feminist,” and, for the latest conversations on Judaism and gender be sure to follow them on twitter @lillithmagazine

 

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