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- Title
Recent Data on Religious Identity of College Freshmen: A Note.
- Authors
Maller, Allen S.
- Abstract
This article provides clear and conclusive evidence about issues related to exogamy or out-marriage that have agitated the Jewish community for the last three decades. An exogamy rate of 30 per cent or higher had been characteristic of both German and Hungarian Jewry in the early decades of the twentieth century. The overwhelming majority of the offspring of such marriages did not identify as Jews. If the same thing happened in America, a precipitous decline in the numbers of the Jewish community would indeed take place. Jewish community surveys, however, are frequently viewed as understating the actual amount of exogamy because they rely upon master lists of people who donate to Jewish Federations, belong to Jewish organizations, have Jewish names, or are known to other Jewish people. The challenge of an exogamous rate of 30 per cent is twice as threatening as a rate of 15 per cent. It also means that the Jewish community has less time to respond before feeling the effect. Of even greater concern than the rate of exogamy, however, is the percentage of children of such marriages who identify themselves as Jews. In summary, the exogamy rate in the decade preceding 1967 was 25 to 30 per cent of all Jewish marriages. Jewish women are almost twice as successful as Jewish men in influencing their children to identify as Jews when they are in a mixed-marriage. Most, however, do not succeed.
- Subjects
MARRIAGE (Jewish law); ENDOGAMY &; exogamy; MARRIAGE; INTERMARRIAGE; JEWS
- Publication
Jewish Social Studies, 1987, Vol 49, Issue 3/4, p317
- ISSN
0021-6704
- Publication type
Article