counseling jewish women: a phenomenological study

Journal of Counseling & Development ■ April 2013 ■ Volume 91 131

Research

© 2013 by the American Counseling Association. All rights reserved.

Received 07/15/11Revised 10/08/11

Accepted 02/28/12DOI: 10.1002/j.1556-6676.2013.00081.x

Over the last 2 decades, social scientists have noted the lack of attention the field of psychology has paid to religion, espe-cially compared with other multicultural variables such as race (Schlosser, Foley, Poltrock Stein, & Holmwood, 2010). In par-ticular, Kielty Briggs and Dixon Rayle (2005) concluded that many counselor program directors and educators are unclear as to how to integrate religious issues into core courses and counselor education curricula accredited by the Council for Accreditation of Counseling and Related Education Programs. Thus, few counseling trainees receive adequate supervision to competently address clients’ religion in counseling (Hall, Dixon, & Mauzey, 2004; Levitt & Balkin, 2003).

Regarding Jewish realities, counseling scholars have also observed the relative invisibility of Jews as a topic matter in the counseling literature and multicultural counseling movement (Altman, Inman, Fine, Ritter, & Howard, 2010; Torton Beck, Goldberg, & Knefelkamp, 2003). Fischer and Moradi (2001) contended that “conspicuously absent from the multicultural counseling literature are theory and research related to the Jewish people” (p. 351). Specifically, in his review, Langman (1999) concluded that “books, journals, classes, and confer-ences in counseling and psychology make little mention of Jews, Jewish issues, or anti-Semitism” (p. 2).

Several writers have theorized that this notable absence may emanate from (a) high levels of Jewish assimilation (Langman, 1995), (b) viewing Jews solely as members of a religious sect (Friedman, Friedlander, & Bluestein, 2005), or (c) anti-Semitism (Weinrach, 2002). Moreover, MacDonald-Dennis (2006) proposed that Jews are often ignored because they are classified as members of the general White American

Freda Ginsberg, private practice, Montreal, Quebec, Canada; Ada L. Sinacore, Department of Educational and Counselling Psy-chology, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Freda Ginsberg is now at Counselor Education Department, State University of New York (SUNY) Plattsburgh. This research was made possible by the support and guidance of Linda Forrest, Department of Counseling Psychology and Human Services, University of Oregon. This study was partially funded by the Michigan State University College of Education doctoral dissertation fellowship award. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Freda Ginsberg, Counselor Education Department, SUNY Plattsburgh, 101 Broad Street, 107F Ward Hall, Plattsburgh, NY 12901 (e-mail: [email protected]).

Counseling Jewish Women: A Phenomenological StudyFreda Ginsberg and Ada L. Sinacore

The field of counseling has paid little attention to religion in general and Jewish women’s realities in particular. This article presents the findings of a qualitative phenomenological study examining 12 Ashkenazi, non-Orthodox, Jewish American women’s self-reported understanding of their Jewish identity, revealing the themes of Jewishness and being Jewish in a broader societal context, as well as 7 related subthemes. Recommendations are offered for counselors, educators, and researchers who work with Jewish women.

Keywords: counseling, Jewish women, Jewish identity, anti-Semitism

majority. In her aptly titled book, How Jews Became White Folks, Brodkin (1998) discussed this post–World War II equa-tion of Jews equaling White and how this racial categorization was never considered before. Naumburg (2007) noted that clinicians tend to view their Jewish clients, except for those who are visibly religious Jews, as Caucasian Americans, un-aware that being Jewish is a hidden diversity that “requires a willingness to see beyond white skin and be aware of potential differences that lie beneath the surface” (p. 80). Thus, Yeung and Greenwald (1992) and Schlosser (2006) concluded that counselors’ lack of awareness of Jewish realities results in their being ill-prepared to fully help Jewish clients in counseling. This reality is problematic because many non-Orthodox, American Jews view psychotherapy favorably and “are likely to utilize psychotherapy services” (Schlosser, 2006, p. 425).

Scholars, however, have recently begun to gather data on Jewish identity that focus on religious denomination. Spe-cifically, Hartman and Hartman (1999) looked at nine Jewish religious and ethnic identity components of 610,000 New York Reform, Conservative, and Orthodox households and concluded that the strength of Jewish identity is highly related to Jewish denomination. Similarly, Friedman et al.’s (2005) qualitative study of 10 Reform, Conservative, Orthodox, and nonaffiliated Jewish adults revealed that Conservative Jewish Americans may experience themselves as bicultural, that is, both Jewish and American. Next, Altman et al. (2010) explored the unique nature of the Jewish ethnic identity of 10 young adult, Conservative Jewish Americans and discovered six themes that inform participants’ Jewish identity. Although these studies signify a positive change in the counseling field’s

Journal of Counseling & Development ■ April 2013 ■ Volume 91132

Ginsberg & Sinacore

interest in studying Jewish life, there is only one published data-based article that specifically looks at Jewish women, namely Goldberg and O’Brien’s (2005) study on attachment, and one dissertation examining Jewish women’s body image (Greenberg, 2009).

There are, however, several books and articles that have shed theoretical light on the unique ways Jewish women understand their lives and identities and how this holds implications for counseling (see Green & Brodbar, 2011; Josefowitz Siegel & Cole, 1991, 1997; Weiner & Moon, 1995). Accordingly, these Jewish women scholars agree that a Jewish woman’s identity, or her “Jewishness,” indicates much more than membership in a religious group and is fundamental to her sense of self. As such, a Jewish woman’s identity is multifaceted and informed in part by religion, peoplehood, culture, and history (Holzman, 2010). Thus, there is no typical Jewish woman, because each is diverse and may be from any nationality, race, or socioeconomic class (Weber, 1997).

Despite the lack of homogeneity among Jewish women, this population can be largely categorized into one of two ethnic groups, namely Sephardi or Ashkenazi (Cantor, 1995). Like-wise, the vast majority of Jewish women identify with various streams of the Jewish religion or culture, namely Orthodox, Reform, Conservative, Reconstructionist, or secular (Hart-man & Hartman, 1999). Another core aspect of many Jewish women’s identity is their adherence to tikkun olam (ethic of world repair), which orients women to do mitzvot (good deeds) in an effort to bring about social justice (Biale, 1995). As such, many Jewish women practice tzedakah, which literally means charity but actually refers to “a whole notion of community, based on social action” (Segal, 1998, p. 278). Hyers (2007) explained that Jewish women have an obligation to draw upon their unique appreciation for the alleviation of suffering and to help repair the world.

In addition, the impact of anti-Semitism on Jewish women is unique and profound (Weiner, 1991). Jewish women must contend with stereotypes, such as the Jewish American princess (“JAP”) and the spoiled Jewish woman who is too aggressive, pushy, bossy, tense, driven, and difficult (Kaye/Kantrowitz, 1992). According to Josefowitz Siegel and Cole (1991), these stereotypes of Jewish women are merely “sexist caricatures of the limited traditional role assigned to women, presented in an anti-Semitic package” (p. 249).

Finally, a Jewish woman’s identity is inextricably linked to her membership in a persecuted minority group (Naumburg, 2007). As a result, an awareness of a constant lack of safety is a central component of a Jewish woman’s psychological mindset, which is “an ever-present filter through which to view the world” (Holzman, 2010, p. 321). Silberstein Swartz (1998) claimed that a Jewish woman’s identity rests on the historical trend of being discriminated against and that these experiences determine a Jewish woman’s sense of her place in the world today. In sum, Schiffman (1999) elucidated that all modern

Jews, regardless of their family’s history of persecution, are “post-Holocaust Jews” (p. 85), or as Weiner (1995) noted in a chapter title, “survivors nonetheless.”

Although literature on Jewish women in counseling is slowly growing, these important works are predominantly anecdotal or theoretical in nature, leaving key topics unstudied. As such, there is a paucity of data-based studies examining Jewish women’s lives. Given the complexity of Jewish identity and counselors’ potential misunderstanding of Jewish women, it is important to provide firsthand accounts, which are systemati-cally analyzed, to learn how Jewish women understand them-selves in Christian North America. Specifically, gaining insight into the experiences of Jewish women living in the United States will help counselors educate themselves about Jewish women’s lives, thereby improving service provision to this unique group.

To this end, the present study explored the self-reported identity and worldview of 12 Ashkenazi, non-Orthodox, Jewish American women. This particular population, that is, Ashkenazi and non-Orthodox, was chosen because it represents the pre-dominant group of Jews in North America (Elazar, 1992). Given these parameters, we posed the following research questions: (a) What is the nature of Jewish women’s identity, ethnicity, worldview, and ways of expressing Jewishness? (b) How do Jewish women experience their Jewishness in a Christian soci-ety, and what is the psychological effect of this experience? and (c) How do anti-Semitism and its related stereotypes influence Jewish women psychologically?

EpistemologyFeminist researchers argue that methodology must be informed by epistemology (Reinharz, 1992). Accordingly, for the pres-ent study, we used a feminist standpoint epistemology, which holds that knowledge is constructed through the complex con-figurations of location, history, culture, and interests. Feminist standpoint theory privileges the standpoint of women and postulates that there are specific positions that provide better understandings than others. Moreover, standpoint epistemology necessitates that researchers identify their subjective stance (Sprague, 2005). For the purposes of this study, the standpoint of Ashkenazi, non-Orthodox, Jewish American women was centralized to develop an understanding of their identity and life experiences.

MethodA phenomenological qualitative method was used because this approach aims to describe the meaning of the lived experiences for several individuals regarding a particular concept or phenom-enon (Creswell, 2007). This method also allows researchers to capture participants’ points of view, gather contextual data on their experiences, and offer rich descriptions of the phenomena being studied (Denzin & Lincoln, 1994). In the present study, the phenomenon investigated was how Jewish women experienced


Counseling Jewish Women

their Jewish identity. This method was appropriate because it focuses on the ways in which participants apply meaning to their experiences and emphasizes their subjective and noncritical experiences, one person at a time (Schwandt, 2007).

We used purposive selection to ensure that the participants in the study represented the phenomenon (Jewish women’s iden-tity) under investigation (Wertz, 2005). That is, we selected par-ticipants who were Ashkenazi, non-Orthodox, Jewish American over 30 years of age, because age 30 and older was thought to be when the nature of participants’ Jewish identity may be more self-determined than not. Data were collected using an in-depth semistructured interview. The primary research question guid-ing the development of the interview protocol was, “What is the nature of Jewish women’s identity, ethnicity, worldview, and ways of expressing Jewishness?” The interview protocol was developed based on the literature on Jewish women and cov-ered the following topics: Jewishness, ethics, Jewish women’s role in Jewish religion and culture, and anti-Semitism. Once developed, the protocol was piloted to ensure that questions adequately addressed the topics of interest.

Research Team

This article reports on data from a larger study. The research team comprised four women counseling psychologists in their 40s, namely, the interviewing researcher (first author), the noninterviewing researcher (second author), and two judges. The first author is Ashkenazi American/Israeli and the second is Italian American; both are Reform Jews who had earned doctoral degrees in counseling psychology. Both researchers pursued the topic of Jewish women’s identity in an attempt to contribute to the multicultural dialogue on this understudied topic. One of the judges is a Turkish Canadian Muslim and the other is a Caucasian Canadian Buddhist.

Procedure

After securing approval from the university ethics review board, we recruited participants through networking and word-of-mouth in a medium-size midwestern American city. Participants were unknown to us and were not members of our respective Jewish communities. Potential participants were provided with a brief description of the study, and if they were interested, an appoint-ment was set with the principal researcher to discuss informed consent and the nature of the study. After signing the informed consent, participants completed a demographic sheet, followed by a 60- to 90-minute in-depth semistructured audiotaped in-terview. Upon completion of data collection, all tapes from the interviews were transcribed verbatim and verified.

The overall data-analytic strategy used was consistent with those recommended for phenomenological data analysis (Dey, 1993). First, we read each transcript and took notes on overall impressions. Next, we reread transcripts and identified data units to support each impression. Data units were defined as phrases, sentences, or paragraphs. Third, impressions were

reexamined and clustered so that their corresponding data units reflected similar topic areas, called focus points. We then reread transcripts, focusing on each focus point separately to identify additional supporting data units. Focus points were then regrouped into categories. Categories were analyzed across all transcripts for themes and subthemes.

To ensure the trustworthiness of the data analysis, that is, to ensure rigor without sacrificing relevance, we utilized a number of techniques: (a) using judges (Porter, 1999), (b) using an auditor (Hill, Thompson, & Williams, 1997), (c) member checking (Janesick, 1994), (d) journaling and bracketing (Eis-ner, 1991), and (e) keeping an audit trail of the data analysis (Shenton, 2004). Throughout the data-analytic process, two outside judges were asked to validate or raise questions about the impressions and themes that emerged from the data. We selected these particular judges because their cultural and re-ligious backgrounds were different from ours. We hoped that these cultural differences would lead the judges to identify any of our biases, if they existed. In addition, the noninterviewing researcher served as an auditor and challenged the views, in-terpretations, and biases of the interviewing researcher. In so doing, the auditor examined the interviewer’s assumptions to maintain the integrity of the analysis. Additionally, to bracket her subjective frame, the interviewer kept a log before and after each session and throughout the study to track thoughts, feelings, questions, and concerns. With regard to member checking, after the initial data analysis was complete, we pro-vided participants with a summary of the analysis to ensure that it accurately reflected their experiences. Finally, to ensure confirmability, we kept a detailed audit trail of how the data were gathered and analyzed (Shenton, 2004).

Participants

Consistent with recommendations for qualitative research in counseling psychology (Hill et al., 1997), recruitment for our study resulted in 12 Ashkenazi, non-Orthodox, Jewish American women between the ages of 31 and 53 years, all of American-born parents. All participants identified English as their native language. Eleven participants identified as able-bodied, and one participant had a physical disability. The participants were predominantly heterosexual, with only one identifying as lesbian. Eight participants were married or part-nered, two were dating, one was single, and one was divorced. In the married/partnered group, six had Jewish partners, and the other two did not. Six of the participants were mothers. For educational status, all of the participants had at least a bachelor’s degree, seven had a master’s degree, two held doctorates, and two held juris doctorates. In addition, six participants held full-time positions, five worked part time, and one was retired. Regarding socioeconomic status, two participants identified as lower middle class, six as middle class, and four as upper middle class. As for the participants’ affiliation with a par-ticular denomination of Judaism, eight identified as Reform,


Ginsberg & Sinacore

two as Conservative, one as Reconstructionist, and one had no affiliation. Also, six of the 12 participants held a synagogue membership. Six participants were raised in a secular home, three in a Reform home, two in an Orthodox home, and one in a Conservative home.

ResultsThe results of this study indicated that being a Jew was central to the participants’ identity and worldview. That is, being a Jew informed both how participants viewed themselves and the ways they interacted with and interpreted the broader society. The data analysis resulted in two major themes: (a) Jewishness and (b) being Jewish in a broader societal context. The following sections present these two major themes and the subthemes.

Jewishness

Participants reported that their Jewishness was fundamental to their identity as women and was central to their self-view. For example, one participant said, “I am innately Jewish,” and another added, “I would put being Jewish even before being a woman; it’s that much a part of my identity.” An in-depth analysis of participants’ understanding of their Jewishness revealed four interrelated subthemes: (a) Jewish ethics, (b) Jewish family and community life, (c) gender roles, and, (d) the Jewish people.

Jewish ethics. Participants reported that their Jewishness was based, in part, on an ethical tradition that compelled them to be good by doing mitzvot (good deeds) and tzedakah (charity), both aiming to contribute to the ideal of tikkun olam (world repair). One woman explained, “Tikkun olam and mitzvot, it’s just how I live my Jewish life.” Another partici-pant agreed, “I feel very, very, strongly about social justice, equality, and helping people, and not only Jewish people. I do think that it is a part of being Jewish.”

Jewish family and community life. In addition to informing participants’ Jewishness, the ethical tradition of tikkun olam was an integral component of these women’s family and community life as they were growing up. That is, participants described how their families and community taught them to be Jewish, maintain Jewish values, and strive for tikkun olam. For example, one woman said, “My mother had the most powerful impact on my Jewish identity of anybody. She volunteered like crazy, you know, tzedakah.”

In addition to Jewish ethics and values, participants’ childhood families were where they learned about the Jew-ish traditions that were central to their Jewish identities. One participant reflected, “I was born Jewish and raised in a Jewish home, so if I was trying to figure out who I was, perhaps how observant was more the question, not whether or not I wanted to remain Jewish.” Similarly, participants emphasized the importance of the intergenerational transmission of Jewish-ness. One woman explained,

If my children say, “I’m going to choose to not be Jewish,” I would say, “That’s not an option. You’re Jewish; your grand-parents were Jewish; your great grandparents were Jewish. We’re still around for a reason and you have a responsibility to perpetuate that.”

Other participants spoke of the intergenerational nature of Jewish traditions. For example, “When I light Shabbat [Sab-bath] candles, I know my mother does, my grandmother did, my great-grandmother did, all the way back. It’s a continuum of thousands of years.”

Gender roles. Participants’ Jewish family life was another contributing factor to their Jewish identity, and there were clear expectations about how to be a Jewish woman. One participant stated, “Jewish women are raised strong and in a confident manner.” Participants discussed how the expectation of being a strong Jewish woman stemmed from the cultural ideal of eshet chayil (a woman of valor), which is based on a famous Hebrew prayer of the same name. One participant shared, “People in my family have referred to eshet chayil to describe great women of my parents’ generation. It’s a symbolic thing and the poetry describes a wise and moral woman.” Another participant was more critical. She com-mented, “We read the saying eshet chayil at holidays or at a funeral. But women have changed so much since my mother and grandmother’s day. What was good for Abraham’s wife is certainly not good for me.” Moreover, some participants felt that the cultural ideal of eshet chayil promotes a romanticized view of Jewish wives and mothers. One participant articulated her understanding of this view of Jewish women: “There were things I understood that made for a good Jewish woman in a good Jewish home. Most of it had to do with maintaining the Jewish domestic sphere.” Another participant added,

The messages were be good; keep kosher [dietary law]; don’t do anything on Shabbat [day of rest] that would embarrass us; be married in a traditional Jewish wedding; have Jewish children; and be a Jewish wife; otherwise you dilute and hurt the group.

Thus, participants felt pressured to fulfill the role of “good” Jewish wives and mothers and discussed how Jewish women’s limited religious roles marginalized them in the Jewish commu-nity. Regarding synagogue life, one participant shared, “In my old synagogue, the ritual committee had decided that women could read from the Torah [Old Testament] but no one had yet. And a lot of congregations only allow men to sit in the front.” Another woman said, “It bothered me that a woman could not walk upon the bimah [synagogue alter] because she was a woman. God forbid she might be menstruating.” Likewise, when discussing Jewish religious education, participants reported that priority was given to educating Jewish boys. One participant recalled, “I had no religious training. The boys went to Hebrew school, the girls



did not.” Another participant concurred, “No one ever pushed Sunday school because there’s no religious training for girls.” Moreover, the prioritizing of boys’ Jewish education was reflected in family and community expectations for the coming-of-age ceremony, bar-mitzvah. One participant remembered, “Both my brothers went to religious school and had bar-mitzvahs that were like weddings; I did not.”

Finally, participants discussed the traditional prayer that religious Jewish men recite each morning called, “Thank God I wasn’t born a woman.” Most participants found this prayer very offensive. As one woman put it, “I remember when I first learned about the ‘Thank God I’m not a woman’ thing. It still makes me really angry.”

The Jewish people. Participants discussed how belonging to the “Jewish people” is central to their Jewishness. One woman shared, “When I meet somebody who is Jewish there’s a sense of familiarity; I have an underlying assumption that they have a similar cultural sense of what it means to be a Jew.” Another agreed, saying “I need my Jewish world to come back to. That’s my home base. That’s my rock.” A third concurred, “It’s being one person who’s part of a larger whole. I feel really connected with Israel and Jews around the world.”

Participants wrestled with the notion of how their Jewish-ness was connected to being part of “a chosen people.” One participant explained sarcastically, “We’re the chosen people. We choose, even if you make us suffer, to stay Jews. I think we’re chosen to suffer.” Another woman confided, “I’m kind of embarrassed when non-Jewish people come up to me and ask me if I think that I’m one of the chosen people. I’m just an ordinary person.” Similarly, another woman said, “Of all the things about being Jewish, that is the most offensive. I actually cringe when I hear that. It creates isolationism and elitism, and I don’t like that at all.”

In sum, participants in the study identified how being Jewish is fundamental to their identity and how this identity is informed by Jewish ethics, their Jewish families and com-munity, Jewish gender roles, and being a member of the Jew-ish people. Accordingly, participants discussed the benefits, strengths, challenges, and conflicts therein.

Being Jewish in a Broader Societal Context

In addition to the participants’ views on being a Jewish woman in the Jewish world, they described their experiences of being Jewish in the broader non-Jewish societal context. One woman offered her strategy for letting others know she is Jewish. She said, “I don’t feel a need to advertise who I am. I don’t wear a Jewish star, but if somebody asked, it’s not something I would hide.” Similarly, another woman said, “The fact that I’m Jewish is never a secret. I don’t wear a big sign, but I’m very proud to be who I am and I don’t hide it.” Others were more cautious. One said, “I made sure somebody knew me long and well before they knew I was Jewish.” Another woman agreed, “There are days when I think, do I want to wear my

Jewish star? Will someone have a judgment about that, that I can’t control?” A more in-depth analysis of participants’ experiences of being Jewish in a broader societal context revealed three interrelated subthemes: (a) being a minority, (b) Jewish stereotypes and anti-Semitism, and (c) the Holocaust.

Being a minority. Participants described the challenges of living as a religious minority and the ways this differenti-ated them from the majority. One participant explained, “I definitely have always felt a sense of otherness. I don’t feel or see myself as part of the larger culture.” Another woman shared, “I’ve experienced being a minority in terms of being a member of a small group and very often not understood.” Furthermore, participants shared how their status as a minor-ity led them to identify more closely with other minorities. One participant had a positive view. She said, “I always feel like a minority and it’s not bad thing. I think it’s made me more of a compassionate person. It helps me be more sensi-tive to other minorities.”

In addition to sharing their experiences of being a minority, participants discussed how they felt marginalized as Jews. For example, one woman commented, “Yeah it’s a Christian world. This is a Christian country and when people are saying ‘God’ in this country, they’re saying the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.” Another participant agreed, “ I always find insensitive things like planning big events on Jewish holidays. There’s no excuse for that. When a university schedules classes to start on Yom Kippur [Day of Repentance], that’s blatant. Do they schedule classes on Christmas?”

Jewish stereotypes and anti-Semitism. Participants’ ex-periences of being marginalized in the broader society were further compounded by anti-Semitic stereotypes. One partici-pant noted several of the more common Jewish stereotypes, “They would say that Jews are selfish, conceited, think they’re better.” Another woman added, “The rich Jew, the loud pushy mother, and the JAP [Jewish American princess]. They also think all Jews are rich.” Another women reflected on the Jew-ish mother stereotype, “Let’s see, bossy, overbearing, raise momma’s boys, constantly feeding you, the ultimate martyr, the guilt trips.” Another recalled,

Very often in our town, I was the first Jewish person they had ever met. Some even asked, “Do Jewish people have horns?” They had a real anti-Semitic stereotypical idea of what a Jew was. They couldn’t believe I didn’t have horns and a tail like the devil.

The pervasive nature of these stereotypes troubled partici-pants, and as a result, they theorized about the roots of anti-Semitism. One woman said, “They have it in their heads that the Jews are trying to run the world or that Jewish people are taking over.” Another agreed, “The concern is there’s a Jewish con-spiracy that Jews own Hollywood and the political process. We’re only 1% of the population and that’s threatening to people?”


Ginsberg & Sinacore

Yet others in the study related the origins of anti-Semitism to the notion of being “a chosen people.” One participant purported, “In history, they would say, ‘Jews are chosen and they think they’re so great and we’re going to teach them their lesson.’ You know that’s jealousy.” Another participant concurred, “Because they believe we’re the chosen people of God and we’re the favorites, let’s just destroy the favorites.”

Others had their own theories. One participant believed, “I think people resent the fact that we don’t want to be Christians. For centuries, people said you have to be Christian. We said, ‘No,’ and people resent that.” Another participant said sar-castically, “Because we’re different? We’re a minority? We’re identifiable? We killed Jesus? Who knows why?”

Personal experiences of anti-Semitism. In addition to describing anti-Semitic stereotypes and theorizing about the origins of anti-Semitism, participants recalled their personal experiences of implicit, explicit, and violent anti-Semitism. One woman described what anti-Semitism was like for her:

I feel anti-Semitism because I just know that’s what it is; it’s using my Judaism to make me feel bad. Being treated poorly because I’m Jewish is not something that I can necessarily prove, but boy I can taste it.

Another woman noted how frequently anti-Semitism oc-curs. She commented, “All kinds of anti-Semitic stuff hap-pens. Yeah, every day, all the time. It happens a lot.” Another woman said, “I’m always sensitive of anti-Semitism. I know that I might not be accepted everywhere I go.”

In addition to describing the general experience of living with anti-Semitism, participants reported several explicit anti-Semitic incidents. One participant shared, “When I was 12, and the only Jew, this girl said, ‘Can I see your horns?’ It was a seminal moment for me.” Another participant shared the following story:

This one girl came up to me and said, “If you don’t believe that Jesus died on the cross for your sins you are going to go to hell and I was just wondering if you were worried about that.” And I asked, “Where did you learn that?” And she said, “That’s what they taught us at church.”

A third woman remembered, “My ‘boss to be’ in Houston looked me right in the eye and said, ‘I’m not going to have a kike on my staff.’” A fourth participant shared, “When I was in elementary school, one girl called me a dirty Jew. They also called me ‘Jew girl,’ ‘kike,’ ‘bagel girl,’ and ‘matzo ball.’”

Finally, participants recalled their experiences of anti-Semitic violence. One woman said, “There was a swastika painted on our driveway and on my synagogue and on my locker in high school. There were always drive-by shootings at my synagogue.” Another woman told this story: “I was accosted by a Libyan and Iraqi student who didn’t like what I

said in class. They physically took me and said, ‘You’re com-ing with us.’ I was pretty scared because I knew how they felt about Jews.” Another participant remembered, “One day I was chased and beaten up by girls from a Roman Catholic school. The experience was so terrifying and bizzare because it was clearly a religious incident. It is still a profound, immediate, tangible experience for me.”

The Holocaust. The participants’ experiences of being a minority and negotiating anti-Semitism are further compli-cated by being “post-Holocaust Jews.” The women in this study overwhelmingly reflected on how the Holocaust was not merely an event of the past but a part of their psychological lives today. As one participant explained, “You know I grew up with many children survivors of the Holocaust and I have nightmares about their horrific stories.” Another shared, “My grandfather came to the United States after Kristalnacht [the Night of Broken Glass] from Germany, and there was always the shadow of the Holocaust on our lives.” A third agreed: “The Holocaust created my grandfather to be the man that he was and how he raised his son and how his son raised me. My personality was molded because of the Holocaust.” Still another participant echoed this sentiment when she said, “The Holocaust changed the world and it changed the way the next generation of Jews, who descended from those survivors, will ever see the world.” Another woman discussed the personal nature of the Holocaust as follows: “When I think about the Holocaust it’s not from an objective point of view, rather a subjective one, like it happened to me and my family.” One woman explained how normal events lead her to remember the Holocaust. She said, “I’ve been in crowded situations where I think, ‘God, is this what it was like in the concentra-tion camp deportation cars?’ I have these kinds of visions.” One woman described her visceral sense of this tragic period in Jewish history when she thinks about the Holocaust. She said, “I think for me there are seminal Holocaust images. I think for a long time my body was informed by images of nude, young women lying dead in trenches.”

In summary, participants indicated that living as a minority in a Christian society resulted in experiences of marginaliza-tion. More specifically, the women in the study elaborated on how anti-Semitic stereotypes and incidences influenced their Jewish worldview. Finally, participants discussed the over-whelming power the Holocaust still had on them as Jewish women, both emotionally and psychologically.

DiscussionConsistent with the theoretical and anecdotal writings on this topic (e.g., Holzman, 2010), the results of the present study indicate that Jewishness is a complex construct that is central to Jewish women’s identity and worldviews. Moreover, theory indicates that fundamental to a Jewish woman’s worldview is a Jewish code of ethics that aims to establish social justice in



the world (Hyers, 2007). As such, participants reported that being Jewish was informed by multiple factors and served as the primary lens through which they viewed the world. Specifically, participants described how their Jewish identity was affected by how they were raised, which affected how they understood their world, interacted with others, and made decisions in their lives. Thus, the Jewish women in this study discussed the challenges inherent in negotiating the gender and cultural expectations of them as wives and mothers, informed by Jewish values and ethics, which require them to “repair the world.” That is, participants described the nature of their Jew-ish morality in detail, how they could relate to the suffering of others, and the importance of being involved in social activism to address all forms of oppression and discrimination.

Additionally, although the theoretical literature on Jewish women discusses what it means for this group to be a minority, it does not directly address what it means for Jewish women to live in a Christian society. As such, the results of this study provide insight into the participants’ experiences of living as Jewish women in a Christian country, which is key to how they experience their lives and surrounding environments. Living in a Christian society is further complicated by experiences of both covert and overt forms of anti-Semitism. Consistent with the literature, the Jewish women in this study discussed enduring an anti-Semitic world, both currently and histori-cally. Moreover, scholars maintain that all modern Jewish women are, in fact, “post-Holocaust Jews” (Schiffman, 1999, p. 85), with a direct personal association to all Jewish suf-fering and the Holocaust (Schlosser, 2006). The participants in this study discussed the intense impact that the Holocaust has had on their lives and how they can never feel fully safe in a post-Holocaust world. In fact, participants described how the Holocaust vicariously traumatized them, as if they had lived through this event themselves. In sum, by gaining an increased understanding of the experiences of Jewish women living in the United States, counselors will be able to provide more effective services to this population.

Limitations and Implications for Future Research

Although this study offers a data-based conceptualization of Jewish women’s identity and worldview, it is not without its limitations. First, it was conducted in the midwestern United States where Jews are in the minority compared with other regions, such as the northeastern United States. Moreover, this study focused on a specific age group and Jewish ethnic-ity and did not attend to denominational differences, thus the transferability of the study’s findings is limited. Despite these limitations, the study offers important insights into under-standing Jewish identity as reported to a Jewish interviewer. Future research could attend to both Jewish women and men who represent different ages, ethnicities, sexual orientations, and denominations, as well as Jews from other regions in the United States. Furthermore, a study examining the experiences

of Jews in other areas of the Diaspora could determine if these results apply to Jews outside of the United States. Finally, re-searchers might explore Jews’ experiences in counseling, either in the role of client or in the role of counselor, and the related identity issues that emerge. In sum, this study is an important first step to understanding the experiences of Jewish women in the United States and their counseling needs.

Implications for Counseling

Counselor education can increase counselors’ competency for working with Jewish women, not only by encouraging the study of Jewish history, religion, and anti-Semitism but also by focusing on counselor self-awareness about Jewish realities and stereotypes. That is, counselor educators and counselors need to understand that being Jewish may mean more for a Jewish woman than a simplistic identification with a religious group and may even be more central to her experience of herself than her ethnicity, nationality, race, or gender. As a result, a conceptualization of Jewishness as a predominant identity, often above all others, may conflict with the field’s current prioritization of race and ethnicity as main sources of identity and experience (Jun, 2010). Given that most Ashkenazi Jewish American women are Caucasian, counselors are cautioned against oversimplifying the concerns of Jewish women based solely on their racial categorization. Therefore, exploring the unique nature of Jewish women’s worldview could prove invaluable in providing culturally sensitive services to this population.

Furthermore, counselor educators and counselors need to understand that sexism within the Jewish community and traditional gender roles that require women to maintain a Jew-ish home, raise Jewish children, and preserve Jewish culture may be central to how Jewish women understand their lives, yet these may also be sources of conflict. Counselors need to consider the challenges Jewish women may face when meet-ing their familial and cultural expectations and how deviating from gender expectations by, for example, being lesbian, remaining single or childless, or preferring a career focus, may affect their status in the Jewish community.

Finally, counselor educators and counselors need to un-derstand that Jewish women experience themselves as “being other,” as do other racial and ethnic minorities, and that be-ing Jewish is what defines this otherness. Thus, non-Jewish counselors need to appreciate that Jewish women may not inherently trust non-Jews, which may influence a working relationship in therapy. Likewise, to build a better therapeutic relationship, counselors need to explore their personal and familial beliefs about Jews and, in particular, any stereotypes they may have about Jewish women. Accordingly, counselors need to explore how Jewish women experience themselves as a minority in a Christian society, wherein anti-Semitism still exists. In particular, being overtly Jewish may put some women at risk of anti-Semitism. Therefore, counselors may


Ginsberg & Sinacore

need to deepen their appreciation of how the anti-Semitic reality in the United States and the historical tradition of anti-Semitism affect Jewish women. Specifically, failing to ap-preciate anti-Semitism as a real influence and ongoing stressor may lead service providers to misdiagnose or misinterpret Jewish women’s personalities as being neurotic and paranoid, rather than possessing a healthy mistrust for non-Jews.

To provide culturally sensitive treatment, counselors need to develop an appreciation of how anti-Semitic violence and historical events such as the Holocaust are a common thread in the Jewish familial and community fabric, which affect Jewish women’s psyches, worldview, experience of non-Jews, and sense of overall safety in the world. In this regard, coun-selors may incorporate a conceptualization of vicarious and insidious trauma into their understanding of Jewish women’s life strategies.

ReferencesAltman, N. A., Inman, G. A., Fine, S. G., Ritter, H. A., & Howard, E.

E. (2010). Exploration of Jewish identity. Journal of Counseling & Development, 88, 163–173.

Biale, R. (1995). Women and Jewish law: The essential texts, their history, and their relevance for today. New York, NY: Schocken Books.

Brodkin, K. (1998). How Jews became White folks and what that says about race in America. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.

Cantor, A. (1995). Jewish women/Jewish men: The legacy of patriarchy in Jewish life. San Francisco, CA: Harper Collins.

Creswell, J. W. (2007). Qualitative inquiry and research design: Choosing among five traditions (2nd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Denzin, N. K., & Lincoln, Y. S. (1994). Handbook of qualitative research. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Dey, I. (1993). Qualitative data analysis: A user-friendly guide for social scientists. New York, NY: Routledge.

Eisner, E. (1991). The enlightened eye: Qualitative inquiry and the enhancement of educational practice. New York, NY: Macmillan.

Elazar, D. J. (1992). Can Sephardic Judaism be reconstructed? Juda-ism: A Quarterly Journal of Jewish Life and Thought, 41, 17–25.

Fischer, A. R., & Moradi, B. (2001). Racial and ethnic identity: Recent developments and needed directions. In J. G. Ponterotto, J. M. Casas, L. A. Suzuki, & C. M. Alexander (Eds.), Handbook of multicultural counseling (pp. 341–370). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Friedman, M. L., Friedlander, M. L., & Bluestein, D. L. (2005). Toward an understanding of Jewish identity: A phenomeno-logical study. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 52, 77–83. doi:10.1037/0022-0167.52.1.77

Goldberg, J. L., & O’Brien, K. M. (2005). Jewish women’s psy-chological well-being: The role of attachment, separation and Jewish identity. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 29, 197–206. doi:10.1037/0033-3204.41.2.152

Green, B. A., & Brodbar, D. (Eds.). (2011). A minyan of women: Family dynamics, Jewish identity and psychotherapy practice. New York, NY: Routledge.

Greenberg, S. T. (2009). An investigation of body image dissatisfaction among Jewish American females: An application of the tripartite influence model (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa. Retrieved from http://ir.uiowa.edu/etd/368

Hall, C. R., Dixon, W. A., & Mauzey, E. D. (2004). Spirituality and religion: Implications for counselors. Journal of Counseling & Development, 82, 504–507.

Hartman, H., & Hartman, M. (1999). Jewish identity, denomina-tion and denominational mobility. Social Identities, 5, 279–311. doi:10.1080/13504639951491

Hill, C. E., Thompson, B. J., & Williams, E. N. (1997). A guide to conducting consensual qualitative research. The Counseling Psy-chologist, 25, 517–572.

Holzman, C. G. (2010). I’ve always known I’m Jewish, but how am I Jewish? Women & Therapy, 33, 315–331. doi:10.1080/02703149.20101.485956

Hyers, L. L. (2007). Resisting prejudice every day: Exploring women’s assertive responses to anti-Black racism, anti-Semitism, heterosexism, and sexism. Sex Roles, 56, 1–12. doi:10.1007/s11199-006-9142-8

Janesick, V. J. (1994). The dance of qualitative research: Metaphor, methodolatry, and meaning. In N. K. Denzin & Y. S. Lincoln (Eds.), Handbook of qualitative research (pp. 209–219). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Josefowitz Siegel, R., & Cole, E. (Eds.). (1991). Seen but not heard: Jewish women in therapy. New York, NY: Harrington Park Press.

Josefowitz Siegel, R., & Cole, E. (Eds.). (1997). Celebrating the lives of Jewish women: Patterns in a Jewish sampler. Binghamton, NY: Harrington Park Press.

Jun, H. (2010). Social justice, multicultural counseling and practice: Beyond a conventional approach. Los Angeles, CA: Sage.

Kaye/Kantrowitz, M. (1992). The issue is power: Essays on women, Jews, violence, and resistance. San Francisco, CA: Aunt Lute Books.

Kielty Briggs, M., & Dixon Rayle, A. (2005). Incorporating spiritual-ity into core counseling courses: Ideas for classroom application. Counseling and Values, 50, 63–75.

Langman, P. F. (1995). Including Jews in multiculturalism. Journal of Multicultural Counseling and Development, 23, 222–236.

Langman, P. F. (1999). Jewish issues in multiculturalism: A handbook for educators and clinicians. Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson.

Levitt, D. H., & Balkin, R. S. (2003). Religious diversity from a Jewish perspective. Counseling and Values, 48, 57–66.

MacDonald-Dennis, C. (2006). Understanding anti-Semitism and its impact: A new framework for conceptualizing Jew-ish identity. Equity & Excellence in Education, 39, 267–278. doi:10.1080/10665680600792794

Naumburg, C. G. (2007). Judaism as a hidden diversity. Smith College Studies in Social Work, 77, 79–99. doi:10.1300/J497v77n02_06



Porter, N. (1999). Reconstructing mountains from gravel: Remember-ing context in feminist research. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 23, 59–64.

Reinharz, S. (1992). Feminist methods in social research. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

Schiffman, L. (1999). Generation J. San Francisco, CA: Harper Collins.

Schlosser, L. Z. (2006). Affirmative psychotherapy for American Jews. Psychotherapy: Theory, Research, Practice, Training, 43, 424–435. doi:10.1037/0033-3204.43.4.424

Schlosser, L. Z., Foley, P. F., Poltrock Stein, E., & Holmwood, J. R. (2010). Why does counseling psychology exclude religion? A content analysis and methodological critique. In J. Ponterotto, J. M. Casas, L. A. Suzuki, & C. M. Alexander (Eds.), Handbook of multicultural counseling (3rd ed., pp. 453–466). Los Angeles, CA: Sage.

Schwandt, T. A. (2007). The Sage dictionary of qualitative inquiry. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Segal, S. (1998). The streets are paved with cutbacks: Jewish women and economic justice. In S. Silberstein Swartz & M. Wolfe (Eds.), From memory to transformation: Jewish women’s voices (pp. 276–286). Toronto, Ontario, Canada: Second Story Press.

Shenton, A. K. (2004). Strategies for ensuring trustworthiness in qualitative research projects. Education for Information, 22, 63–75.

Silberstein Swartz, S. (1998). Return to Poland: In search of my par-ents’ memories. In S. Silberstein Swartz & M. Wolfe (Eds.), From memory to transformation: Jewish women’s voices (pp. 72–92). Toronto, Ontario, Canada: Second Story Press.

Sprague, J. (2005). Feminist methodologies for critical researchers: Bridging differences. New York, NY: Rowman & Littlefield.

Torton Beck, E., Goldberg, J. L., & Knefelkamp, L. L. (2003). Integrating Jewish issues into the teaching of psychology. In P. Bronstein & K. Quina (Eds.), Teaching gender and multicul-tural awareness: Resources for the psychology classroom (pp. 237–252). Washington, DC: American Psychological Associa-tion. doi:10.1037/10570-017

Weber, R. N. (1997). The politics of coming home: Gender and Jewish identities in the 1990s. In R. Josefowitz Siegel & E. Cole (Eds.), Celebrating the lives of Jewish women: Patterns in a Jewish sampler (pp. 177–186). Binghamton, NY: Harrington Park Press.

Weiner, K. (1991). Anti-Semitism in the therapy room. In R. Josefowitz Siegel & E. Cole (Eds.), Jewish women in therapy: Seen but not heard (pp. 119–126). New York, NY: Harrington Park Press.

Weiner, K. (1995). Survivors nonetheless: Trauma in women not directly involved with the Holocaust. In K. Weiner & A. Moon (Eds.), Jewish women speak out: Expanding the boundaries of psychology (pp. 221–235). Seattle, WA: Canopy Press.

Weiner, K., & Moon, A. (Eds.). (1995). Jewish women speak out: Ex-panding the boundaries of psychology. Seattle, WA: Canopy Press.

Weinrach, S. G. (2002). The counseling profession’s relationship to Jews and the issues that concern them. Journal of Counseling & Development, 80, 300–314.

Wertz, F. J. (2005). Phenomenological research methods for counsel-ing psychology. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 52, 167–177. doi:10.1037/0022-0167.52.2.167

Yeung, P. P., & Greenwald, S. (1992). Jewish Americans and mental health: Results of the NIMH Epidemiologic Catchment Area study. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology, 27, 292–297.

counseling jewish women: a phenomenological study

Documents