The Structure of Jewish Identification in the United States: 2001 Revisited

This chapter reviews the basic underlying structure of group identification among Jews in the US as well as differences and similarities between selected sub-groups within the Jewish population. The source of data was the 2001 NJPS – a large national representative sample of US Jewry. Three main issues emerged: the major thrust of trends possibly strengthening or weakening a shared Jewish identification over time; the nature of Jewish identification differentials within the US Jewish population, by denomination and organizational membership; and the similarity or difference of American Jewish identification patterns versus other Jewish communities worldwide. The discussion mostly relies on the conceptual foundations of Similarity Structure Analysis (SSA), showing the different identificational patterns of the Orthodox, the affiliated non-Orthodox, the non-affiliated non-Orthodox, and those of more distant Jewish origins.