The Changing Conventional Jewish Family

In the context of population studies, marriage can be generally viewed as the resultant of three major groups of determinants: sociocultural, or the desirability of marriage; socioeconomic, or the feasibility of marriage; and demographic, or the availability of marriage partners. Abundant evidence available on marriage patterns of Jews in the past points to a number of singular traits in comparison to other population groups. The normative centrality of the family in traditional Jewish culture generally produced a greater marriage propensity among the Jews than among other ethnoreligious groups. The peculiar occupational stratification of Jewish communities produced different responses of marriage frequencies among Jews and non-Jews as affected by general socioeconomic change. The relatively small size and segmented structure of the pool of potential marriage candidates tended to reduce marriage frequencies among the Jews. Legal limitations imposed upon the Jews in certain countries before emancipation constituted a further factor of attrition to past Jewish nuptiality. This chapter, largely based on NJPS data, discusses the main marriage and family trends of Jews in the US and their long-term consequences for population size and structure.