Lubavitcher Women in America: Identity and Activism in the Postwar Era » (New Edition)

Lubavitcher Women in America offers a rare look at the world of Hasidic women activists since World War II. The revival of ultra-Orthodox Judaism in the second half of the twentieth century has baffled many assimilated American Jews, especially those Jewish feminists hostile to Orthodox interpretations of women's roles. This text gives voice to the lives of those Hasidic women who served the late Lubavitcher Rebbe as educators and outreach activists, and examines their often successful efforts to recruit other Jewish women to the Lubavitcher community in Crown Heights, Brooklyn.

Booknews

Morris (George Washington U.) adds to the expanding literature on Orthodox Jewish women by focusing<-->from a Crown Heights, Brooklyn feminist historian fieldwork perspective<-->on what they consider their empowering experiences (as educators and outreach activists) within their prescribed roles, rather than on why they hold different values than hers. As Hasidic women consider themselves liberated from Christian-defined womanhood, the author dubs them counter- rather than anti-feminist. Includes historical context, and a glossary of Yiddish/Hebrew terms. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.