Seminar Booklet 2016

Jewish Identity in America and Abroad/ Professor Dina David, 2014
The topic selected for next year’s partnership seminar is Jewish Identity. This led me
to search for a comprehensive definition of the term, Jewish Identity, but I was unable to find
one. This article explores my journey to define the term Jewish Identity and what my own
identity as a Jew means to me. During this journey I reflected on how being involved with
the partnership impacted my own Jewish Identity by strengthening it as a whole. As a result
of my own experiences I now believe that exposure to Israel and the partnership itself will
help to develop and enhance my students’ Jewish Identity.
As an educator I began my journey how I normally achieve in my classroom by
employing the Socratic Method. 1 According to Merriam Webster Online the Socratic Method can
be defined as: “the method of inquiry and instruction employed by Socrates esp. as represented in the
dialogues of Plato and consisting of a series of questionings the object of which is to elicit a clear and
consistent expression of something supposed to be implicitly known by all rational beings.”
Thus I began my quest of searching for a comprehensive definition for Jewish
Identity. I started by asking what Jewish Identity is; but I quickly realized the complexity of
the many possible answers. The first part of my journey to define Jewish Identity began with
my attempt to categorize it. I anticipated that this journey and the categorization would be far
simpler than it turned out to be. I started by asking myself the following questions: “Can
Jewish Identity be strictly defined by Judaism and if so, if one is not religious is he or she
still considered capable of having a Jewish Identity? Can Jewish Identity be defined in
strictly cultural terms, or is Jewish Identity a combination of national identity and religious
belief?” The most complex part of defining the term, Jewish Identity, I discovered was
attempting to define what it means to be Jewish. This resulted in more questions, “Is Judaism
a religion, a race, a nation, or just an ethno-cultural grouping?” and “How can we strengthen
our own and others’ Jewish Identity if we are incapable of defining the term itself?”
The next step of my journey was to explore what my identity as a Jew meant to me. I
began with some self reflection on my own past as a Jew and an Israeli. I am not unique.
Like so many other Jews I have a complex and extensive background.
I was of two Iraqi Sephardic Jews in Israel. In 1992 I moved to Indianapolis to teach
Hebrew at the Bureau of Jewish Education. As time progressed I became more immersed in
the American Cultural and the American Jewish culture.
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