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This paper explores the experiences of Palestinian Arab citizens of Israel (PAI) on entering Israeli higher education (HE). Adopting a sequential exploratory mixed methods design, seven online focus groups ("n" = 19) were conducted, followed by an online survey ("n" = 453). The findings indicate that PAI students experience academic, physical, social and cultural disorientation upon entering HE. This disorientation transforms with time into a persistent feeling of lagging behind others. Three structural barriers appear to impede PAI students' progress in HE: language, age and finances -- all manifestations of larger systematic discrimination faced by PAIs in Israel. PAI students deal with these challenges by turning to one another for support and forming groups on campus. Variations across gender, parental education and institution type are explored. The paper concludes by discussing practical implications and future research directions.

Bedouin early childhood education lacks substantial resources and budgets, and so the adjacent Jewish education seems more appealing. Given the existing tensions between Arabs and Jews and the need to change the obscure future of co-existence, this paper examines the integration of Bedouin children into the early childhood education of a kibbutz, and the attitudes of the Jewish parents toward this integration. Fifteen Jewish parents whose children attend the kibbutz kindergarten were interviewed individually, and content analysis was performed on the interview transcripts. Findings show that the interviewees had positive attitudes toward the educational integration, which they expected would promote coexistence. However, there was clear evidence of a patronizing attitude toward the Bedouin children, who were perceived as the beneficiaries of the integration and not as legitimate partners. Genuine future integration should initiate programs in order to close gaps in general, and gaps in education in particular, by allocating finances and resources to developing infrastructure and services, so that choosing Jewish education will be on an ideological basis, and not for considerations of receiving a better education.

This research investigates how the interventions of records' creators and archivists have shaped the Six Day War Files Collection to sustain Israel's own narrative of the War. Using a theoretical framework of settler colonialism, epistemic delinking, and symbolic annihilation, this narrative is deconstructed to showcase how it has served to further Israeli colonialism at the expense of Palestinians being marginalized as a people and Palestine being erased as an autonomous state. In constructing this narrative, Palestinians were excluded from the telling of the Six Day War, and in instances where they could not be erased, they were misrepresented or maligned. By delinking the records from their colonial context and unsettling this narrative, Palestinians' experience of coloniality can be reinstated where it was excluded. This paper offers a novel perspective to the current archival scholarship regarding Palestine, revealing how symbolic annihilation in the archive extends and is an extension of systemic annihilation. Moreover, it challenges traditional archival practices which have historically paved the way for acts of imperialism to occur unquestioned.

Purpose: This study aims to investigate the linkage of identity of new and veteran immigrant students of the Ethiopian community in Israel, by examining their attitudes to children's literature books written simultaneously in Hebrew and Amharic. The data were collected using focus groups of Ethiopian students attending a teacher training college. The main findings revealed that they referred to two major types of identity: one type is an unreconciled identity, characterized by defiance, which seeks to minimize the visibility of one's ethnic group within the main culture and tries to adopt the hegemonic identity, whereas the other type of identity contains the original ethnic identity and--in contrast to the first type--tries to reconcile it with the hegemonic culture. Design/methodology/approach: This is a qualitative study, which emphasis was on participants' attitudes, beliefs and perceptions (Kalka, 2003). The goals of the research were to examine identity perceptions of students of the Beta Israel community, as they are exposed to bilingual literary works in Hebrew and Amharic. Findings: The main findings revealed that they referred to two major types of identity: one type is an unreconciled identity, characterized by defiance, which seeks to minimize the visibility of one's ethnic group within the main culture and tries to adopt the hegemonic identity, whereas the other type of identity contains the original ethnic identity and--in contrast to the first type--tries to reconcile it with the hegemonic culture. Research limitations/implications: This paper has shed light on an important subject and it would be worthwhile to continue the study using other methodologies. Practical implications: This paper contributes to the structuring of a cultural code that serves to organize social meaning and establish individuals' identity. Social implications: This awareness enriches the basis of their own values and allows them to enrich their attitude to their future pupils, for example, to recognize the value of local culture versus that of the immigrants' place of origin, and to develop an understanding and acceptance of the diversity in the classroom. As they take part in building a multicultural Israeli education framework, dealing with identity patterns is also the key to their own integration in society. Originality/value: The originality of the study lies in the usage of two new concepts--unreconciled and reconciled--as referring to the immigrants' identities.

This study investigates the concept of "connectedness to nature" among students from an indigenous Bedouin community, whose relationship with nature is influenced by a variety of cultural, social and environmental factors, not least of which is the fact that the environment in which they live is highly contaminated. We asked 294 fifth- and sixth-grade students (130 boys and 164 girls), who live in the highly rural Bedouin villages in Israel's Negev desert, to complete an open questionnaire that was specifically designed to elicit detailed information about these particular students' connection to nature. The paper presents the results of two analyses of this questionnaire. The first--a quantitative analysis--divides the students' answers into five aspects of connectedness to nature (nature enjoyment, empathy for living creatures, sense of oneness, sense of responsibility and experience of nature in my immediate environment). The second--an inductive, qualitative analysis of the students' explanations and elaborations of their answers--provides a more nuanced description of the various social, historical and situational factors that influence these students' relationship with their environment. It then addresses the tension between these two analyses, highlighting the limitations of "traditional" categories of nature connectedness while showing how these can nevertheless be used to elicit detailed, complex and pertinent information. It concludes by demonstrating how this information, if analyzed critically through its correspondence, or lack of correspondence, with the original assumptions of the statements that elicited it, might be used in the development of place-based environmental education programs for specific populations.

The purpose of this paper is to problematize the place of religious authority in politics and education. Specifically, this essay highlights the role of religious authority in establishing a moral order that values compliance and conformity at the expense of liberty and critique. In doing so, the essay reflects on Israeli politics and Islamic political thought. Pondering on both, the essay explains how the authority conferred through the use of religious language creates a condition of hyper-solidarity. Under conditions of hyper-solidarity, religious authority becomes pervasive, permeating, and more entrenched and difficult to challenge. It becomes increasingly difficult to be critical, because to criticize is to forgo that hyper-solidarity, and to assume a position of exteriority. Therefore, obedience becomes a choice and a position taken in favor of stability, consistency, and continuity of the group.

This paper compares the concept of mixed faith/cultural education in Northern Ireland and Israel. It is primarily concerned with the processes that these "integrated" schools adopt in their quest to improve relations between divided ethnic groups. Drawing on qualitative data collected in two mixed religion primary schools in each jurisdiction the paper shows that the schools' existing cultural norms act as important mediating influences on the way that inter-group relationships are constructed. The paper concludes that attention needs to be paid to both the policy context and the culture if contact initiatives are to be successful. (Contains 5 notes.)

This paper attempts to examine critically the symbolic matrimonial union of different Nation States with numerous ethnic groups with kaleidoscopic cultures, customs and traditions with the possibility of having a formidable and a united country. Historians and scholars of various fields of academic enterprise in different historical epochs have spotted out through intellectual telescope and investigations that the protracted ailment of Nigeria State started in 1914 on the eve of amalgamation of the North and South Protectorates. It is the aim of this paper to redirect scholars’ attention to the major fundamental reasons why Nigeria is becoming an ancient Israel whereof the Northern Kingdom parted way from the Southern Kingdom consequent upon young despotic King who was not diplomatic in managing the affairs of the State probably because of his youthful exuberance. This paper observed that there is a loose tie among the Nation States that formed the entity Nigeria because the various Nations never consented to come together as one country, but rather, it was an imposition of the colonial masters just for an easy administrative purpose to exploit the natives and rob them of their patrimonial rights. This paper will focus mostly on the plethora of reasons that have contributed to the problem of: poor governance, marginalization, ethnicity, nepotism, unequal distribution of national wealth, poverty, economic bankruptcy, corruption, insecurity, political gerrymandering, poor health system, paper value educational system and visionless leadership. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues for an interdisciplinary approach within the study of religion and conflict. Using a religious studies framework, it demonstrates that tools from human geography, peace studies, and the theology of religions can be used to shed light on the intractability of conflicts where religion is not "innocent". Within human geography, the spatial dimension of individual and communal identity, most particularly the concept of "mythical space", can illuminate the non-empirical, affective factors that condition attitudes to religious and ethnic others. Similarly, within the theology of religions, the typology of exclusivism, inclusivism, and pluralism can aid understanding of tendencies within all human communities, religious and non-religious, when faced with perceived threats from significant others. Two case studies, Sri Lanka and Israel/Palestine, are examined through this interdisciplinary approach, using illustrative "moments" within each conflict. Both highlight the affective power of primal imaginaries that are informed by narratives about religion, land, and identity. Without dismissing the importance of political and economic factors in the arising of conflict, this paper argues that it is not enough to analyse these factors alone. Other disciplines are necessary and this paper argues for two important examples: human geography and the theology of religions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the last few decades of the twentieth century, increased independence and autonomy of local schools through the implementation of school-based management (SBM) have become widespread in Western education. SBM is designed to operate within a more general framework of decentralisation of the educational authority. This research set out to investigate to what extent SBM in Arab-Bedouin elementary schools has impacted local curriculum development. Ten Israeli Arab-Bedouin elementary schools participated in the study. A questionnaire and a semi-structured interview were used as research tools, and the data analysis revealed that because of a complex set of cultural and political factors, there is no curriculum development in these schools. This paper concludes with specific recommendations for enabling Arab-Bedouin SBM schools to create curricula while taking into consideration the cultural, political and social contexts in which they operate. (Contains 4 tables.)

This paper advances the analysis of multiculturalism by examining multiculturalism in a contextualized manner. To understand multiculturalism and assess its effects on the recognition of migrant children, researchers need to analyse multicultural practices in schools by taking into account the social mirrors resulting from different social and structural conditions, such as national ideologies and the ethos of reception. The analysis of multicultural policies in four different types of daycare centres enrolling migrant workers' children in Israel--community, Catholic, municipal, and those supported by private associations--points to three types of contextualized multicultural models: contextualized misrecognition, contextualized recognition, and de-contextualized recognition. By juxtaposing recognition or misrecognition appearing at the daycare level with legal and ideological social mirrors, multicultural patterns can acquire a different meaning. Municipal daycares with a few migrant children as well as daycares supported by private associations that adopt a "blind-homogenizing" approach reflect an absence of recognition that is contextualized in the larger society. Community daycares adopting a survival approach, Catholic daycares applying a "business as usual" approach, and municipal daycares enrolling a large number of migrant children adopting a multicultural approach reflect different degrees of cultural and religious recognition. However, when analysed in the larger local or national context, this recognition results in a de-contextualized recognition that suppresses the beneficial character of the multicultural education provided. (Contains 30 notes.)

The paper examines whether college application behavior assists members of privileged social groups to preserve their advantages in diversified higher education systems. The study is based on a survey conducted in Israel in 1999 on a sample of 4,061 freshmen in the research universities and the academic colleges, which are often perceived as the second tier of higher education. The findings show that strategic application behavior helps less able children of academic parents to achieve the summit of higher education: studying lucrative fields of study at the research universities. Mizrachim, the disadvantaged Jewish ethnic group, are strategic when applying for lucrative fields of study, but it does not affect their actual enrollment. Strategic application behavior helps Arabs, the most disadvantaged group in Israel, increase their odds of achieving the "worst" option, studying non-lucrative fields in colleges. Talented women successfully practice strategic behavior when applying for lucrative fields of study. The effects of strategic application behavior are, thus, mixed. It helps in preserving socio-economic and ethnic inequalities, but also helps in reducing gender inequality among talented students.

Apart from the conflict between Arabs and Jews, two types of inter-group relations are the foci of social strain within the Jewish community of Israel: (1) inter-ethnic relations between Ashkenazim and Sephardim, and (2) relations between the religious and the nonreligious. Since 1967, the continuing survey of the Guttman Institute has been tracking the quality of these relations on the basis of repeated interviews with national samples of Jewish adults. Of theoretical interest is the different nature of these two types of interrelations and their over-time dynamics. Overall, inter-ethnic relations have improved over the years of the study. But the relations between religious and nonreligious sectors has not kept pace. Throughout the period of the research, religion looms as a more serious problem than ethnicity. The hypothesis that inter-group conflict intensifies in "normal" periods and declines in time of crisis is examined with respect to stressful events, especially in the domains of security and economy. However, regardless of over-time fluctuations in the perception of the quality of inter-group relations, the divergence between the two kinds of conflict persists. The paper also treats variations in the perception of inter-group conflict in the eyes of respondents who differ by ethnicity and by levels of religiosity.

This paper offers an assessment of the efforts to de-Arabize the Bedouin Arab youth of the Negev. We show that despite the extensive efforts to achieve this goal, they have become pronouncedly alienated from the State of Israel, and are increasingly perceiving themselves as an integral part of Israel's Palestinian Arab national minority. The findings of our research illustrate the futility of the policy to de-Arabize the Bedouin and to instill in them the unfounded belief that they are full and equal citizens of the State of Israel. We argue that the failure of the policy in this regard is inevitable primarily for the following reason: Israel's national identity is constructed in a manner that leaves no room for Arab culture and heritage and this identity provided the legitimization for discriminatory policies against the Bedouin, as well as against other Arab groups. Thus, the shift toward Palestinian national and cultural identity found among Bedouin youth, can be partly explained as a result of their growing awareness of this political reality and their decreasing readiness to accept it. But then again, this shift is nothing but another manifestation, albeit a sobering one at that, of the challenge facing Zionist ideology since the pre-state era, more than 50 years ago. To put it succinctly, the challenge is this: if Israel aspires to be judged as a liberal democracy and to ensure its legitimacy and political stability, it must make significant changes in its basic governing principles. It must either incorporate the culture and collective aspirations of its Arab citizens within the national identity, and/or allow them some form of political autonomy.

Discusses Israeli teachers' negative attitudes toward Jews of North African and Middle Eastern origin, who constitute about half of Israel's Jewish population and comprise 90 percent of Israel's disadvantaged. Describes several countermeasures and predicts that change will come as the position of Oriental Jews in Israeli society improves. (DM)

This paper reports findings on associations between four subscales of social alienation and psychological distress and sleep problems, and the moderating effects of ethnic pride and shame on these relationships. The study employed a cross-sectional survey design. Participants were 1008 Israeli Palestinian and Jewish adolescents recruited via public schools that allowed access. The questionnaires were administered in adolescents' native language (Hebrew or Arabic) in their homeroom classes. As hypothesized, findings showed that adolescents who have more trust in procedural justice and prefer their own ethnic group reported fewer sleep problems and that adolescents who were less committed to the law and more alienated reported more sleep problems. The findings also showed negative association between psychological distress and believing in procedural justice and positive association with alienation. However, of sixteen moderating effects tested only ethnic pride reached statistical significance and moderated the effect of alienation on sleep problems. Findings also showed that gender, ethnicity and SES were partially linked to both outcomes variables. Psychological distress and sleep problems were associated with female gender, Palestinian-Israeli ethnic affiliation and low SES. Several possible explanations are offered for the findings. Directions for future research, and potential implications are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Ethnic Democracy model hinges on a complex political principle that sanctions undisguised bias in favour of a specific ethnic group. Thus, it is a system whose hierarchical design must, by its very nature, ignore any notion of democratic equality. The organising principle of Ethnic Democracy holds that the dominating or majority ethnic group shall have exclusive access to power, self-determination, and will have superior status in the sociopolitical life of the nation. Over and above its moral shortcomings, the feasibility of this model for governing in deeply divided societies should be examined to understand how Ethnic Democracy variously affects different social groups and how its architects envision the state's commitments to its citizens. To that end, this paper has examined the case of Israel as example of this system. The social inequalities that separate Jews and Arabs are clear indication of an institutional bias that favours the Jewish ethnic group to the detriment of Israeli Arabs, despite Israel's reputation as an impartial parliamentary democracy. In order to develop a cogent line of reasoning with which to analyse Israel's ethno-democratic traits, this paper offers a parallel reading of Let It Be Morning, a novel written by the Arab Israeli writer Sayed Kashua, and the ground-breaking essay "Ethnic Democracy: Israel as an Archetype", written by the Israeli sociologist Sammy Smooha. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Neoliberal governance has been associated with rising inequality and economic exclusion. Recent scholarship proposes that the social investment state (SIS) is a turn away from such inequality and exclusion-enhancing neoliberalism. The ideal SIS responds to neoliberalism-generated social ills by investing in the productive capacities of all its citizens. However, commentators ask whether an SIS addresses the plight of weaker elements in society, specifically that of disadvantaged ethnic minorities. This paper looks specifically at this question by utilising a critical-case study research design of a surprising example of social investment in disadvantaged ethnic minorities: the extensive labour market policies for Israeli Arabs. This paper introduces the concept of a neoliberal targeted SIS in which social investment programmes are developed for economic reasons, promoted by neoliberal actors (right-wing parties and Ministries of Finance), target narrow groups instead of being applied to all, and the preferred mode for the delivery of services is private. Egalitarian outcomes – to the extent that they materialise – might be thought of as a policy by-product. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At a time dominated by the rhetoric of identity and in a region, the Levant, where political and cultural borders seem insurmountable, this paper aims to create a parallelism between two study traditions: Phoenician and Israelite studies. The main point of contact between the two disciplines is that, in both of them, questions of identity emerge as pivotal issues in the interpretation of many kinds of sources (language, religion, material culture, etc.). This paper proposes a theoretical framework in which research focusing on the definition and localisation of ethnic identities gives way to research which is interested more in the Levant as a whole, and in communities rather than peoples. According to the anthropologist J.-L. Amselle, it is time to dismiss the “ethnographic reason", which creates or emphasises discontinuity, minimises continuity and, thus, multiplies ethnicities and academic disciplines. After all, if there is one vocation that is proper to Phoenician studies, it should be found in its inner urge to look beyond geographic, chronological and cultural borders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: End-of-life decision making constitutes a major challenge for bioethical deliberation and political governance in modern democracies: On the one hand, it touches upon fundamental convictions about life, death, and the human condition. On the other, it is deeply rooted in religious traditions and historical experiences and thus shows great socio-cultural diversity. The bioethical discussion of such cultural issues oscillates between liberal individualism and cultural stereotyping. Our paper confronts the bioethical expert discourse with public moral attitudes.Methods: The paper is based on a qualitative study comprising 12 focus group discussions with religious and secular persons in the USA, Germany, and Israel (n = 82). Considering the respective socio-political and legal frameworks, the thematic analysis focuses on moral attitudes towards end-of-life decision making and explores the complex interplay between individual preferences, culture, and religion.Results: Our findings draw attention to the variety and complexity of cultural and religious aspects of end-of-life decision making. Although there is local consensus that goes beyond radical individualism, positions are not neatly matched with national cultures or religious denominations. Instead, the relevance of the specific situatedness of religious beliefs and cultural communities becomes visible: Their status and role in individual situations, for example, as consensual or conflicting on the level of personal perspectives, family relationships, or broader social contexts, e.g., as a majority or minority culture within a political system.Conclusions: As the group discussions indicate, there are no clear-cut positions anchored in "nationality," "culture," or "religion." Instead, attitudes are personally decided on as part of a negotiated context representing the political, social and existential situatedness of the individual. Therefore, more complex theoretical and practical approaches to cultural diversity have to be developed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Whilst the city is a central focus of research on diasporic resettlement, little research has explored the city as a site of diasporic return. This paper explores return visits to Calcutta by members of the Anglo-Indian and Jewish communities who have migrated to London, Toronto and Israel since 1947. In doing so, the paper contributes to broader debates about return visits and migrations as well as the connections between cities, communities and diasporas. Unlike research that focuses on the nation and/or ‘homeland’, the paper explores the city as a destination for diasporic return. In contrast to work that concentrates on particular ethnic groups that become minorities after migration and expect to feel an ethnic ‘affiliation’ on their return, the paper studies two communities that were minorities before migration. Drawing on interviews with Anglo-Indian and Jewish Calcuttans, the paper argues that decisions to return – and not to return – are shaped by ideas about the city as home more than the nation as homeland. Moreover, returns to the city are also, in different and sometimes contested ways, returns to the community and are experienced and understood in terms of wider narratives of urban and community continuity and change. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to rank the factors associated with smoking according to their relative effect on the tendency to smoke. Design/methodology/approach - A probit procedure and ordinary least squares methods are used to analyze factors that affect the probability of being a smoker and factors that affect smoking intensity, as measured by the number of cigarettes smoked per day. Findings - The paper finds that a relative risk (RR) of smoking is highest for Arab males especially those with only 11-12 years of schooling, married with more than five children or unmarried, while it is lowest for Arab females, especially those married with two to four children, or less than eight years of schooling. Originality/value - The findings indicate that certain characteristics are associated with much larger RR. Mainly, it is found that the RR of smoking is highest for Arab males who work 1.20 weekly hours, have 11-12 years of schooling, with more than five children or are unmarried, while it is lowest for married Arab females with two to four children, with less than eight years of schooling, who work 21-30 hours a week. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]