The 'Estranged' Generation? Social and Generational Change in Interwar British Jewry

2017 | History & Politics

This book focuses on the nature and extent of social change, integration and identity transformation within the Jewish community of Britain during the interwar years. It concentrates mainly on examining the notion - espoused by communal and religious leaders throughout the 1920s and 1930s - that an 'estranged' generation of Jews of migrant heritage existed within the population. This book, therefore, focuses specifically on the migrant second generation (i.e. British and foreign-born children of Russian and Eastern European Jews who migrated to Britain in the late Victorian era up to the First World War), and analyses their purported 'estrangement' from Jewish religion, culture, traditions and lifestyles and their acculturation of the values, characteristics, traits and identities of mainstream British society. It charts and analyses the fear of 'estrangement' evident among first generation migrants and the established Jewish community of Britain between the wars. However, the main focus is firmly placed on the migrant second generation themselves, and traces the nature and extent of this group's detachment from Jewish mores and customs and their attachment to mainstream society.

David Dee (Author)