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Paper short abstract:

In the Hasidic world where religion is everything, males and females have very specific roles and responsibilities, in both secular and religious life. How do people balance the familiar dichotomies upon which Hasidic communities rely, and deal with the problems outside of that experience?

Paper long abstract:

In the ultra-Orthodox world of Hasidic Jews, women have traditionally worked outside the home, enabling their husbands to study Torah full time. As Ayala Fader found in her recent work in Brooklyn, women are often the mediators between the Hasidic world and outside society. Because, in Hasidic culture, women have been the chief breadwinners for centuries, understanding the interaction of gender and social problems requires a different approach. This research examines the daily lives, thoughts, and interactions of married women in the Karlin-Stolin Hasidic community of Givat Ze'ev, in Israeli Occupied Palestinian Territories of the West Bank.

Hasidic men are the ultimate authorities on all religious texts, laws, and practices in a world where religion is everything. Women also invest totally in religion, but because they are denied access to texts and other male arenas, their religious activity manifests itself in unique ways. Furthermore, women are the ones concerned with the practical affairs of everyday life. In a community where women have widespread roles in the public forum, there is plenty of opportunity for women to exert influence and exact change. Nevertheless, men unarguably hold the ultimate decision-making power, and are the acknowledged leaders in their community. With such clearly defined gender delineations, how does the community balance the religious and the secular, and the male and the female, and problems that lie outside the familiar dichotomies upon which Hasidic communities rely?