The project's final conference was staged at the Norwegian Center for Holocaust and Minority Studies on 31 October 2022.
About the project
Jews are not a visible minority in present-day Norway. Neither skin colour, language, dress codes nor socioeconomic status sets them apart. Furthermore, they are few in number – around 1,500 people. As a minority group they nevertheless fit into many category headings, as a religious, national, cultural and ethnic minority (the idea of a single people). The Jewish minority therefore has a clearly rooted status as a minority group, at the same time as typical criteria for identifying an individual as belonging to a minority are absent. This combination of visibility and invisibility is important for the preservation of traditions and identity.
The research project’s overarching objective has been to identify how Jewish identity is preserved and renewed in a society containing so few Jews as Norway.
The primary goal of the research project Negotiating Jewish Identity – Jewish Life in 21st Century Norway (Jødiske identiteter – valg og forhandlinger, praksiser og tradisjoner i samtidens Norge) was to generate new knowledge about cultural and social practices among contemporary Jews in Norway. Jewish identity – in the same way as any other kind of group identity – is interpreted and (re)negotiated in relation to internal discourses, in relation to the majority and in relation to other minorities. The research identified such negotiations and showed how what it is like to be a Jew in Norway is affected by social and cultural changes, globally as well as nationally.
Examples of relevant international factors include Israel’s policies, antisemitic incidents, increased migration, nationalism and right-wing populism in Europe. At the national level, delineations of identity are defined by the activities of Jewish institutions (organisations, cultural practices, rituals and collective memories) and a burgeoning of identity politics among younger generations. The Holocaust forms a large part of Jewish and European awareness of history. Various studies emphasise how this collective memory represents an important component in Norwegian Jewish identity and family life.
The project is divided into two main areas: studies of institutions that encompass Jewish life (organisations, cultural practices, rituals and collective memories) and studies of relationships and individual experiences of being a minority. The project includes seven individual studies ranging from fieldwork, interviews with individuals and focus groups to text studies and discourse analyses.
Results:
- Døving, C. A. (2023): Jewish in a Multicultural Society: from a particular to a universal minority consciousness in Jewish Culture and History, https://doi.org/10.1080/1462169X.2023.2235923
- Døving, C. A. (2022): Jødisk. Identitet, praksis og minnekultur [Jewish. Identity, Practice and Remembrance Culture], (Ed.), Oslo: Universitetsforlaget. (an anthology presenting all the studies in the project)
- Døving, C. A. (2022): “Et sted å begynne når identitet skal studeres” [A Place to Start when Studying Identity] in Jødisk. Identitet, praksis og minnekultur [Jewish. Identity, Practice and Remembrance Culture], (Ed.), Oslo: Universitetsforlaget.
- Døving, C. A. (2022): “Norskhet, minnekultur og jødisk identitet: Før og nå – og med ‘Michelet-debatten’ som et eksempel” [Norwegianness, Remembrance Culture and Jewish Identity: Before and Now – and with the “Michelet Debate” as an Example] in Jødisk. Identitet, praksis og minnekultur [Jewish. Identity, Practice and Remembrance Culture], (Ed.), Oslo: Universitetsforlaget.
- Stene, N. (2023 (forthcoming): Bodies speak louder than words. Negotiating Norwegian, Jewish identities through brit milah”, Scandinavian Journal of Jewish Studies
- Haaland, G. (“Med barna i trappene: Jødisk gudstjeneste på Oslo-måten” [With the Children on the Stairs: Jewish Religious Services the Oslo Way]. pp. 225–246 in Jødisk: Identitet, praksis og minnekultur [Jewish. Identity, Practice and Remembrance Culture], edited by Cora Alexa Døving. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget, 2022.
- Haaland, G. “Lyden av skolebarn: Jødisk læring i Det Mosaiske Trossamfund” [The Sound of Schoolchildren: Jewish Learning at the DMT Synagogue]. To be published in Prismet 74 (1/2023).
- Eberson Dægnes, M. and Lenz, C. (2021) "Ein norwegischer Sonderweg? Stolpersteine als Elemente norwegisch-jüdischer Erinnerung und Identitätsverhandlung"[FA1] . In: Silvija Kavcic, Thomas Schaarschmidt, Anna Warda & Irmgard Zürndorf (Eds.) Steine des Anstoßes. Die Stolpersteine zwischen Akzeptanz, Transformation und Adaption. pp. 97–123 https://app.cristin.no/results/show.jsf?id=192449
- Høeg, I. M. (2022). Contesting religious space – Spatiality, religion and identity-making among Jews in Trondheim. Journal of Contemporary Religion. (accepted)
- Høeg, I. M. (2022b). Religion og identitet i den trønderske flerkulturelle forsamlingen [Religion and Identity in the Multicultural Community of Trøndelag]. In Cora Alexa Døving (Ed.) Det jødiske. Identitet, praksis minnekultur. [Jewish. Identity, Practice and Remembrance Culture]. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget
- Høeg, I. M. (2022). Cultural Jewishness and Geographically Bounded Identity. Negotiating Jewish identity and the Jewish cemetery in the local context of Trondheim. In Avril Maddrell, Sonja Kmec, Tanu Priya Uteng & Mariske Westendorp (eds). Mobilities in Life and Death: Negotiating room for migrants and minorities in European cemeteries. Comparative Migration Studies. Springer Open. (forthcoming)
- Eberson Dægnes, M. (2022): Minnebånd og minneknuter. Barnebarnsgenerasjonens møter med holocausterindring [Remembrance Ties and Tangles. The Third Generation’s Encounter with Recollections of the Holocaust], doctoral thesis (PhD), University of Oslo (UiO).