IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v19y2022i13p7575-d843962.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Ultra-Orthodox Lesbian Women in Israel: Alternative Family Structures as a Bridge between Religious and Sexual Identities

Author

Listed:
  • Shirley Ben Shlomo

    (The Louis and Gabi Weisfeld School of Social Work, Bar Ilan University, Ramat Gan 52900, Israel)

  • Ayelet Oreg

    (The Louis and Gabi Weisfeld School of Social Work, Bar Ilan University, Ramat Gan 52900, Israel)

Abstract

The Jewish ultra-Orthodox community enforces strict rules concerning its members’ way of life and demands that their identities be consistent with that of this conservative community. However, such congruence does not exist for ultra-Orthodox women who identify as lesbians. Drawing on social representation theory, this study examines the unique family structures that lesbian ultra-Orthodox women in Israel have adopted to accommodate their conflicting identities. The study employed a qualitative multiple case study design, conducting in-depth interviews with seven ultra-Orthodox lesbian women, and adopted a phenomenological approach to learn about their lived experience. The women had all married young in arranged marriages and all had children. Four of them were still married, while the other three were divorced. In all cases, however, their lesbian identity was kept hidden. The findings reveal the unique family structures these women created that allowed them to maintain their religious way of life on the surface, while remaining committed to their sexual identity in secret. The study extends the social representation theory and promotes an understanding of the multifaceted identity of ultra-Orthodox lesbian women. The findings can aid in designing interventions that can help such women cope with the secret aspects of their life.

Suggested Citation

  • Shirley Ben Shlomo & Ayelet Oreg, 2022. "Ultra-Orthodox Lesbian Women in Israel: Alternative Family Structures as a Bridge between Religious and Sexual Identities," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(13), pages 1-21, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:19:y:2022:i:13:p:7575-:d:843962
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/13/7575/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/13/7575/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Sawrikar, Pooja & Katz, Ilan, 2017. "Barriers to disclosing child sexual abuse (CSA) in ethnic minority communities: A review of the literature and implications for practice in Australia," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 83(C), pages 302-315.
    2. Armstrong, Peter, 2015. "The discourse of Michel Foucault: A sociological encounter," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 27(C), pages 29-42.
    3. Coleman-Brueckheimer, Kate & Spitzer, Joseph & Koffman, Jonathan, 2009. "Involvement of Rabbinic and communal authorities in decision-making by haredi Jews in the UK with breast cancer: An interpretative phenomenological analysis," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 68(2), pages 323-333, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Dorit Segal-Engelchin & Orit Taubman-Ben-Ari, 2023. "Editorial: Health and Well-Being Related to New Family Forms: Perspectives of Adults, Couples, Children, and Professionals," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 20(8), pages 1-8, April.
    2. Billig, Miriam & Maor, Maya, 2024. "From the body as an object to embodied subjectivity: Social egg freezing as a personal definition rite among ultra-orthodox singles," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 348(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Carmit Katz & Yochay Nadan & Tamar Zion, 2021. "“Torn between Two Worlds”: Practitioners’ Perceptions of Children in Situations of High Intensity Parental Dispute in the Jewish Ultra-Orthodox Community in Israel," Child Indicators Research, Springer;The International Society of Child Indicators (ISCI), vol. 14(4), pages 1617-1634, August.
    2. Maran, Laura & Bracci, Enrico & Funnell, Warwick, 2016. "Accounting and the management of power: Napoleon’s occupation of the commune of Ferrara (1796–1799)," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 60-78.
    3. Sara Genut & Yaacov G. Bachner & Zvika Orr & Adi Finkelstein, 2022. "Ultra-Orthodox Nursing Students’ Cultural Challenges Inside and Outside Their Community during the COVID-19 Pandemic," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(15), pages 1-17, July.
    4. Suyanto, Bagong & Hidayat, Medhy Aginta & Sugihartati, Rahma & Ariadi, Septi & Wadipalapa, Rendy Pahrun, 2019. "Incestuous abuse of Indonesian girls: An exploratory study of media coverage," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 96(C), pages 364-371.
    5. Stacchezzini, Riccardo & Masiero, Eleonora & Lai, Alessandro, 2023. "Histories as counter-accounting," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 91(C).
    6. Nadan, Yochay & Katz, Carmit & Zion, Tamar & Wertheimer, Aya, 2021. "High intensity parental dispute in the Jewish ultra-Orthodox community in Israel: Perspectives of social workers and disaffiliated parents," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 120(C).
    7. Carlotta del Sordo & Massimo Fornasari & Rebecca L. Orelli, 2021. "Power and Discipline: The Role of Accounting in the Monte di Pietà of Ravenna between 18th and 19th Centuries," International Journal of Business and Management, Canadian Center of Science and Education, vol. 14(7), pages 1-93, July.
    8. Ferhat D. Zengul & Nurettin Oner & James D. Byrd & Arline Savage, 2021. "Revealing Research Themes and Trends in 30 Top‐ranking Accounting Journals: A Text‐mining Approach," Abacus, Accounting Foundation, University of Sydney, vol. 57(3), pages 468-501, September.
    9. Sawrikar, Pooja & Katz, Ilan, 2017. "How aware of child sexual abuse (CSA) are ethnic minority communities? A literature review and suggestions for raising awareness in Australia," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 81(C), pages 246-260.
    10. Sawrikar, Pooja, 2020. "Service providers’ cultural self-awareness and responsible use of racial power when working with ethnic minority victims/survivors of child sexual abuse: Results from a program evaluation study in Aus," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 119(C).
    11. Sawrikar, Pooja, 2020. "Service providers’ understanding of cross-cultural differences in belief of myths about child sexual abuse: Results from a program evaluation study in Australia," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 118(C).
    12. Young, Amanda & James, Kieran & Hassan, Abeer, 2022. "The role of regressive sugar tax in the soft drink industry levy (SDIL): A Marxist analysis," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 88(C).
    13. Cooper, Christine, 2015. "Entrepreneurs of the self: The development of management control since 1976," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 14-24.
    14. Kieran Harrahill & Áine Macken-Walsh & Eoin O’Neill & Mick Lennon, 2022. "An Analysis of Irish Dairy Farmers’ Participation in the Bioeconomy: Exploring Power and Knowledge Dynamics in a Multi-actor EIP-AGRI Operational Group," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(19), pages 1-39, September.
    15. Bento da Silva, Jose & Llewellyn, Nick & Anderson-Gough, Fiona, 2017. "Oral-aural accounting and the management of the Jesuit corpus," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 44-57.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:19:y:2022:i:13:p:7575-:d:843962. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.