This qualitative study discovers teenage boys whose connections to Judaism and Jewish life offered them resilience and contextual opportunities for identity development. Those who have active, positive Jewish identities describe adaptations that are more independent of adolescent peer norms and freer, in terms of masculine pressures, than less Jewishly identified boys. Finding countercultural vitality in these boys’ masculine identities, reflecting their rootedness in community support, contributes to the understanding of male development on a number of levels. For the Jewish community, the study findings underscore how critically important culturally based connections can be for boys. In a world dominated by restrictive ideals for being male, a boy’s ability to consider alternatives is likely to depend on his relationships and access to other ecological resources. And for those hoping for a better world for boys, and for everyone else, these teens’ commitments convey the essential fact, that just as children cocreate childhood, boys can help to reinvent boyhood.
Barry, III, H., Josephson, L., Lauer, E., & Marshall, C. ( 1976). Traits inculcated in childhood: Cross-cultural codes . Ethnology, 15(1), 83-114.
2.
Bourdieu, P. ( 2001). Masculine domination. Stanford, CA : Stanford University Press.
3.
Brandtstadter, J. ( 1999). The self in action and development. In J. Brandtstadter & R. M. Lerner (Eds.), Action and self-development (pp. 37-65). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
4.
Brandtstadter, J., & Lerner, R. M. (Eds.). (1999). Action and self-development . Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
5.
Breitman, B. ( 1988). Lifting up the shadow of anti-Semitism: Jewish masculinity in a new light. In H. Brod (Ed.), A mensch among men: Explorations in Jewish masculinity (pp. 101-117). Freedom, CA: The Crossing Press.
6.
Brod, H. (Ed.) (1988). A mensch among men: Explorations in Jewish masculinity. Freedom, CA: The Crossing Press.
7.
Brod, H. ( 1994). Some thoughts on some histories of some masculinities . In H. Brod & M. Kaufman, (Eds.), Theorizing masculinities (pp. 82-96). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
8.
Brod, H. ( 1998). Of mice and supermen: Images of Jewish masculinity. In M. Kimmel & M. Messner (Eds.), Men’s lives (pp. 45-54). Boston : Allyn & Bacon.
9.
Brown, L.M., & Gilligan, C. ( 1992). Meeting at the crossroads: Women’s psychology and girls’ development. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
10.
Chu, J. ( 2000). Learning what boys know: An observational and interview study with six four year-old boys. Unpublished dissertation. Boston: Harvard University.
11.
Chu, J.Y. ( 2004). A relational perspective on adolescent boys’ identity development. In N. Way & J. Y. Chu (Eds.), Adolescent boys. Exploring diverse cultures of boyhood (pp. 78-106). New York: New York University Press.
12.
Connell, R.W. ( 1989). Cool guys, swots and wimps: The interplay of masculinity and education. Oxford Review of Education, 15, 291-303.
13.
Connell, R.W. ( 1995). Masculinities. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Creswell, J.W., & Miller, D.L. ( 2000). Determining validity in qualitative inquiry. Theory into Practice, 39, 124-130.
16.
Farrell, W. ( 1993). The myth of male power. New York: Simon & Schuster.
17.
Ferrer-Wreder, L., Montgomery, M.J., & Lorente, C.C. ( 2003). Identity promotion, adolescence. In T. P. Gullota & M. Bloom (Eds.), Encyclopedia of primary prevention and health promotion (pp. 600-606) New York: Kluwer .
18.
Giroux, H. ( 1983). Theory and resistance in education. South Hadley, MA: Bergin and Garvey.
19.
Groth, M. ( 2007). "Has anyone seen the boy?": The fate of the boy in becoming a man. Thymos. Journal of Boyhood Studies, 1, 6-42.
20.
Heidmets, M. ( 1985). Environment as a mediator of human relationships: Historical and ontogenetic aspects. In T. Garling & J. Valsiner (Eds.), Children within environments. Toward a psychology of accident prevention (pp. 217-227). New York: Plenum.
21.
Henwood, K., & Pidgeon, N. ( 2003). Grounded theory in psychological research. In P. M. Camic, J. E. Rhodes, & L. Yardley (Eds.), Qualitative research in psychology: Expanding perspectives in methodology and design (pp. 131-156). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association Press.
22.
Herring, H., & Leffert, N. ( 1997, Fall). Analysis: A new Jewish identity in formation?Agenda: Jewish Education, pp. 8-12.
23.
Holzman, M. ( 2003). G’varim: Resources for Jewish Men. New York: National Federation of Temple Brotherhoods .
24.
hooks, b. ( 1994). Teaching to transgress. New York: Routledge.
25.
Janssen, D. ( 2007). BOY-linguistic anthropological notes. Thymos. Journal of Boyhood Studies, 1, 43-67.
26.
Kadushin, C., Kelner, S., & Saxe, L. ( 2000). Being a Jewish teenager in America: Trying to make it . Boston: Brandeis University.
27.
Kaufman, M. ( 1994). Men, feminism and men’s contradictory experiences of power. In H. Brod & M. Kaufman (Eds.), Theorizing masculinities (pp. 142-164). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
28.
Kehler, M. & Martino, W. ( 2007) Questioning masculinities: Interrogating boys’ capacities for self-problematization in schools. Canadian Journal of Education, 30 (1), 90-112.
29.
Kehler, M., Davison, K., & Frank, B. ( 2005). Contradictions and tensions of the practice of masculinities in school: Interrogating "Good Buddy Talk". Journal of Curriculum Theorizing, 21 (4), 59-72.
30.
Kindlon, D., & Thompson, M. ( 1999). Raising Cain. Protecting the emotional life of boys. New York: Ballantine.
31.
Leffert, N., & Herring, H. ( 1998). Shema: Listening to Jewish youth. Minneapolis, MN: Search Institute.
32.
Marecek, J., Fine, M., & Kidder, L. ( 2001). Working between two worlds: Qualitative methods and psychology . In D. L. Tolman & M. Brydon-Miller (Eds.), From subjects to subjectivities. A handbook of interpretative and participatory methods (pp. 29-44). New York: New York University Press.
33.
Martino, W. ( 1999). "Cool boys," "party animals," "squids" and "poofters’: Interrogating the dynamics and politics of adolescent masculinities in school . British Journal of Sociology of Education, 20, 239-263.
34.
Martino, W.J. ( 2008). Male teachers as role models: Addressing issues of masculinity, pedagogy and the re-masculinization of schooling. Curriculum Inquiry, 38, 189-223.
35.
Maxwell, J.A. ( 1992, Fall). Understanding and validity in quantitative research . Harvard Educational Review, 62, pp. 279-299.
36.
Maxwell, J.A. ( 2005). Qualitative research design: An interactive approach . Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
37.
Mook, B. ( 2007). The changing nature of childhood and boyhood: A metabletic study. Thymos. Journal of Boyhood Studies, 1, 157-178.
38.
Moving Traditions. ( 2008). Where have all the young men gone? Jenkintown, PAAuthor.
39.
O’Neil, J.M., Good, G.E., & Holmes, S. ( 1995). Fifteen years’ of theory and research on Men’s gender role conflict: New paradigms for empirical research. In R. Levant & W. Pollack (Eds.), The new psychology of men (pp. 164-206). New York: Basic Books.
40.
Ravitch, S.M. ( 2002). Engaging and retaining Jewish youth beyond Bar/Bat Mitzvah . Melrose Park, PA: The Auerbach Central Agency for Jewish Education.
41.
Reichert, M. ( 2001). Rethinking masculinities: New ideas for schooling boys . In W. Martino & B. Meyenn (Eds.), What about the boys? (pp. 38-52). Philadelphia : Open University Press.
42.
Reichert, M., & Kuriloff, P. ( 2003). Boys’ selves: forging identities in the looking glass of school life. Teachers’ College Record, 106, 547-576.
43.
Reichert, M.C., Stoudt, B., & Kuriloff, P. ( 2006). "Don’t love no fight": Healing and identity among urban youth, The Urban Review, 38, 187-220.
44.
Segal, L. ( 1990). Slow motion. Changing masculinities, changing men. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.
45.
Smith, C., & Denton, M.L. ( 2005). Soul searching. The religious and spiritual lives of American teenagers. New York: Oxford University Press.
46.
Stevenson, H.C. ( 2004). Boys in men’s clothing: Racial socialization and neighborhood safety as buffers to hypermasculinity in African American males . In N. Way & J. Y. Chu (Eds.), Adolescent boys (pp. 59-77). New York: New York University Press.
47.
Stoudt, B.G. ( 2006). "You’re either in or you’re out." School violence, peer discipline and the (re)production of hegemonic masculinity . Men and Masculinities, 8, 273-286.
48.
Thorne, B. ( 1994). Gender play. Girls and boys in school. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.
49.
Tolman, D.L., & Brydon-Miller, M. (2001). From subjects to subjectivities. A handbook of interpretative and participatory methods. New York: New York University Press.
50.
Way, N. ( 2004). Intimacy, desire, and distrust in the friendships of adolescent boys. In N. Way & J. Y. Chu (Eds.), Adolescent boys (pp. 167-196). New York: New York University Press.
51.
Whitehead, S.M. ( 2002). Men and masculinities. Cambridge, UK: Polity.
