The Dismal Jewish Social Science

Abstract

Steven, I’m honored to have learned so much from you, to work with you, and to have become friends, collaborators, and colleagues over the past few years. For me, working with you has been one of the most valuable, exciting, challenging, rewarding and enjoyable academic experiences of my young career. Among all that I’ve gained from working with Steven, there are two things in particular that I would like to highlight. And, as is always the case, he not only talks about them, but he performs them. First: I learned the beauty of the foursquare table. As a heuristic framework, I have seen Steven use this in countless situations to make sense of questions about identity or attitude. And I’ve learned to use it myself. In his talk, Steven turned the foursquare table on himself, in order to self-identify as an ‘‘anxious transformationist.’’ As he was speaking, I could see the table take shape–with one axis belonging to Calvin Goldscheider and one to Charles Liebman. The foursquare table frames some of Steven’s ways of thinking, of accounting for all possible alternatives, and for working systematically through questions, problems and issues. Second: I learned the beauty of the mnemonic device. In my work with Steven, I’ve seen our ideas take shape in various alliterative groupings like ‘‘the Three M’s’’ or in certain alphabetical arrangements like ‘‘The Laws of ABCD.’’ This afternoon, Steven gave us the ‘‘Four I’s.’’ These are more than handy catchphrases–they are also analytical tools for making insights memorable and for presenting information in a way which is simple but not simplistic–particularly for non-academic and deeply interested and invested audiences. So, while I have no foursquare table or mnemonic to add, I want to offer an addendum to Steven’s ‘‘Four I’’ formula that is neither another ‘‘I’’ nor an application of any methodological tool in particular. I want to talk about economics. For all of our expertise in the various fields of Jewish life, for our ability to operationalize surveys