Ethiopian Israeli Research Articles

Acculturation patterns as reflected in narratives of Ethiopian Israeli teachers

This study examines the professional path of 14 Ethiopian Israeli teachers and analyzes the acculturation patterns in their narratives. The teachers were interviewed about their professional integration, and their stories were characterized according to their motivations: teaching as a tool for achieving self-confidence, teaching as a mission, and teaching as a means of employment security. In the discussion, the relationship between the motivation and acculturation is examined. The study shows the importance of viewing the teachers as individuals instead of stereotyping them, and it may contribute to greater integration of immigrant teachers of color and immigrant cultures around the world.

“We have to separate so we can be together again”: Eritrean mothers’ gendered racialisation and family separation within the Israeli and UK asylum regimes

ABSTRACT This article explores how two asylum-seeking women from Eritrea attempt to secure safety and legal status for their children – born and unborn – and themselves by leaving them behind in the settler colonial state of Israel and taking on forged Ethiopian Israeli identities to travel to the UK to facilitate a process of family reunification. Situating the Israeli asylum regime in the settler colonial state and drawing on multi-sited ethnographic research collected between 2016–2018 in Israel and the UK, the article argues that by engaging in acts of refusing militarised border regimes, migration enforcement, and their racialised orderings, the women shape a future for themselves and their children. The article then sheds light on the women’s experience of waiting while faced with protracted uncertainty and separation from their children. It also analyses how gendered and racialised legal precarity and motherhood are experienced.

"If everyone sits on their hands, nothing happens": A phenomenological analysis of protest as a reflection of personal and communal processes

In 2015, a video of policemen beating up an Ethiopian-born first Lieutenant in the Israeli Defense Forces, was published by the Israeli media and triggered a massive protest against police brutality and discrimination of the Ethiopian community. The current study aimed to understand the meaning the members of the Ethiopian community attribute to the protest, and its' relation to their experiences within the Israeli society. The paper is based on data gathered through interviews with 19 young Ethiopian Israeli adults. The analysis revealed that the participants' interaction with Israeli society is characterized by a shared experience of discrimination and racism, which shaped their perception of protest as a means of speaking out, strengthening a collective identity and achieving feelings of empowerment. However, individual differences were found in the way the participants believed their protest should be conducted. Findings suggest that an understanding of protest should take into account not only shared group experience but also illuminate individual differences. Universalist understandings of protest should be widened to include an examination of how protest can inform us about the social and historical process of relations between a minority group and the majority group.

Parent-Youth Relationships, Racial Discrimination, and Delinquency among Second-Generation Ethiopian Israeli Adolescents: Translational Implications

Second-generation immigrant youth in general, and Ethiopian Israeli youth in particular, are at risk for poverty and exposure to discrimination, circumstances that increase their vulnerability to delinquent behavior. Studies of immigrant youth indicate that family influences exert powerful influences on delinquent behavior and have been the focus of many efficacious prevention programs. Little is known, however, regarding family relationships and delinquency among Ethiopian Israelis, a vulnerable group for whom limited family-centered prevention programs exist. We thus investigated parent-youth relationship factors associated with delinquency and their potential to moderate the link between racial discrimination and delinquency. The study sample included 110 Ethiopian Israeli adolescents who completed measures of discrimination, relationship quality, and limit setting with their mothers and fathers, and delinquency. Direct effect analyses indicated that having a disengaged relationship with one’s father, a lack of limit setting by one’s mother and, to a limited extent, having an engaged relationship with one’s mother were particularly salient family factors predicting delinquency. Interaction analyses revealed that disengaged mother-youth relationships, engaged mother-youth relationships, and a lack of limit setting by mothers and fathers moderated the influence of racial discrimination on delinquency. The present study provides evidence for the importance of parent-youth engagement characteristics and parental limit setting in the relationships between Ethiopian Israeli youth and their mothers and fathers.

Policy entrepreneurs and anti-racism policies

ABSTRACT Under what conditions will those who fight against racism shift their strategies from traditional political participation to entrepreneurial activity? What would the institutional characteristics of the new organizations be, and what strategies would their activists employ? Whereas previous studies on anti-racism activities focused on traditional collective organizational patterns of action, this study examines the phenomenon on the individual level. We analyze the struggle of Ethiopian Israeli activists against racism. The framework suggests that the diffusion of techniques from other locations around the world and long-term learning processes in view of past failures, as well as newly acquired political skills, explain the transition to political entrepreneurial patterns. A comparison between traditional anti-racism actions and entrepreneurial strategies indicates that the essential differences between the two are the latter’s flexibility, creativity and innovation. These differences are manifested in the entrepreneurs’ attitudes toward the existing organizations, their relationship with the establishment, and their coalition-building strategies. The entrepreneurs’ coalition building is two-pronged. On one hand, they cooperate with the establishment on specific issues, and on the other hand, their actions challenge the establishment. They do not trust policymakers and are ready to confront the government more radically than in the past.

Valvular Heart Disease in a Young Israeli Ethiopian Immigrant Population From the Gondar Region With Implications for Rheumatic Heart Disease.

Rheumatic heart disease (RHD) among Ethiopian school children was recently found to be 1.4%. Immigration of the Jewish population from the Gondar region to Israel created an opportunity for further enquiry. A cross-sectional study of the cardiac status of 113,671 adolescent recruits aged 16-19 years from the northern district of Israel who completed the medical profiling process over a 22-year period. 140 recruits had a history of rheumatic fever (0.12%), although none from an Ethiopian origin (n = 1,719). The prevalence of valvular heart disease clinically and confirmed echocardiographically in Ethiopian recruits was not different from the total population (0.81 and 0.93%, respectively). However, the prevalence was higher in those migrating to Israel in their 13th year or older (2.09%), compared to those migrating at a younger age or born in Israel (0.49%). The Ethiopian teenage Israeli population from Gondar had a high rate of auscultation positive and echocardiographically confirmed valvular disease that suggested a high rate of RHD (~1.6%), despite no relevant past history. Our findings also suggested that for the younger Ethiopian immigrants or Israeli born subjects of Ethiopian origin, the improved medical care may well reduce the prevalence of valvular heart disease to that of the rest of the local population.

Effects of Helminth Eradication on the Immune System.

Introduction:Helminth infection has a profound effect on the immune system. However, the precise nature of the immune changes that are elicited by helminth infection have not been sufficiently characterized. Furthermore, the reversibility of these changes after treatment has not been documented sufficiently. We studied the immune profiles of Ethiopian immigrants to Israel at baseline, that is on arrival and at one-year follow-up and compared individuals who received antihelminth treatment during the study period with those who missed the treatment.Methods:A longitudinal follow up study involving different groups of subjects was conducted. Baseline data was recorded from the newly arrived Ethiopian immigrants for a series of peripheral blood tests, including: IgE and Eosinophil levels, T-cell populations, T-cell receptor phenotypes, and cytokine measurement. These tests were all repeated after a 1-year interval. Results were compared between the newly arrived Ethiopian immigrants (NEW-Eth-Il), long term Ethiopian immigrants (LT-Eth-Il), and non Ethiopian Israeli controls (NON-Imm-Il).Results:Of the 184 individuals, 111 were NEW-Eth-Il, who had a high prevalence of helminth infection, the immunological changes were elevated IgE levels and eosinophil counts, decreased CD4/CD8 ratio, increased proportion of HLA-DR+CD3+, HLA-DR+CD4+ and HLA-DR+CD8+ cells, decreased proportion of CD45RA+CD4+ (naive) and CD28+CD8+ cells, increased proportion of CD45RO+CD4+ (memory) cells, and increased secretion of IL-4 and IL-5 (Th2 type cytokines). In the 42 LT-Eth-Il participants, who all had negative tests for helminth infection, we did not observe these immune changes and their immune profile did not differ markedly from that of the NON-Imm-Il controls. The follow-up immune profiles of 33 NEW-Eth-Il who received succesful antihelminth treatment, showed a significant normalization in the above-mentioned variables that was not observed in the 19 NEW-Eth-Il who missed and did not receive the antihelminth treatment.Conclusions:These findings demonstrate that helminth infection is associated with profound immune changes that are normalized within a short time after helminth eradication. They also strengthen the hypothesis that effective antihelminth interventions, in areas endemic for intestinal helminths, may have an impact on AIDS and tuberculosis epidemics.

Iterative emplotment scenarios: Being ‘the only Ethiopian’

The realism-social constructionism debate has been consequential over the last several decades. Silverstein’s vocabulary of micro-/macro-contexts aids in understanding why the tension can be a useful epistemological heuristic for discourse analysts. Narratives were collected in focus groups of Ethiopian-Israeli college students. Five narratives were selected for ethnic mentions and found to have a particular ‘iterative’ ‘emplotment scenario’ (IES) – recurrent storylines and settings – across tellers and telling events. ‘the only Ethiopian’ is an IES of being sent away to a majority-White elementary/secondary school, socially isolated and denigrated. How are we to understand it when a particular plotline and setting recur in our corpora? I argue that although each story and storytelling is unique, they all borrow from a larger-than-single-telling, already existent trope, that is, a budding master narrative. Taken together, a unique view of a particular socio-cultural process – in this case, something of what it means to be an Ethiopian Israeli – emerges.

Migration, gender, and mobility: Ethiopian–Israeli women's narratives of career trajectories

ABSTRACTMost studies on the Ethiopian community in Israel discuss the difficulties in its social, cultural, occupational, and educational integration. Too little attention has been paid to the young professionals in the community who are experiencing upward mobility and to the women in particular. As opposed to stereotypes of Ethiopian–Israelis as poor, uneducated, and marginalized, this article explores socio-economic advancement of Ethiopian–Israeli women in Israel. We look at their integration in the labour market and their professional mobility in the areas of arts, business, religion, the army, and education by analysing the factors that play a role in their success. This study allows us to explore Ethiopian women's worlds by looking at their background and the steps they have taken to succeed in their careers.

Underrepresentation of Ethiopian–Israeli minority students in programmes for the gifted and talented: a policy discourse analysis

Students from disadvantaged or minority backgrounds are often underrepresented in public educational programmes for the gifted and talented (G&T), a phenomenon that has concerned educators for the last two decades. Ethiopian–Israeli minority students (EIMS) are a good example of this phenomenon, as more than 95% of the vast resources allocated to promoting this minority population are directed to advancing underachieving students. To explain the roots of this policy, we analysed all reports presented to the Israeli parliament regarding EIMS during the years 2000–2012, as well as all studies that these reports were based on. A policy discourse analysis revealed that the public-political discourse concerning EIMS focuses almost entirely on the weaknesses and needs of this population. In addition, this discourse is led by policy networks of interest groups that are involved in promoting minority students. Analysis of the relative achievement levels of EIMS suggests that some students, and especially those in lower school grades, are suitable candidates for integration within G&T frameworks. We suggest that a change of the discourse concerning EIMS and emphasizing their strengths may lead to a change in policy, which will promote G&T students and reduce the ‘stereotype threat’ within this group.

African Tongues on the Israeli Stage: A Reversed Diaspora

Over the last decade, Moroccan Israeli and Ethiopian Israeli actors have started to speak Maghrebi and Amharic, respectively, onstage. Their performances indicate a new, nonmainstream theatrical richness and “otherness,” and acknowledge diasporic cultures in Israel. “This is not a ‘trend,’ it is a return,” says a well-known Israeli singer—it is a reversed diaspora.

An identity structure in narrative

This article refocuses the discussion of identity in narrative and practice by looking at structuring-in-practice and beyond to the discourse functions of identity. The narrative of an Ethiopian Israeli female college student is analyzed, wherein she tells about changing elementary schools — a context mirroring the immediate situation in her new academic setting. The analysis identifies and labels the partial, microgenetic elicitation of identity-attributable imagery in each utterance and then consolidates the accumulation of those images into the various groupings relevant in the narrative. In the particular narrative studied here all consolidated images contrast against the one identity-attributable image that is interactionally advantageous. This result, found in all 28 prototypical narratives in my corpus of 46, is evidence of a poetic identity structuring of narrative serving two discourse functions: (1) metasemantic- the contrastive identity work creates and indexes the narrative’s Complication and its subsequent Resolution; (2) metapragmatic- the contrastive identity work creates and indexes the identity for impression management. The contrastive basis of the poetic identity structure of narrative is indicative of much Western identity and narrative construction. Thus, identity and narrative are shown to stand in reflexive relation one to the other, where identity is an ‘indexical icon’, a map of itself drawn in the very narrative from which it emerges.

Changes in Thyroid Function in Ethiopian and Non-Ethiopian Israeli Patients With Human Immunodeficiency Virus Infection or Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome

To investigate whether human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection or its treatment is a risk factor for thyroid dysfunction and whether thyroid function changes over time in 2 distinct subpopulations with HIV or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) in Israel: Ethiopian immigrants and Israeli patients. Serum thyroid-stimulating hormone (TSH) and free thyroxine levels were determined in HIV carriers undergoing follow-up at the Hadassah-Hebrew University Medical Center HIV clinic in Jerusalem, Israel, and these thyroid measurements were correlated with clinical and laboratory variables pertaining to their disease, including disease duration, drug therapy, viral load, CD4 count, low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, and creatine kinase. Serum samples stored at -20°C from the time of referral were tested as well. We recruited 121 consecutive patients with HIV or AIDS for this study: 60 Ethiopians and 61 Israeli patients. Of the 121 patients, 4 (3%) had abnormal thyroid function-subclinical hypothyroidism in 2, overt hypothyroidism in 1, and overt hyperthyroidism in 1. Previously stored serum samples were available for 60 of the 121 patients and revealed 2 additional patients with subclinical hypothyroidism, whose TSH has normalized in the subsequent test. Throughout the follow-up period of 3.2 ± 1.9 years, the mean TSH level remained unchanged in the Israeli cohort but significantly declined in the Ethiopian cohort. Thyroid function abnormalities were uncommon in these Israeli patients with HIV or AIDS. This finding does not support the need for routine thyroid function tests in this patient population. The decline in TSH level in the Ethiopian population over time probably represents a shift from an iodine-deficient to an iodine-sufficient country.

Emergent literacy in children of immigrants coming from a primarily oral literacy culture

This study examined emergent literacy skills of 61 kindergarten children whose families had immigrated to Israel from a primarily oral society (Ethiopia). Three complementary perspectives were examined: developmental patterns, individual differences, and the contribution of parent literacy. The emergent literacy skills of children whose families were from Ethiopia were compared to those of 52 children coming from a primarily literate culture. The groups had acquired less complex Hebrew literacy skills in the same order, including phonological awareness, letter naming and consonant writing. However, the Ethiopian Israeli children were less proficient on various aspects of Hebrew language proficiency, and less familiar with aspects of cultural and environmental literacy. Most were also unable to speak or comprehend Amharic. In both groups, phonological awareness explained individual differences in letter naming, but vocabulary and syntactic knowledge added to the explained variance only in the Ethiopian Israeli group. Letter naming was associated with consonant writing in both groups. Hebrew oral and written language proficiency of Ethiopian Israeli mothers was positively correlated with literacy skills in their children. The results underscore the importance of distinguishing between less complex, modularized, aspects of emergent literacy and more complex literacy skills. Here the cumulative effects of poverty, oral home culture, parental inability to mediate language and literacy, and non-optimal conditions for becoming bilingual place young immigrant children at risk for academic failure early on.

What goes around, comes around: rotating credit associations among Ethiopian women in Israel

This article looks at how working-class Ethiopian women, who have migrated to Israel, have sought empowerment and economic control through the establishment of rotating credit associations known as iqqub. In the changing world of Ethiopian Israeli women, iqqub associations and their specific cultural manifestations constitute a highly meaningful experience, whose building-blocks incorporate the financial, the social, the ritualistic, and the symbolic. It is a complex mechanism of tradition and renewal: its existence challenges paternalistic assumptions regarding the status of Ethiopian immigrants vis-à-vis the state and its institutions and the experience of Ethiopian Israeli women specifically. As we shall demonstrate, the iqqub serves as a generative focus for gender relations and the dramatic changes that have affected them. Ethnographic examination of the iqqub and its internal discourse expands our understanding of the dynamics of change among the group's cultural, gender, and power relations.

An analysis of self-concept among Ethiopian immigrant and Israeli-born children and adolescents

This article reports a study comparing self-concept among 114 immigrant children and adolescents of Ethiopian origin in Israel and among 164 native-born Israelis, including an exploration of how age, gender, and first-language proficiency affect various dimensions of this construct. For the younger children (aged 8—9 years), self-concept was found to be higher among the native-born than among children of Ethiopian origin, while for junior high school children (aged 14—15 years), results were reversed. Findings are interpreted and discussed in light of the complex immigration history and the ongoing integration difficulties faced by members of the Ethiopian community, and related to different coping mechanisms adopted by participants at different ages. Ethiopian adolescents appear to cling more to their peer group, compared with younger children who seem to be more affected by the immediate family circle. Gender differences were found mainly regarding physical self-concept, in favor of boys. Self-rates of language proficiency appeared to be associated with several aspects of self-concept. Finally, and given the unique circumstances of the interaction between Ethiopian immigrants and Israeli society, findings emerge as relevant to the context of refugees, for whom the gap with the host culture is often wider than that encountered by voluntary migrants. Several recommendations related to language, family, and intergroup relations are included.

A Lot of Ropes, But No Lion: School Culture and Ethiopian Israeli Students’ Struggle for Identity

A Lot of Ropes, But No Lion: School Culture and Ethiopian Israeli Students’ Struggle for Identity

Women in the Menstruation Huts: Variations in Preserving Purification Customs among Ethiopian Immigrants

This article presents a unique case of activism among women immigrants from Ethiopia to Israel, in their attempt to preserve the custom of the menstruation huts (margam gojos) in their new social reality. In Ethiopia, Jewish women retire to a special remote hut in the village named margam gojo, meaning curse hut, during menstruation. Immigration to Israel brought changes to many aspects of life, including religious ones. Cicurel and Sharaby present the various ways in which women of kessoch (Ethiopian religious leader) families have responded to the Israeli demand that they relinquish their Ethiopian purification customs, from giving up their customs and adopting Jewish ones to building an Israeli version of the margam in their personal backyards. The different practices of the custom in Ethiopia and in Israel indicate a syncretic integration between the Ethiopian culture and Israeli society, which affords a solution to the immigrant's new identity and enables the kessoch's wife to empower herself and her status in Israel.

Fatherhood and Immigration: Perceptions of Israeli Immigrant Fathers from Ethiopia and the Former Soviet Union

Social services in multicultural societies often assist families in cultural transitions. These processes are seen as carrying potential risks and threats for families and children. Studies primarily examine immigration as a complex transition that affects the stability and continuity of family roles. This study focuses on the impact of immigration on the role of fathers. Moving away both from the risk theory of immigration and the deficit theory of fatherhood, this study focuses rather on the systemic barriers and obstacles facing immigrant fathers in their new country and the positive opportunities this change represents for them and their families. The study examines the impact of immigration on fatherhood by comparing Ethiopian and former Soviet Union Israeli immigrant fathers' perceptions of fatherhood in the midst of cultural change.

Visuomotor Organization and Thinking Operations Performance of School-Age Ethiopian, Bedouin, and Mainstream Israeli Children

In this study, the cognitive performance, specifically visuomotor organization and thinking operations, of new immigrant children (Ethiopian) and children from a minority group (Bedouin) was compared to the performance of mainstream Israeli children in two age groups. By assessing the cognitive performance of children from different cultural contexts, a more basic understanding can be gained of the child's ability to perform in school, in daily self-care, and in play/leisure tasks. Furthermore, knowledge of information-processing development that influences occupation in different cultures will advance occupational science. The findings suggest that cultural context as well as schooling have a powerful impact on children's cognitive performance. The findings may have implications for various diverse populations, and therefore it is recommended to study the cognitive performance of school-age children in other populations and to use a dynamic assessment to explore the learning potential of children. It is recommended to develop preventive intervention programs in populations from diverse cultural contexts.