Language In Israel Research Articles

The Impact of Ethnic Identity on Language Attitudes

ABSTRACT Few studies have explored the relationship between ethnic identity and language attitudes in heritage language speakers. Via self-reported questionnaire data, the present study examined correlational and causal connections between ethnic identity and language attitudes in three generations of Israeli and American Mountain Jews. Native to the eastern Caucasus, Mountain Jews immigrated in the 1990s to Israel and the United States, bringing with them two heritage languages, Juhuri and Russian. The effect of ethnic identity on language attitudes emerged as strong for both Juhuri and Russian, but varied across countries, generations, languages, and types of attitudes. Strong correlations between ethnic identity and language attitudes were found for both heritage languages in Israel, but in the United States the connection between Russian and Mountain Jewish identity was lost across generations. Results are discussed in terms of previous research on heritage languages, identity and attitudes, and highlight the revival of ethnic identity among second-generation immigrants.

Noticing and metalinguistic awareness in the L2 writing process: A translation-based writing task for L1 Arabic speakers preparing to teach Hebrew as a second language

This study explores aspects of noticing and metalinguistic awareness in L2 writing via a translation-based writing task that involved L2 output followed by translation to the L1 and then reverse translation back to the L2. We designed an innovative writing task that included translation, informal contrastive analysis, and learners’ evolving interlanguage. We administered the task to 37, L1 Arabic speakers who were preparing to become teachers of Hebrew as a Second Language in Israel. We present what participants reported as salient during three stages of the task: (1) after producing written output in Hebrew (L2) and then translating the text into Arabic (L1); (2) after reverse translating the text from Arabic back to Hebrew (L1 to L2); and (3) after completing the writing task and orally debriefing as a group. Content and thematic analysis of participants’ collected reflections revealed four areas of linguistic saliency: (1) vocabulary and semantics; (2) syntax and structure; (3) content; and (4) pragmatics. Findings suggest translation-based writing tasks raise metacognitive awareness around these four components of L2 writing. Implications for L2 classroom writing pedagogy will be discussed.

Assessing change in syntactic features of Hebrew written by native Arabic speakers: a longitudinal study

Much of the theorization in Second Language Acquisition is based on findings in unrelated language dyads, with English as L1 or L2. We focus on two closely related languages, Hebrew and Arabic. Hebrew is the majority language in Israel, taught in Arab minority schools mostly by L1 Arabic-speaking teachers. We explore the persistence of very common syntactic errors in Hebrew of Arab high-school students, and the correlation between persistence, interference and developmental errors. From a longitudinal corpus of Hebrew essays written by 22 Arab 11th graders, and a year later in 12th grade, the six most frequent syntactic error categories were isolated. Statistical analysis showed interference to be involved in the vast majority of the errors that also persisted most, whereas almost all the improvement over the year was in developmental errors with no interference. This contradicts a common claim that interference, initially predominant, decreases over time with relation to developmental errors. We found prepositions to be particularly problematic, especially in errors involving interference, but these were no more persistent than others. We conclude that more research on syntactic interference in the acquisition of closely related languages would benefit SLA theory, as our findings differ from many typically attested patterns.

Minority Languages in Academia: The Arabic Language in the Israeli Academy

ABSTRACT Although they constitute twenty percent of Israel’s citizens, Arabs have no significant opportunity to study their own language in Israel’s academic institutions. Academic courses are conducted in Hebrew, the official language of the country. This has implications for the Arab students’ academic achievement as well as for their sense of belonging on Israeli campuses. In the framework of a graduate program on exclusion, the Academic College of Education has recently introduced two courses in Arabic—a revolutionary experiment in the Israeli academic world. Based on interviews with twenty Arab students who participated in these courses, the research presented here demonstrates how these courses not only enhance the students’ self-expression, participation, and self-confidence in the classroom; they also send a message to the Arab students that the college sees them and acknowledges their identity. The study has implications for the growing multi-cultural reality of academic institutions elsewhere in the world.

Palestinian kindergarten teachers in Israel and Arabic education policy

AbstractThis study aims to explore language education policy among Palestinian Arab kindergarten teachers in Israel, employing the framework of language policy proposed bySpolsky (2009), based on three major components: language practices, language ideologies, and language management. A mixed-method research approach consisting of both quantitative and qualitative methods of data collection is employed. A questionnaire was completed by a total of 509 kindergarten teachers. In addition, a semi-structured interview was carried out with 12 kindergarten teachers, selected from among those who answered the questionnaire, in order to gain a deeper understanding about Arabic language education policy. The data revealed that Palestinian Arab kindergarten teachers in Israel mostly use a mixture of Standard Arabic (StA) and Spoken Arabic (SpA) as the medium of instruction, using Hebrew or foreign words only sparingly. They express positive attitudes towards Arabic’s role as an important language in Israel. They also show positive attitudes about StA, believing that it is necessary to master it, yet facing difficulties while using it when speaking with the children. Regarding language management, they conduct activities that help develop StA skills, both for themselves and their students. Finally, there are significant interrelations between the kindergarten teachers’ background variables (religion, type of city they live in, seniority, education, and district) and language practice, ideology, and management. Based on these findings, it is important to construct a clearly-defined StA educational policy in Arab kindergartens.

Translation for Israeli television: the reflection of a hybrid identity

Broadcasting in today ’s world is characterized by the tensions between competing entities, including the nation-state, the agents of globalization as well as national and other minorities. This article sets out to describe these tensions as manifested in translation for Israeli TV, focusing on the relations between Hebrew – the main and most ideologically protected language of Israel – and two minority languages, Arabic and Russian. The latter represent groups that are similar in size but differ greatly in that only the former seeks acknowledgement as a national minority.

Perceptions of identity, language abilities and language preferences among Russian-Hebrew and English-Hebrew bilingual children and their parents

ABSTRACT Israel’s population includes over a million Russian-speaking immigrants and more than 300,000 native English speakers. These groups differ in social integration and in the status of their heritage languages in Israel. We compared children’s and parents’ perceptions of children’s identities, language abilities, and language preferences among Russian-Hebrew and English-Hebrew bilinguals via sociolinguistic questionnaires. Forty-six Russian-Hebrew (RH) and 15 English-Hebrew (EH) bilingual children and their parents participated. Analyses addressed inter-generational (children vs. parents) and inter-group (RH vs. EH) differences. Identity ratings revealed both child–parent and group differences. Identity. RH parents and children differed regarding perceived Home and Societal identities. EH children and parents agreed about Home identity but not about Israeli identity. RH parents gave higher ratings to their children’s HL/Russian abilities than their children did, while EH parents and children both rated HL abilities as higher than Societal language abilities. Both RH and EH parents expressed greater preferences for the SL/Hebrew than their children, but parents’ and children’s ratings of preferences for the Home language differed for the two groups. Examining relations among perceived identity, language abilities, and preferences in children and their parents, the study sheds light on the children’s patterns of socialisation, acculturation, and maintenance of home language identity.

The Nation State Law and the Arabic Language in Israel: Downgrading, Replicating or Upgrading?

Article 4 of the Nation State Law (NSL), entitled ‘Languages’, stipulates that Hebrew is the language of the state (Article 4(a)); the Arabic language has a special status in the state and regulating the use of Arabic in or by state institutions will be set in law (Article 4(b)); and this clause does not harm the status given to the Arabic language before the law came into effect (Article 4(c), the ‘validity of laws’ clause). The question is whether, how, and to what extent these provisions hinder the present legal status of the Arabic language in Israel. The legal status of Arabic had never been determined decisively before enactment of the NSL. The High Court of Israel has always been divided on this matter, particularly between judges who perceived Arabic as an official language and judges who deemed it solely as having been granted its acknowledged ‘special legal status’. Furthermore, the judges who perceived Arabic as an official language of the state were also in dispute among themselves as to the meaning, the scope and the consequences of such recognition. Considering these circumstances, my view is that the NSL perpetuates the legal status of Arabic as prescribed in the laws and case law that already existed, and that the validity of laws clause, coupled with the special status granted to Arabic in a basic law, suggests that the door is still open for the Court to further endorse the legal status of Arabic in Israel.

Willingness and concerns of transfusion-dependent hematological patients toward the option of home transfusion therapy

Background: One of the main obstacles of providing home-based palliative care to transfusion-dependent hematology patients is the lack of home transfusions services. While healthcare professionals are concerned with safety and cost of home transfusions, the attitude of the patients toward home transfusions are mostly unknown. Aim: To obtain quantitative data regarding the willingness and concerns of transfusion-dependent patients with hematological diseases toward the option of home transfusions. Design: A cross sectional survey including a self-administered questionnaire in one of the three main spoken languages in Israel was administered to patients in 17 hospital hematology outpatient clinics between May 2019 and March 2020. Results: About 52% of 385 patients that participated in the survey preferred home transfusions to hospital transfusions. Gender, age, education, or type of disease were not associated with preference for home transfusions, nor were hospital location or its size. The likelihood to prefer home transfusions was significantly higher among the Hebrew-speakers and those who had not experienced adverse effects previously. The most significant factor associated with preference of home transfusions was a perceived negative effect of hospital-based transfusion on quality of life. The main reason to reject home transfusions was fear of possible adverse effects and concerns over losing contact with the medical staff at the treating hospital. Conclusion: These data suggest that a significant portion of transfusion-dependent patients in Israel view home transfusions as a preferred treatment option and that its successful implementation requires maintaining ongoing contact with the treating hospital.

A Language for Israel: The Role of Translation in Building the Resources of Hebrew

Contrary to common misperceptions, translation is not merely a subsidiary or secondary art but is a critical, productive, and generative process. At key moments in history, translation has helped to strengthen languages, build national literatures, and construct national identities. The case of Hebrew provides a unique example of an ancient sacred language that has evolved into a modern and functional one, now the primary official language of Israel. This article provides an overview of translational activity in Israel, with a focus on the profound impact that translation has had on the development of the Hebrew language. Translations of foreign literature served to nourish an emerging Hebrew literature, diversify its repertoire, and build the resources of the language itself. Translation was even viewed as an integral part of nation building, as illustrated by the vision and personal involvement of Israel’s first Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion, which culminated in a program of translating world masterpieces to create an “Intellectual State” in addition to the new political one.

ON THE ARABIC IN ISRAEL

In this article an attempt is made to shed light on the unique status of the Arabic
 language, both spoken and written, in Israel. Arabic is de jure the second official language in the State of Israel, but de facto it is marginal. By 1948 Hebrew had become in fact the only official and dominant language in Israel. In the 1950s all the Jewish attempts to persuade the Arabs in Israel to write their literature in Hebrew, to learn only Hebrew or to write Arabic in Hebrew characters failed. In the summer of 2008 right-wing Jewish members of the Knesset also failed to strip Arabic of its status as an official language.

On rights, ruins and returns: Rachel Tzvia Back’s Israeli anglophone lyric palimpsest

ABSTRACTWritten at the height of the Second Intifada, Israeli anglophone poet Rachel Tzvia Back’s On Ruins & Return uncovers the politics of Palestinian indigeneity and the material realities of occupation. Back evokes the near-extinct buffalo and crafts a “lyric palimpsest” to draw a line between settler colonialism in North America and Israel–Palestine. This article offers an overview of the understudied field of Israeli anglophone literature and its affinity to postcolonial and global anglophone discourses through an examination of Back’s transnational mobility, the role of English as a colonial-turned-global language in Israel–Palestine, the architectural legacy of British colonialism in Jerusalem, and anti-colonial resistance. The article analyses Back’s postcolonial lyric palimpsest in terms of its form, theme, authorial voice and audience, and argues that English-language writing challenges Israeli nationalism, while simultaneously underscoring the ongoing repercussions of colonialism.

Russian-speaking community of the State of Israel

The subject of the study are the features of the Russian-speaking community of the State of Israel. The author examines such aspects of the topic as: the nature of the community ties that are formed among the Russian-speaking Israelis and the status of the Russian language in Israel. An attention is also paid to the factors that contributed to the formation of a unique identity of the representatives of the «Russian Israel», to the main stages of the evolution of the Russian-speaking community in the political life of Israel and to the formation of the Russian media space. The Russian-speaking community is rightfully regarded as a long-term phenomenon, which is currently an important player in the political arena of the country. The novelty of the study is the implementation of a comprehensive analysis of the phenomenon of the «Russian Israel» on the basis of original sources. The main conclusion of the study: the territorial localization, the preservation of the cultural environment of the country of origin, the special status of the Russian language in Israel and its place in the media space, the maintenance of the community symbols of different nature, the program of socio-political development became the factors of the unification of the Russian-speaking community of Israel.

The Arabic Language in Israel: official language, mother tongue, foreign language. Teaching, dissemination and competence

It is interesting for our discourse to focus on Israel, and observe in the same country three realities usually found in two or more different countries. In Israel, the Arabic language is legally admitted as an official language, ; is the target language for the Arab schools; it is spoken by Arabic speakers; in theory, we expect to find it as a foreign language in the curricula of Jewish schools. Effectively the Arabic language in Israel is: -legally admitted as an official language; -the target language of Arab schools; -widely and informally spoken by Arabic native speakers; -in theory, offered by the curricula of Jewish schools. Israel, where Arabic is both mother tongue and foreign language, has not yet decided how to spread and master the competence of this key-language, nor has set clear criteria for the crucial choice between standard or spoken Arabic. A research carried out by Ibrahim and Peretz (Ibrahim, Peretz 2005) was based on the triangulation standard Arabic- spoken Arabic – Hebrew. With reference to the vehicle of transferring for meanings, it was observed that spoken Arabic works better and faster than standard Arabic and Hebrew, during the processing of input. All this proves the need to intentionally teach colloquial Arabic and assign to it priority for being ‘the language in use‘, which detains a strongest communicative power. The Israeli education system remains based on the acquisition of skills in standard Arabic only. It is proved that standard Arabic it is not enough for developing the necessary competence in our students, in Israel as well as in Europe.

THE PROBLEM OF EDUCATIONAL SPREAD’S FORMATION AND DEVELOPMENT IN THE MIDDLE EAST COUNTRIES (CASE STUDY OF ISRAEL)

The present article investigates a very specific language situation, language policy and its implementation in the educational process in Israel, that is a country in the Middle East where there is a whole palette of languages (over 32 languages) and cultures. The authors carried out a thorough analysis of the development and domination of the todays’leading languages in Israel (Hebrew, Arabic, English), dwelled upom historical factors that had influenced and shaped language dynamics in the country. The current research based on and supported by other similar reseaches in this area presents a unique case study of a dying language (Hebrew) revilatisation in the XXI c. as well as the domination of English, Arabic in the region, which in their place have pushed other existing languages (Ladino, Yiddish) to the edge of their extinction. The current research argues that such a ‘language mosaic’ is not specifically driven by any pre-planned by the state language policy, but is a reflection of extra-linguistic factors which shape the objective reality in Israel. Keywords: Language policy, language situation, Israel, Hebrew, Arabic

‘Everything comes with a price … ’; family language policy in Israeli Arab families in mixed cities

ABSTRACTThe state of Israel has an indigenous minority of Arabs, distinguished from the Jewish majority by national, religious, cultural, and linguistic characteristics. Most Jews use Hebrew as their L1, while Arabs use Arabic, both official languages in Israel. Most Arabs tend to live in separate geographical areas and about 10% of Israel’s Arabs live in ‘mixed cities.’ Since neither side defines them as homogeneous, these cities may afford rich insights about Israeli reality. Recently, there has been a growing tendency among Arab parents in mixed cities to send their children to Hebrew-speaking educational settings, especially in preschool years. This study aimed at understanding this phenomenon from both sociolinguistic and psychological perspectives, viewing language as closely related to power and identity as well as to emotions and close relationships. Qualitative information was gathered from interviews with parents, focusing on parents’ motives to send their children to these educational settings and on the impact of this decision on the family’s language policy and emotional interactions. Overall, findings reveal how the external urban setting interacts with the internal family system. The mixed city context appears to invade the family dynamics in mixed ways, and sociopolitical dimensions interact closely with emotional ones.

The problem of Christian identities in Ephesians

The article examines the impact of the work of Nils Alstrup Dahl on contemporary New Testament scholarship about early Christian identities. The focus is specifically on the many complex questions related to identity in Ephesians, which include the nature of the document itself. The article draws upon a social constructionist approach in analysing the text, with a particular interest in the use of the language of Israel, emphasis on concepts of citizenship, and concentration upon the household and family life.

Iconicity of the Psalms

The article contributes to a better understanding of the imagery of the Psalms. A first part outlines the key concept of linguistic and non-linguistic symbols (following a suggestion from P. Ricoeur, C. Geertz, and the concept of, image fields by D. Peil). In order to interprete pictorial language in Israel's prayers one should not focus only on inventive metaphors but on the ongoing variation of conventional cultural (often cultic) symbols. The second part of the article shows the significance of the approach and elaborates in more detail on basic elements of the pictorial world of the Psalms, thereby using linguistic analysis as well as comparism with Ancient Near Eastern iconography (correspondence of cosmic and social sphere, temple and world, divine throne sphere as a fixed image field, images of life and abundance, the counter sphere of death). Some hermeneutical reflections on the role of the Psalter's mental images for the response of modern readers conclude the article.

An immigrant language in a multilingual state: status and group competition (Russian in Israel)

This paper explores changes in the status and function of the Russian language in Israel since the 1989 when mass immigration from the former Soviet Union began. Due to a more tolerant attitude to multilingualism and the necessity to accommodate various needs of newcomers, Israeli establishment did not prevent the growing use of Russian in the public sphere. Relying on the monitoring of Russian–Israeli internet sites and participant observation, this paper analyses controversies in Israel's language policy and tensions accompanying the presence of the Russian language on the political arena, in education and in the workplace.

Acculturative Experiences of the English-Speaking Immigrants and Repatriates in Israel

This study focused on the attitudes, motivations, and experiences of the immigrants and repatriates from English speaking countries in Israel (n=232). Based on the welcoming national policy of ingathering of repatriates and the high regard for English language in Israel we predicted high motivational intensity in Hebrew language knowledge, English language maintenance and transmission to future generations, low anxiety levels in Hebrew language use, positive attitudes toward Israel and Israelis, and overall positive attitudes toward life in Israel. Our study supported these predictions and is based on the Acculturation Model and Interactive Acculturation Model (Berry, 1980, 1990, 1991, 1997; Bourhis et al., 1997), Common Ingroup Identity Model (Gaertner & Dovidio, 2000), Similarity-Attraction Hypotesis (Byrne, 1971). Our findings point to a possible link between linguistic appreciation and healthier acculturation climate for both groups involved: the host and the immigrant. Educating the host community about the language of the immigrant may foster more inviting attitudes in the host community and in return support the integrative acculturative process of the incomers.