Edith Bruder is a French ethnologist who has specialized in the study of African Judaism and religious diasporas, new religious movements, and marginal religious societies. She is a research associate at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London; [1] a research associate at the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS); and a research fellow at the Faculty of Theology's School of Biblical Studies and Ancient Languages, North-West University, South Africa.
She is president and founder of the International Society for the Study of African Jewry – ISSAJ. [2] She is also involved in the development of research in philanthropy in Europe in collaboration with the Center for Research in Philanthropy (CerPhi) in Paris, France and the European Network on Philanthropy (ERNOP). [3]
Bruder lives in Paris, where she received her education. She holds a Ph. D. in Ethnology and History from SOAS, a DESS in Clinical Psychology from Paris Diderot University, and a DEA in Art History from Pantheon-Sorbonne University.
Bruder's most significant publication, The Black Jews of Africa – History, Identity, Religion (2008), was based on extensive field work. It was the first such work to provide scientific data and a reference list that deals comprehensively with the issue of Judaism in western, central, eastern and southern Africa.[ citation needed ]
Bruder examines the trend towards Judaism in Africa at large, and explores the interdisciplinary concepts of "metaphorical diaspora," global and transnational identities, and colonization.
Bruder is a co-author of a documentary Black Jews: Juifs Noirs d’Afrique (work in progress) widely drawn from her fieldwork, with Laurence Gavron as filmmaker (Schuch Productions).
Bruder is co-editor of African Zion: Studies in Black Judaism which is an examination of Black Judaism in Africa, the United States and India.
African Jewish communities include:
Jewish identity is the objective or subjective sense of perceiving oneself as a Jew and as relating to being Jewish. It encompasses elements of nationhood, ethnicity, religion, and culture. Broadly defined, Jewish identity does not rely on whether one is recognized as Jewish by others or by external religious, legal, or sociological standards. Jewish identity does not need to imply religious orthodoxy. Accordingly, Jewish identity can be ethnic or cultural in nature. Jewish identity can involve ties to the Jewish community.
The history of Jews in Algeria goes back to Antiquity, although it is not possible to trace with any certainty the time and circumstances of the arrival of the first Jews in what is now Algeria. In any case, several waves of immigration helped to increase the population. There may have been Jews in Carthage and present-day Algeria before the Roman conquest, but the development of Jewish communities is linked to the Roman presence. Jewish revolts in Israel and Cyrenaica in the 1st and 2nd centuries certainly led to the arrival of Jewish immigrants from these regions. The vast majority of scholarly sources reject the notion that there were any large-scale conversions of Berbers to Judaism.
The history of the Jews in Tunisia extends nearly two thousand years to the Punic era. The Jewish community in Tunisia grew following successive waves of immigration and proselytism before its development was hampered in late antiquity by anti-Jewish measures in the Byzantine Empire. After the Muslim conquest of Tunisia, Tunisian Jews experienced periods of relative freedom or even cultural apogee to times of more marked discrimination; under Muslim rule, Jews were granted legal status as dhimmi, which legally assured protections of life, property, and freedom of religion, while demanding an increased tax burden. The community developed its own dialect of Arabic, although the use of Judeo-Tunisian Arabic has decreased due to relocation from Tunisia. The arrival of Jews expelled from the Iberian Peninsula, often through Livorno, greatly influenced the community's composition, inter-group relations, and customs.
Shmuel Trigano is a sociologist, philosopher, professor emeritus of sociology at Paris Nanterre University. He was Tikvah Fund Visiting Professor in Jewish Law and Thought at Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, New York (2009), and Templeton Fellow at the Herzl Institute (Jerusalem) program "Philosophy of the Tanakh, Midrash and Talmud" (2012-2013), (2015-2017). Elia Benamozegh European Chair of Sephardic Studies, Livorno, Italy (2002).
Tudor Parfitt is a British historian, writer, broadcaster, traveller and adventurer. He specialises in the study of Jewish communities and Judaising communities around the world, particularly in Africa, Asia and the Americas and the development of issues about the construction of race.
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Isaiah Gafni is a historian of Judaism in the Second Temple and Talmudic periods. He is the Sol Rosenbloom Chair of Jewish History at Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and president of Shalem College in Jerusalem.
The history of the Jews in Haiti stretches from the beginning of the European settlement until the modern day.
Meshuchrarim, also known historically as the "Black Jews", are a Jewish community of freed slaves, often of mixed-race African-European descent, who accompanied Sephardic Jews in their immigration to India following the 16th-century expulsion from Spain. The Sephardic Jews became known as the Paradesi Jews.
The Jews, or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites of ancient Israel and Judah and traditionally adhering to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, religion, and community are highly interrelated, as Judaism is their ethnic religion, though it is not practiced by all ethnic Jews. Despite this, religious Jews regard converts to Judaism as members of the Jewish nation, pursuant to the long-standing conversion process.
Katya Gibel Mevorach is Professor of Anthropology and American Studies at Grinnell College. Under the name Katya Gibel Azoulay, she is author of an explication and theory of identities, Black, Jewish and Interracial: It's Not the Color of Your Skin but the Race of Your Kin, and Other Myths of Identity.
Uncertain accounts of Jews in Madagascar go back to the earliest ethnographic descriptions of the island, from the mid-17th century. Madagascar has a small Jewish population, including normative adherents as well as Judaic mystics, but the island has not historically been a significant center for Jewish settlement. Despite this, an enduring origin myth across Malagasy ethnic groups suggests that the island's inhabitants descended from ancient Jews, and thus that the modern Malagasy and Jewish peoples share a racial affinity. This belief, termed the "Malagasy secret", is so widespread that some Malagasy refer to the island's people as the Diaspora Jiosy Gasy. As a result, Jewish symbols, paraphernalia, and teachings have been integrated into the syncretic religious practices of some Malagasy populations. Similar notions of Madagascar's supposed Israelite roots persisted in European chronicles of the island until the early 20th century, and may have influenced a Nazi plan to relocate Europe's Jews to Madagascar. More recently, the possibility of Portuguese Jewish conversos making contact with Madagascar in the 15th century has been proposed.
This timeline of anti-Zionism chronicles the history of anti-Zionism, including events in the history of anti-Zionist thought.
The sociology of Jewry involves the application of sociological theory and method to the study of the Jewish people and the Jewish religion. Sociologists are concerned with the social patterns within Jewish groups and communities; American Jewry, Israeli Jews and Jewish life in the diaspora. Sociological studies of the Jewish religion include religious membership, ritual and denominational patterns. Notable journals include Jewish Social Studies, The Jewish Journal of Sociology and Contemporary Jewry.
Karima Dirèche is a French Algerian historian specialising in the contemporary history of the Maghreb. From September 2013 to August 2017, she has been the director of the Institute for Research on the Contemporary Maghreb in Tunis.
Esther Benbassa-Dudonney is a Turkish-Israeli-French historian and politician. She specializes in the history of Jews and other minorities. Between 2011 and 2023, Benbassa served as a French senator, representing Paris (2017–2023) and Val-de-Marne (2011–2017).
Black Judaism is variation of Judaism that is practiced by communities of African descent, both within Africa and within the African diaspora, including North America, Europe, Israel, and elsewhere. Significant examples of Black Judaism include Judaism as it is practiced by Ethiopian Jews and African-American Jews. As the Israelites and modern Jews originate from the Levant, these practices stem from the conversion and imitation of Jewish community traditions. Jews who may be considered Black have existed for millennia, with Zipporah sometimes considered to be one of the first Black Jews who was mentioned within Jewish history.
Doris Bensimon was an Austrian-born French sociologist and academic whose research focused on the study of contemporary Judaism. She taught at the University of Caen and Institut national des langues et civilisations orientales (INALCO).
Jean-Christophe Attias is a French Jewish historian and scholar.
Bruder's works have been reviewed by various commentators: