Jews and Arabs in Israel Encountering Their Identities
Transformations in Dialogue
By (author) Maya Kahanoff
Publication date:
13 April 2016Length of book:
280 pagesPublisher
Lexington BooksISBN-13: 9781498504973
Jews and Arabs in Israel Encountering their Identities reveals the powerful potential of inter-group dialogues to transform identities and mutually negating relations. Using meetings with Israeli Jewish and Palestinian Arabian students who attend the Hebrew University of Jerusalem as case studies, Kahanoff examines the hidden psychological dimensions of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and illustrates how each participant’s sense of identity shifted in response to encounters with conflicting perspectives. Kahanoff contends that an awareness of the limitations of dialogue, without the renunciation of its value, is the most realistic basis upon which to build a sustainable agreement. This book is recommended for scholars of psychology, sociology, religious studies, political science, and communication studies.
Maya Kahanoff's Jews and Arabs in Israel Encountering Their Identities is a milestone in ethnic and sectarian conflict analysis for two major reasons. First, Kahanoff is the rare scholar who skillfully uses depth psychology to explain the complexities of identity formation in the context of historical experience. Second, she presents the Israeli Arabs and Jews in their own words to make her case persuasively.