Becoming Un-Orthodox: Stories of Ex-Hasidic Jews Davidman Lynn

Leaving a religion is not merely a matter of losing or rejecting faith. From these conversations emerge accounts of the great fear, angst, and sense of danger that come of leaving a highly bounded enclave community. For many, it involves dramatic changes of everyday routines and personal habits.Davidman bases her analysis on in-depth conversations with forty ex-Hasidic individuals.

Many of those interviewed spoke of feeling marginal in their own communities; of strain in their homes due to death, divorce, or their parents' profound religious differences; experienced sexual, physical, or verbal abuse; or expressed an acute awareness of gender inequality, the dissimilar lives of their secular relatives, and forbidden television shows, movies, websites, and books.Becoming Un-Orthodox draws much-needed attention to the vital role of the body and bodily behavior in