Kibbutz children and the question of Jewish identity

Danish Jewish history is neither a unified narrative nor a static dimension. It lives and is created even today. A new generation of Danish Israeli kibbutz children is in the process of forming their identity in a crossroads between two cultures, religions and nationalities.

The Society for Danish Jewish History and the Danish Jewish Museum invites you to a lecture by museum inspector Sara Fredfeldt Stadager and Laura Hoffmann Jensen, BA in Religious Studies and Museology.

It will happen on 19 May at 18:30 in the Blixen hall in Den Sorte Diamant.

The Danish Jewish Museum's collection is large and diverse, but one specific field has so far remained untouched and created a gap in the collection: the new generation of Danish Israeli Jews whose parents met in a kibbutz.

The kibbutz children are now adult children of mixed marriages of Danish women who traveled to kibbutz in Israel from the 1960s to the 1980s. Love arose here, where Danish and often cultured Christian women started families with Jewish Israeli men. Some of these families chose to settle in Denmark.

Back in the spring of 2021, the Danish Jewish Museum began collecting life story interviews and photos from Danish Israeli kibbutz children in their 20s and early 30s. This project has just been resumed with a series of new interviews and collection of photos.

In the meantime, with her bachelor's project on the subject, Laura Hoffmann Jensen has taken the first infant research step towards a greater understanding of modern Jewish identity and more nuances of Jewish diversity in Denmark.