Religious, national or cultural? A case study of frameworks for Jewish education in post-Soviet Central Asia

ABSTRACT

In post-Soviet Central Asia, Jewish educational frameworks were shaped by unique forces introduced by various Jewish organizations. This article describes and explains the unique formation of Jewish education in post-Soviet Central Asian republics, how it was revived and which organizations shaped it. The article presents and analyses various educational initiatives introduced by Jewish organizations and educational frameworks: formal and informal, local and foreign, state and privately sponsored, religious and civic–national. It claims that all were unique.

KEYWORDS:

• Jewish education
• Bukharan Jews
• Ashkenazi Jews
• JDC (Joint)
• JAFI (Sokhnut)
• Chabad Lubavitch
• religion

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.