Another family

I chose to interview Adina Anhalt, a childhood friend who was raised by Christian missionaries but converted to Orthodox Judiasm in her early twenties. She is married to her husband, Josef, and has no children.

- Why did you choose this family?-
I chose this family because I couldn't imagine having a life where everything was dictated by a religion where men had to pray everyday "Lord, thank you for not making me a woman." However, I have been interested in learning more about Judaism and Adina seemed really happy with her life. I wanted to know what it was about.

How did your family differ from the family you chose to interview?-
I was raised in a religious household, but it did not dicate everything I did. It did not set me apart from other children, like Adina's religion sets her apart from other people. (She says she gets odd stares in the supermarket for wearing a shawl and long sleeves in the Arkansas summer.) I also did not perceive my family strucutre to be sexist, although I believe that this was a misinterpretation because Judaism empowers women in a lot of ways, and the traditional American family structure disempowers women in a lot of ways. Adina and Josef are in a different financial situation than I was growing up. They are trying hard to scrape by and were forced to move back to Arkansas because Phoenix was so expensive. We were raised in similar financial situations, but their children will probably be less financially stable because Josef's job doesn't pay as well and Adina's religion prevents her from getting a higher education. Also, her family differed from mine in that she sees the Orthodox community as an extention of her family, wheras I felt like I grew up feeling like the nuclear family should be my primary support network.

Was it difficult finding a family different from your own? Why do you think it was difficult?-
Well, we tend to be around people of our same social status, so I guess it was sort of difficult. My first choice of family was a polyamorous couple who live in a commune in Oregon and are raising their children communally. This is about as different from the way I was raised as I can think of, but I could not get a hold of them. Adina and I had similar childhoods, but the family that she has chosen from herself was very different than the one that I have chosen for myself.

What were the obstacles you faced while preparing your interview, conducting the interview, and then writing your paper?-
I wanted to ask difficult questions without probing too much or sounding judgemental. I think that the most difficult question to ask was about how the values she holds now are different from the way she was raised. She did not delve too much in to her family's reaction to her conversion, but answered the question adequitely. Overall, the interview went quite smoothly and was quite comfortable. It was nice to catch up with her.

Sociologists base much of their data collection on interviews just like the one you have conducted. How does this process affect the way you see sociology as a social science? How does it compare/contrast to other sciences?
I got a degree in soc/anthro, and much of my final project in college was interviewing families. This is what I absolutlely love to do, and I was happy to be able to do it again. I believe that this differs from "hard" science in that everything is subjective. I can only comapre Adina's family to my family, there is no absolute "right" model of a family that I had to compare to. However, "hard" sciences are also subject to cultural relativity. People were using Darwin's theory of evolution as an exuse to sterilize minorities not 6o years ago! Sociologists are able to take this atrocious practice and study it within a cultural context to see why people would have believed that and what that means for the state of race today. I believe it is always important to combine what are considered both "hard" and "soft" sciences in order to acheive an optimal answer. Medical anthropology is a good example of this.