The construction of dual ethnic identity among multi-ethnic adolescents.

This article investigates the relationship between intermarriage and integration among Israeli Jewish adolescents of mixed Middle Eastern and North African (MENA) and European origins, focusing on their ethnic self-identification. It finds that these multi-ethnic adolescents develop a dual ethnic identity comprising a "thin" component, which allows flexible choosing and switching between ethnicities and blurs ethnic boundaries, and a "strong" component, which reinforces an internal experience of two opposing ethnicities and maintains hierarchical distinctions. The study introduces the concept of "ethnicity switching" to describe adolescents’ fluid movement between ethnic identities depending on social context, differing from traditional notions of "passing." The findings suggest that under specific structural and ethno-class conditions in Israel, intermarriage simultaneously facilitates and impedes integration by both weakening and reinforcing ethnic boundaries within the same ethnic group.