Barriers To Belonging Analysis

Barriers to Belonging can be small and affect families as shown through Andrew Denton’s sense of

Belonging within the Jewish community that is impeded by the barriers created by his own father.

Andrew Denton, despite having a long line of deep-seated religious ancestry, has a minimal

understanding of his Jewish heritage as he grew up in a secular household. Denton states that “there

was no religious tradition in our house most particularly because my father [Kit Denton] was a

strong atheist.” Denton discovers from a letter the great disappointment and tension that his

grandfather (Harry Denton) possessed due to his son’s decision to marry a Catholic woman and

therefore abandon his Jewish religion. Kit’s choice of not belonging and staying “outside the faith”

Also

Kit’s decision of raising his children in a non-religious household effectively created a barrier within

further generations and affect Denton’s place in the Jewish line as connections to the culture and

religion was not enforced nor encouraged in his upbringing. Therefore, small barriers formed by

Denton’s father had affected his own sense of Belonging within the Jewish community and family.

The idea of large barriers to Belonging affecting entire peoples is supported by Andrew Denton’s

family connection to the larger world. During the 1930s, Fascism and Anti-Semitic ideology