Ethnisch-religiöse Gruppe
The term ethnoreligious (or ethno-religious) refers to an ethnic group of people whose members are also unified by a common religious background. Ethnoreligious communities define their ethnic identity neither exclusively by ancestral heritage nor simply by religious affiliation, but often through a combination of both.
In an ethnoreligious group, particular emphasis is placed upon religious endogamy, and the concurrent discouragement of interfaith marriages or intercourse, as a means of preserving the stability and historical longevity of the community and culture. This adherence to religious endogamy can also, in some instances, be tied to ethnic nationalism if the ethnoreligious group possesses a historical base in a specific region.
Ethnoreligious groups
Jews
The Jews are today perhaps the largest and most familiar ethnoreligious community. Ascertaining and defining membership in the Jewish people (the question of "who is a Jew") involves both a traditional religious component and an ethnic one.
Other groups
Other ethnoreligious communities which combine ethnic identity with religious belonging include
- Amish
- 'Alawi
- Assyrians
- Bosniaks (Islam)
- Chaldean Christians
- Copts
- Croats
- East Indians and various other groups in the Indian union.
- Goan Catholics
- Mandaeans
- Mangalorean Catholics of Karnataka
- Malaysian Malay
- Maronites
- Mennonite
- Parsis
- Samaritans
- Serbs (Orthodox Christianity)
- Sikhs (more often seen as an ethnic group in diaspora)
- Syrian Malabar Nasranis
- Yazidi (more often considered a religious minority within the religiously-diverse Kurdish ethnicity)