Aviya Kushner is the Forward’s language columnist and the author of Wolf Lamb Bomb and The Grammar of God.
Aviya Kushner
By Aviya Kushner
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Culture Where does the fascist ‘Sieg Heil’ Nazi German salute come from?
Some have traced the German salute origins back to Rome, but the truth is murkier than that
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Culture How a terrific collection of stories managed to escape Lithuania and survive
Chana Blankshteyn's work improbably emerges in a glorious new translation
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Culture Did Franz Kafka predict the COVID-19 pandemic?
And other questions raised by a new collection of the inscrutable author’s aphorisms
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Culture Learning about antisemitism from the people who fought it
A London exhibit at the Wiener Holocaust Library examines the historical context of the world's oldest hatred
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Culture Four reasons why a racist and antisemitic theory has become so dangerous — and why we need to stop it
The Buffalo massacre represents another red-alarm moment that Jews are obligated to confront
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Culture For Israel, an extraordinary summit reveals a path to coexistence
While the world pays more attention to an actor slapping a comedian, something remarkable and long unimaginable is happening in Israel. Four Arab leaders are visiting, representing the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Morocco and Bahrain, along with U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken. And the foreign minister of the United Arab Emirates is sounding like…
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Culture Biden, Putin, Zelenskyy, Penn — and the true nature of obscenity
Let’s talk about what’s obscene. First, consider what President Joe Biden considers “obscene.” “Putin has the gall to say he is “de-Nazifying” Ukraine. This lie isn’t just cynical. It is obscene,” Biden declared in a speech in Warsaw, and later tweeted. How so, one might ask? “President Zelenskyy was democratically elected. He is Jewish —…
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Culture Kyiv or Kiev? Zelensky or Zelenskyy? For Ukraine, spelling is a political act
As tanks advance and homes burn while the Russian invasion of Ukraine intensifies, the spelling of place names may seem like a minor concern. But spelling — and the English transliteration of it — can have tremendous political significance. Spelling can also indicate how credible a news source is, and it can clarify which side…
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