Gordon Haber writes about religion and culture in addition to editing the CANVAS Compendium, a newsletter on Jewish arts and culture. He does not live in Brooklyn.
Gordon Haber
By Gordon Haber
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The Schmooze ‘Chasidim on the Fringe’: New Edgy Website
A frum friend recently suggested I take a look at Unpious.com, a website of “news, commentary, and writings by and for Hasidim on the fringe.” The word “fringe,” in this case, is not a reference to tzitzit, but to the type of Hasid who supposedly writes for Unpious—ambivalent and sex-obsessed. The essays on Unpious.com tend…
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Culture Jewlicious: Celebration of Jewish Cool
I’ve just spent my entire weekend at the sixth annual Jewlicious Festival in Long Beach, Calif., and I’m exhausted. Between sundown Friday and Sunday afternoon, I have eaten Jewish food, exercised with a Jewish boxer, laughed at Jewish comics and listened to Jewish music. I have talked about the Jewish past and argued about the…
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Culture Colonies and Conversion
The Unconverted Self: Jews, Indians, and the Identity of Christian Europe By Jonathan Boyarin University of Chicago Press, 208 pages, $32.50. Some years ago, on a lovely fall morning, I was walking across the Columbia University campus when I saw a group of students unfurl a huge banner that announced “Columbus=Hitler.” Since, at the time,…
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Culture God Lives, but Not in Cambridge
36 Arguments for the Existence of God: A Work of Fiction By Rebecca Newberger Goldstein Random House 416 pages, $27.95. Here is an ambitious novel about big ideas — love, sex, religion — that nevertheless faces these issues with irony and humor. A novel sprinkled with Yiddish and Hebrew, and populated mostly by secular Jews…
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Fast Forward Another Partial Success for Jewish Boxing
In recent weeks we’ve had the prospect of watching not one but two undefeated, observant Jewish boxers in title fights. On November 14th in Las Vegas, Yuri Foreman won the WBA super welterweight championship by unanimous decision. Earlier tonight in Newcastle, England, Dimitry Salita fought Amir Khan for the WBA light welterweight belt, with a…
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Life Foreman-Pacquiao???
Will Yuri Foreman fight Manny Pacquaio? A few weeks ago the idea would have seemed ridiculous, but now it seems like it might just happen. Pacquaio’s next fight is supposed to be against Floyd Mayweather, which would put two of the greatest fighters alive together in the ring. But their promoters (Bob Arum of Top…
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Israel News Top Moments in Madoff Pop Culture
Bernard Madoff caused a lot of heartache with his titanic Ponzi scheme. It seems only natural that a scandal of this magnitude would creep into the larger culture. After considerable mental strain, the Forward has dug up some notable examples. Determining their taste, or lack thereof, is up to you. 1. The “Seinfeld” reunion on…
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News Yuri Foreman: Future Rabbi, Present World Champion
Boxing is a sport for immigrants, for tough young men looking to make a living. Which is why it used to be a sport for American Jews. Before World War II, there were a number of superior Jewish fighters, like Benny Leonard, Barney Ross and Maxie Rosenbloom. But these days, the Jews in boxing tend…
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