Jenna Weissman Joselit, the Charles E. Smith Professor of Judaic Studies and Professor of History at the George Washington University, is a distinguished historian of the American Jewish experience and a former columnist for the Forward.
Jenna Weissman Joselit
By Jenna Weissman Joselit
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Culture Of Boy Cantors and Little Jewesses
With graduation upon us, ’tis the season to think about lofty matters, about responsibility and duty and legacy and heritage. In that connection, consider, for instance, the transmission of Jewish culture from one generation to the next, a task that has bedeviled the Jewish community for centuries now. The Jews of a much earlier time…
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Culture A Manifesto for the Seventh Day
The millennial institution of the Sabbath is currently experiencing something of a renaissance — or, at the very least, it’s the object of heightened attention — and not just within traditional Jewish circles. Judith Shulevitz’s recent book, “The Sabbath World” (Random House), a richly textured interrogation of its meaning and history, has made the rounds…
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Culture Cultivating Our Gardens, Ourselves
In a country where Johnny Appleseed is a foundational character — a wellspring of national virtue — it should come as no surprise that Americans set much store by gardening. These days, tending to a private or a community garden is all the rage, as are books about gardening, which thrive on the shelves of…
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Culture Jews and Animals, A Very Modern Story
I’m not a big one for animals. I never had a pet when I was growing up, not even a goldfish or a turtle, let alone a dog or a cat. But thoughts of these creatures now fill my head. It’s not that I want one — I don’t — but that I’ve come belatedly…
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Culture Failing in the Golden Land
Recently, Philadelphia’s National Museum of American Jewish History announced the creation of a Jewish Hall of Fame, inviting nominations from the public at large. Not surprisingly, those who received the nod and will eventually inhabit this hallowed roster of notables consist of the usual suspects: Irving Berlin and Barbra Streisand, Louis Brandeis and Albert Einstein….
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Culture The Jewish Value of Understatement
Modesty and diffidence are not qualities usually associated with American Jewry. In the clothes we wear, the homes we inhabit and, most especially, the synagogues we build, American Jews live large. An artifact of hard-won affluence and an outgrowth of a fiercely guarded sense of belonging, our predilection for conspicuousness happens all the same to…
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Culture The Miracle of Hanukkah Songs
When it comes to singing the praises of Hanukkah, Adam Sandler’s “The Hanukkah Song” has become a contemporary classic, yet his is hardly the first — nor, I suspect, the last — musical expression of affection and appreciation for the ancient holiday and its Maccabean heroes. “So drink your gin-and-tonic-ah, and smoke your mara-juanic-ah,/If you…
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Culture EnviroJews Avant La Lettre
When it comes to talk of sustainable agriculture and eco-Judaism, the history of American Jewry’s attempts to create an equally sustainable class of Jewish “agriculturists” has gotten lost in the shuffle. That’s a shame, because the story of how largely urban immigrants from Eastern Europe found themselves harvesting beans and cultivating chickens is a whopping…
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