Talya Zax is the Forward’s opinion editor. Contact her at [email protected] or on Twitter, @TalyaZax.
Talya ZaxOpinion Editor
By Talya Zax
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Culture How a Jewish Woman and a Kenyan Man Are Trying To Save the World Together
‘It’s powerful to share a dream together,” Jessica Posner said, holding hands loosely with her husband, Kennedy Odede. The couple are the co-founders of Shining Hope for Communities (SHOFCO). It’s a not-for-profit organization that provides social services in Kibera, Africa’s largest slum. Located in Nairobi, Kibera is home to hundreds of thousands of people, the…
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News Richard Lakin’s Dream of Coexistence Through Education Dies With Him
Richard Lakin lived with a dream to use education to improve lives of both Jews and Palestinians in the Holy Land. The former Connecticut school principal’s dream died with him on Wednesday, October 27 when he succumbed to wounds suffered in a terror stabbing on a Jerusalem bus two weeks earlier. “Dad was a kind,…
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The Schmooze When High Fashion Meets Hasidic Tunes
Last week, audiences at Tel Aviv’s Fashion Week were surprised when Tovale+, a label run by mother and daughter team Tovale and Namma Chasin, “Maaminim.” Ben David, an American Hasidic Jewish singer popular in the Orthodox community, was an unlikely choice for the high-fashion event. The festive tune was a change of pace for the…
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Music The First Ever Chinese-Yiddish Song
While writing her Ph.D. dissertation on Jewish Exile in Shanghai resulting from the Shoah, Yang Meng decided she needed to learn both Yiddish and Hebrew for the sake of her research. A Chinese national already fluent in English and German, once she took on the new languages she found herself fascinated by Yiddish, which she…
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Culture How Geraldine Brooks Was Inspired by King David and Leonard Cohen
I first learned who Geraldine Brooks was when her 2005 novel “March” won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction. My mother had gone to journalism school with Brooks, and the novel was about the absent father in one of her favorite books, Louisa May Alcott’s “Little Women.” Those two connections were enough to make Brooks a…
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Art Where the Characters Are Orthodox and the Themes Are Universal
The first set The Actors Company Theatre uses in its production of Motti Lerner’s “Hard Love” is different from those usually seen in Manhattan’s Beckett Theatre. At first glance, it’s an ordinary kitchen, but a closer look reveals some intriguing features. A shelf mounted above a cabinet holds a tzedakah charity box bracketed by two…
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Culture To Be Young, Poetic and Black — and Jewish
Aaron Samuels started getting hype as a poet as an undergraduate at Washington University in St. Louis. A co-founder of the school’s popular slam poetry team, WUSLAM, his compelling performances and the depth of his investigation into what it meant to be black and Jewish made him stand out. He’s continued to make his name…
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Fast Forward Jamie Zimmerman, ABC Doctor, Dies in Hawaii Accident
Jamie Zimmerman, a doctor and reporter with ABC’s medical unit, died after a freak accident during a Hawaiian vacation. Zimmerman, 31, slipped while crossing the Lumahai River on Kauai and was swept out to sea. Lifeguards and paramedics tried to rescue her but were unsuccessful. “My little girl was always trying to do too much,”…
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