Welcome to the Forward’s coverage of Jewish culture. Here, you’ll learn about the latest (and sometimes earliest) in Jewish art, music, film, theater, books as well as the secret Jewish history of everything and everyone from The Rolling Stones to…
Culture
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I have seen the future of America — in a pastrami sandwich in Queens
San Wei, which serves pastrami sandwiches along with churros and biang biang noodles, represents an immigrant's fulfillment of the American dream
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How the French Put the Olé Into Idiolect
[ ![][2]][2] ‘Who put the condom in condominium?” asks avid reader Hugo Hefnerovich: more as an accusation than as a question. Despite the tone, the inquiry is worthy of further investigation, since the French inventor of the sheep gut prophylactic was a descendant of Rashi who had fled south from Troyes to the eponymous town…
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Natalie Portman’s Guide to Motherhood and Parenting
[ ![][2]][2] Dear Natalie, I’m 7 months pregnant, and I’m already exhausted! I can’t imagine how I’m going to manage when the baby is actually born. Any tips for dealing with the fatigue of being an expectant mother? WORN OUT IN WASHINGTON Dear Worn Out, I hear you! The late months of pregnancy can be…
The Latest
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You Have Beards? We Have Beards!
[ ![][2]][2] LONDON — As excitement mounts for April’s upcoming International Facial Hair Festival in Götterdämmerung, Germany, organizers were delighted to announce a détente between the strong Pan-Muslim team, “Wahhabi Warriors,” and the much-fancied “Israel Right or Wrong” team. Brokered by Billy Gibbons, the lead singer of rock group ZZ Top, the groundbreaking deal will…
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Commission Calls For Immediate ‘Chaiflation’
[ ![][2]][2] A joint commission of Israeli and Jewish communal leaders is urging that the numerical translation of the word “chai,” long associated with good luck, be changed from 18 to 25 as a form of economic stimulus. “We believe that by embarking on this policy of quantitative expansion, the Jewish community can jump-start the…
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Glenn Beck Embraces His Yiddishkeit With Open Arms
[ ![][2]][2] Following the recent revelations that Glenn Beck (born Beckershteyn) shares the Jewish genetic marker, the Cohen Modal haplotype, he has been brushing up on his Yiddish and planning his holidays. Later this year he will be making the pilgrimage to Uman, and in his backpack will be an early draft of Eric Yoffie’s…
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A Partial Retraction
[ ![][2]][2] This paper prides itself on its editorial independence and its willingness to speak the truth, however unpopular. But after due consideration, we at the Backward have concluded that some elements of last week’s editorial, “You Asked For It,” do not stand up to scrutiny: • Not withstanding the stale cookies at the oneg…
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Books Moacyr Scliar, 73, Storyteller of Jewish Latin America
The death of Brazilian fabulist Moacyr Scliar, at the age of 73, on February 27, in his native Porto Alegre, represents the loss of Latin America’s most popular Jewish writer of his generation, and the most influential. Scliar engaged a large audience, at home and abroad, reflecting on crucial issues that define modernity: the place…
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March 18, 2011
100 Years Ago in the forward The Philadelphia Jewish community is up in arms since Rabbi Landman of Temple Knesset Israel gave a sermon in which he said that all Russian Jews are swindlers, fakers, liars, crooks, conspirators, thieves, robbers and murderers. It would be one thing if a Christian or a convert had cast…
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Mamash Not the Queen’s English
I’ve received a number of responses from readers to my March 4 column on “Yeshivish,” two of which I’ll share with you today. One is scholarly, the other is comic, but what rule states that the two can’t appear side by side? On the scholarly side, the American Jewish linguist Sarah Bunin Benor has sent…
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The Rebbe of Sinn Féin
Last December, 300 Israeli rabbis, many of them employees of the state, signed a declaration forbidding Jews to sell or rent property to non-Jews. For some of them, the move was inspired by the philosophy of Isaac Halevi Herzog (1888–1959), one of the main modern proponents of a “halachic state” run according to the tenets…
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The Secret History Of Jewish Metal
Mention of heavy metal music may bring to mind satanic rituals, church burnings and members of the 1980s glam-metal band Ratt sporting shoulder-length hair. If Yom Kippur gets a look in, it’s only because you’ve decided to repent for head-banging so hard to Slayer that your yarmulke fell off. Destined to change that, a number…
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Fast Forward Why the Antisemitism Awareness Act now has a religious liberty clause to protect ‘Jews killed Jesus’ statements
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Culture Trump wants to honor Hannah Arendt in a ‘Garden of American Heroes.’ Is this a joke?
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News School Israel trip turns ‘terrifying’ for LA students attacked by Israeli teens
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Fast Forward The invitation said, ‘No Jews.’ The response from campus officials, at least, was real.
In Case You Missed It
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Culture Cardinals are Catholic not Jewish — so why do they all wear yarmulkes?
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Fast Forward Halal restaurant opening in Congress is like ‘Muslim conquest of Jerusalem,’ says GOP congressman
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Fast Forward Germany formally classifies far-right AfD party as extremist, in blow to Nazi-linked populist movement
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Fast Forward Trump taps shock jock Sid Rosenberg and a Haredi newspaper publisher for Holocaust Memorial Council
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