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
-
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
-
Death at the Doorbell
The world, as we know it, ended in May. At least that was the proposition of the New York Philharmonic. Building toward the end of his first year as the orchestra’s new music director, Alan Gilbert envisioned a spectacular presentation: a fully staged New York premiere of “Le Grand Macabre” (French slang for “the Grim…
-
Watch: Forward Columnist Jay Michaelson on American Jews and Israel
WNBC’s “The Debrief with David Ushery” talks to Forward columnist Jay Michaelson about what Michaelson sees as American Jews’ growing disconnect from Israel. He also weighs in on the comments that ended Helen Thomas’ career:
The Latest
-
Books YIVO Encyclopedia Launches Online Edition
Geese were a staple of Jewish life in Eastern Europe and Jewish women knew how to get the most out of their fowl of choice. The feathers were sold as quills for writing and stuffing for bedding, fat used as an alternative to butter or the Jewish version of lard, and the birds themselves were…
-
The World Cup Winner
As any soccer fan will tell you, it only takes seven games to win the FIFA World Cup once you’ve qualified for the final tournament. Unfortunately, Israel has reached the finals just once — Mexico 1970 — where, after losing to Uruguay and tying with Sweden and Italy, it failed to progress beyond the group…
-
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…
-
Chai Noon
Sherriff’s badges weren’t the only Jewish stars in the Wild West. Consider gunslinger Jim Levy, Deadwood mayor Sol Star, Jewish Pueblo Indian chief Solomon Bibo, blue jeans inventor Levi Strauss and David May, the merchant who built his trading post into a chain of national department stores now controlled by Macy’s. Even O.K. Corral gunfighter…
-
Troubadors of Post-Modernity
Poetry didn’t always reside in the neatly formatted volumes that line our bookshelves. Before the age of Gutenberg — let alone Kindle — poetry existed mainly as performance, spoken or sung by traveling bards, epic balladeers and troubadours. It was a living, communal experience vastly different from the solitary reading that informs our encounter with…
-
June 18, 2010
100 Years Ago in the Forward Forsyth Street resident Feige Gabeh, 20, disappeared this week and is rumored to be in hiding with Joe Shuster, a former boarder in her parents’ home who also disappeared from his wife and two children. Shuster and Gabeh, who knew each other from the Old Country, were having an…
-
Auschwitz Puppets
The performance of KAMP by the Dutch theater group Hotel Modern is a blend of puppetry, film, art installation and sound that attempts, according to its press release, “to imagine the unimaginable: the greatest mass murder in history, committed in a purpose-built city.” When I saw a recent production at St. Ann’s Warehouse in Brooklyn,…
-
Foreman Fights Tough, but Cotto Prevails
The scene at Yankee Stadium: The fate of Jewish welterweight Yuri Foreman’s World Boxing Association title was sealed when the fighter slipped in round seven of his Saturday night championship bout against Miguel Cotto. Foreman fell, twisting his right leg awkwardly at the knee, then limped through two further rounds before Cotto won a technical…
-
Rating Jewish Filmmakers’ Portrayal of Women
Does your film have two women in it? Do they have names? Do they talk to each other? About things other than men? These are the questions, the only questions, of the Bechdel Test, otherwise known as the Mo Movie Measure. Like the APGAR test, it’s a flawed system. But in the same way that…
Explore
Most Popular
- 1
Culture Trump wants to honor Hannah Arendt in a ‘Garden of American Heroes.’ Is this a joke?
- 2
Opinion The dangerous Nazi legend behind Trump’s ruthless grab for power
- 3
Fast Forward The invitation said, ‘No Jews.’ The response from campus officials, at least, was real.
- 4
Opinion A Holocaust perpetrator was just celebrated on US soil. I think I know why no one objected.
In Case You Missed It
-
News These are the most influential Jews in Trump’s first 100 days
-
Fast Forward Nike apologizes for marathon ad using the Holocaust phrase ‘Never Again’
-
Opinion I wrote the book on Hitler’s first 100 days. Here’s how Trump’s compare
-
Fast Forward Ohio Applebee’s defaced with antisemitic graffiti reading ‘Jews work here’
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
