This is the Forward’s coverage of Jewish culture where you’ll learn about the latest (and sometimes earliest) in Jewish art, music (including of course Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen), film, theater, books as well as the secret Jewish history of…
Culture
-
Barbra Streisand’s brand-new duet with Bob Dylan is a whole lot different than you might think
Though Dylan and Streisand's voices may seem ill-suited to each other, the two complement each other gorgeously on 'The Very Thought of You'
-
Film & TV Sneak Peek: The Bielski Brothers on the Silver Screen
Have a look here at the trailer for “Defiance,” Ed Zwick’s take on the story of the Bielski brothers, who organized what is widely considered to have been the largest group of Jewish partisans during World War II. The movie stars Daniel Craig and Liev Schreiber, among others, and is set for release in late…
-
Brandeis Professor Explores ‘Sex and the Shtetl’
The timing could not have been better. When ChaeRan Freeze completed her coursework toward a doctorate in Russian Jewish history in 1993, it was just as the doors to the archives in Moscow and St. Petersburg were beginning to swing open. As a result, she was among the first to request long-untouched troves of material…
The Latest
-
Mikveh Mysteries, Solved
Forward reader Gertrude Frankel writes: “I have been trying, since seeing the movie ‘Little Jerusalem’ (in which such a figure is a great help to a married woman whose husband has strayed), to find out what the name is for the female attendant in the mikvah. I have asked a rabbi, a Hebrew teacher, and…
-
To Black and Back: Viewing the Work of Austrian Director Alex Corti at the New York Jewish Film Festival
A man awakes one morning to discover he has become an insect — hideous, despised and hunted. The world around him looks much the same as it ever has, but he can tell by the piteous looks of those around him that he himself has changed, and can never again be who he once was….
-
The Wrong Heaven: Critic Joshua Cohen on His New Novel
For four years, literary critic Joshua Cohen has offered readers of these pages his unique perspective on literature — in reviews of both fiction and nonfiction, as well as his acclaimed question-and-answer sessions with such writers as George Konrad, Joseph Epstein and others. This week, as Joshua sets out on a tour for his own…
-
Just Say ‘Nu?’: How Are You, cont’d.
The usual responses to general questions about your welfare are: nishKOOsheh Not bad E-E-H A less confident “not bad” FRAIG NISHT Don’t ask AF MEIneh SONim geZUGT It should happen to my enemies. E-e-h and nishkoosheh are two of many Yiddish words with a pronounced physical component. In order to use either of them effectively:…
-
Balkan Beauty
People of the Book By Geraldine Brooks Viking, 372 pages, $25.95. In her new novel, “People of the Book,” Geraldine Brooks compresses six centuries of history and transforms them into a fast-moving mystery novel. Brooks’s engaging, intensely researched historic tale is based on the story of the Sarajevo Haggadah, a book that originated in pre-Inquisition…
-
The 2007 National Jewish Book Awards
Below are the winners of the 2007 National Jewish Book Awards: Everett Family Foundation Jewish Book of the Year Award “How to Read the Bible: A Guide to Scripture, Then and Now” By James L. Kugel Free Press The Jewish Book Council Lifetime Achievement Award Rabbi Harold S. Kushner American Jewish Studies (Celebrate 350 Award)…
-
Tutors Tackle Tinseltown
When entertainment executive Marc Potash landed a job at Universal Pictures last spring, the offer didn’t come out of the blue. After all, Potash had an inside connection at Universal — not because of his background in film production, but because he had been the bar mitzvah coach of the studio co-chairman’s son. Potash, 28,…
-
Holocaust Memorial Takes Flight
Hundreds of thousands of butterflies from around the world are flocking to the Holocaust Museum Houston as part of an educational program about the Holocaust. The museum’s Butterfly Project is attempting to collect 1.5 million handmade butterflies to represent the 1.5 million Jewish children murdered in the Holocaust. So far, it has received more than…
-
Conservative Schools Rethink Israel Studies
This month, a new middle-school curriculum focused on Israel will be launched as a pilot program in Conservative congregational schools. Israel Today is the final unit of Project Etgar, a curriculum currently being tried out in 25 supplementary schools affiliated with Conservative synagogues. “If you go to synagogue school, you come out thinking that Israel…
Explore
Most Popular
- 1
News No Jews allowed: White supremacists are building a segregated community in Arkansas, but is it legal?
- 2
Opinion Zohran Mamdani’s victory proves it: The ‘gotcha’ mode of fighting antisemitism has to go
- 3
News What a Mayor Mamdani would mean for New York Jews
- 4
Fast Forward Mamdani tells Colbert — and a national audience — why NYC Jews shouldn’t fear him as mayor
In Case You Missed It
-
Fast Forward Fraudsters sold fake Sephardic citizenship for cash, say Spanish police
-
Fast Forward DHS releases $94 million of security grants for Jewish institutions as remainder of funding stalls
-
Fast Forward Zohran Mamdani belongs to the Democratic Socialists of America, a leading critic of Israel. Here’s what to know
-
Fast Forward Synagogue custodian detained by ICE, New Jersey mayor calls for his release
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
