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
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Nonprofit CEO Focuses on Social Justice
As a young labor organizer in the late 1990s, Simon Greer was particularly fond of a certain motto often recited by his boss: “If I am not for myself, who will be for me?” But having grown up without any ties to the organized Jewish community, Greer was unaware that the quotation is part of…
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Giving is a Family Tradition For ‘Venture Philanthropist’
‘I am very interested in getting the biggest bang for my buck,” Alice Rosenwald told the Forward recently. “When I invest, I want to make a difference.” Rosenwald, who appears in this week’s Forward 50, is co-chair of American Securities Holdings, a merchant and investment bank with a history of developing innovative investment businesses by…
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Probing Brown’s Dark History
Last month, Brown University released the results of a three-year study of its historical relationship to slavery and the slave trade, and suggested several steps to inform the public about this dark chapter in its past, including the creation in Rhode Island of a memorial to the slave trade. Surprisingly, although the report has a…
The Latest
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Reinventing Politics, With Language
Rituals of Truce and the Other Israeli By Benjamin Hollander Parrhesia Press, 137 pages, $12.95. Vigilance By Benjamin Hollander Beyond Baroque Books, 220 pages, $12. ‘This is the time for political invention,” writes Benjamin Hollander halfway through “Rituals of Truce and the Other Israeli,” his imaginative meditation on the impasse between the Israelis and Palestinians:…
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Gershwin’s American ‘Rhapsody’
Once upon a time, Harry Von Tilzer, Irving Berlin, Sophie Tucker, Sid Caesar, Al Jolson, Fanny Brice, Billy Rose, Marcus Loew and “Mr. Television” himself, Milton Berle, were the reigning kings and queens of American popular culture. The sons and daughters of Jewish immigrants or, in many instances, recent immigrants themselves, they changed the way…
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Spielberg To Establish New Fund
When Steven Spielberg made “Schindler’s List” in 1993, he was already one of the most financially successful movie directors of all time, so rather than reap further gain from the film, Spielberg gave his earnings away. Now, the Forward has learned, Spielberg is doing it again, channeling profits from his 2005 blockbuster “Munich” into a…
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The Jewish Sylvia Plath?
The Romance of a Shop By Amy Levy, edited by Susan David Bernstein Broadview Press, 278 pages, $15.95. Reuben Sachs By Amy Levy, edited by Susan David Bernstein Broadview Press, 251 pages $15.95. Oscar Wilde adored her, calling the young writer “a girl of genius,” while modern critics, in their flippancy and an attempt to…
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November 3, 2006
100 Years Ago In the Forward Despite hunger, exhaustion and beatings of employees at the hands of gangs hired by their bosses, the ongoing strike of the Union of Mineral Water Workers is holding fast and is as strong as iron. As of yet, not one worker has broken ranks with the strikers. The strike…
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Munich Redux
On November 9, Jews throughout Germany will mark the 68th anniversary of the notorious Nazi pogrom, Kristallnacht, with solemn commemorative ceremonies and with vows of “Never again.” Yet in Munich, the very city where the pogrom was first unleashed, a more hopeful tone will pervade the commemorative events: That same day, Munich will dedicate a…
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‘The O.C.’ Mystique
Here’s a confession: I grew up in deep East Coast suburbia, with a song in my heart and a synagogue on every corner. As expected, I furthered my education at a local, semi-prestigious private university with a bunch of wannabe dentists who were bitter about not getting into Harvard. As an aspiring writer with a…
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Two Lawyers, Three Opinions
Lawyers: Are they good for the Jews? It doesn’t take a statistician to observe that there are a lot of Jews in the legal profession, and even more in the legal academy. But why are there so many Jews in the American legal world, and what significance, if any, do the numbers have? To address…
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