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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Ilana Kaufman: The Outsider’s Insider
A queer Jewish woman of color, Ilana Kaufman, 47, has emerged as a national voice for diversity and inclusivity. For years she has pushed for policy changes to make Jews of color and LGBTQ Jews more welcome in Jewish institutions. It’s only fitting that this year she was named director of the Jews of Color…
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Forward 50 | Mikhl Yashinsky: Yiddish Renaissance Man
Mikhl Yashinsky has been casting a spell as the evil Bobe Yakhne in the Folksbiene’s revival of Abraham Goldfaden’s “The Sorceress.” Earlier this year he appeared as Mordkhe the Innkeeper in the Folksbiene’s smash-hit revival of “Fiddler on the Roof” in Yiddish, even pulling double duty for a time attending rehearsals for both shows. A…
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Adeena Sussman: Chef Of The Modern Middle East
In the U.S. it’s fairly easy to think you know all there is to know about Israeli cuisine. It’s all about hummus and falafel, right? With “Sababa: Fresh, Sunny Flavors from My Israeli Kitchen,” Adeena Sussman, 48, became the latest in a line of cookbook authors — think Yotam Ottolenghi and Michael Solomonov — to…
The Latest
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Forward 50 | Elliot Kukla: Pastor for the planet
Rabbi Elliot Kukla, 45, has always lived and worked with one foot in the future. In 2006, after co-founding TransTorah, he became the first openly transgender rabbi ordained by a recognized Jewish movement (Reform). Today, as a rabbi at San Francisco’s Bay Area Jewish Healing Center, he provides spiritual care around grieving, illness and dying….
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Dana Czapnik: New York Chronicler
Some people’s heroism can be seen in charitable works and mitzvot. Others favor the more quiet and reflective mitzvah — like writing a Great American Novel. Czapnik, 40, the New York-based granddaughter of Holocaust survivors, blazed onto the scene this year, demonstrating the kind of rare natural prowess usually ascribed to athletes — like teen basketball…
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Jordana Horn & Shannon Sarna: Mothers Of The Year
This year, Jordana Horn and Shannon Sarna started a Kveller podcast, “Call Your Mother,” to connect with fellow Jewish mothers. With nine — yes, nine! — children between them, Jordana, a journalist and lawyer, and Shannon, an author and editor of The Nosher, share the joys and chaos of life and parenting. The duo has…
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Forward 50 | Jerry Nadler: Impeacher-in-Chief (No. 2)
Born in Brooklyn, Rep. Jerry Nadler, 72, is a Democrat who has represented the most Jewish Congressional district in the United States for 27 years, and he does it in a profoundly Jewish way. Nadler attended Crown Heights Yeshiva and Stuyvesant High School, and maintains deep ties all over the Jewish community. Now, as chairman…
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Irena Klepfisz: Keeper of the Bundist Flame
When an overflow crowd in September came to hear a panel at YIVO discuss the legacy of the Bund, Irena Klepfisz, 78, was the event’s elder-stateswoman. A trailblazing lesbian poet, intellectual and political activist whose work is deeply informed by the movement’s socialist values, she serves as a bridge between the pre-war Bund of her…
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Forward 50 | Brett Lockspeiser: The Torah technologist
What is ancient is new again. That’s part of the philosophy behind Brett Lockspeiser’s Sefaria app, a free digital library of Jewish texts in English and Hebrew. A secular Jew with no formal Jewish education, Lockspeiser, 37, is the project’s chief engineer behind the project. He was nominated for the Forward 50 by a reader…
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Analia Bortz: Scholar Of The Human
Two weeks into medical school at the University of Buenos Aires, Analia Bortz realized she wanted to be a rabbi. “I went to the dean and said, ‘We’re learning about the liver, the heart and the lymph nodes. When do we learn about the human?’” she said. The dean told her that the big questions…
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Forward 50 | Joel Benenson: Netanyahu’s Nemesis
Before entering politics, Joel Benenson tried journalism: he worked for the New York Daily News, but found he felt strongly about the issues he was covering. So he moved in communications for Gov. Mario Cuomo’s reelection campaign in 1994, and then President Bill Clinton’s in 1996. He pioneered new research methods that helped Barack Obama…
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