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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In place of a proud emblem of Jewish immigration in NYC, million-dollar condos and a private garden
Gentrification comes for the Bialystoker Center and Home for the Aged
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Every Word Nerd Is Looking Up ‘Indictment’ — But Why Is It Spelled That Way?
For word nerds, checking up on what’s hot in dictionary look-ups can be an addictive form of procrastination. As of noon today, these were the top five on Merriam-Webster, along with their super-quick definitions: conspiracy: An agreement to commit an illegal act collusion, indictment: Two Latin-based legal terms dossier: a file containing detailed records debase:…
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Was Bob Dylan At His Best When He Was Christian?
I recently attended an alumni reunion at the Berkshires summer camp where I worked in the kitchen in the 1970s. More than one person came up to me at the reunion and said, “I’ll never forget how upset you were when Bob Dylan became a born-again Christian.” When early in the summer of 1979 it…
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Exactly How Did Hitler Become Hitler Anyway?
Becoming Hitler: The Making of a Nazi By Tom Weber Basic Books, 464 pages, $35 Today, historians are in the unfortunate position of having to describe new books on the Nazi era as “timely.” This description is especially apt for Tom Weber’s new book, “Becoming Hitler.” Had it appeared prior to Donald Trump’s election in…
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30 Years Before Trump, Tarkovsky Foresaw The Apocalypse
By the time that Soviet filmmaker Andrei Tarkovsky created his nuclear war parable, “The Sacrifice” (1986), currently playing at the Quad in a new 4K restoration, he had been exiled from one of the Cold War’s superpowers and had been thoroughly nonplussed by the other. Filmed in Sweden, in geographic and spiritual retreat from Moscow…
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Film & TV In A Predominantly Christian Country, Why Is Jewish Humor So Popular?
Jewish Comedy: A Serious History By Jeremy Dauber W. W. Norton & Company, 416 pages, $28.95 Jews are hilarious. We know this, or at least think we do. Just look at all the Jewish cut-ups out there. At the moment, Judd Apatow, Jenji Kohan, Amy Schumer and Sarah Silverman are some of the top performers…
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Art German Far-Right Party Attacks Documenta Over Financial Issues
Documenta, Germany’s leading contemporary art festival, which takes place every five years in the city of Kassel, has been sued by far right members of the city’s council. According to a report by Henri Neuendorf in artnet, the councilmembers, who belong to the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, are accusing the festival’s leadership of misappropriating…
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Art JCC Manhattan To Receive $20 Million Gift and Jenny Holzer Artwork
According to a report in the New York Times, JCC Manhattan has announced that it has received a gift of $20 million from the Meyerson Family Foundation, which also commissioned a site-specific artwork for the center. In honored of the donation, JCC Manhattan will be renamed the Marlene Meyerson JCC, starting in February 2018. The…
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Salinger’s Heirs, Biographers Tussle Over Unpublished Writings That May Not Exist
J.D. Salinger retired in 1965 and died in 2010. What happened in between has become the subject of a restrained controversy, chronicled today by Matthew Haag in The New York Times. Although no new Salinger works have appeared since 1965, and no one close to the writer has said that any will, his admirers still…
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Film & TV How Hedy Lamarr, ‘The Most Beautiful Woman In The World,’ Helped Invent Wi-Fi
When she was a child, Hedy Lamarr’s mother would refer to her as a chameleon. Living up to the moniker, she would go on to lead a surpassingly dramatic life as a Viennese socialite, Hollywood actress, and influential inventor. Her trials and transformations are the subject of Alexandra Dean’s new film, “Bombshell: The Hedy Lamarr…
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The Russian Jew Who Made Fats Domino A Star
New Orleans singer-pianist Fats Domino, one of the seminal influences on rock ‘n’ roll, died Tuesday in his hometown of New Orleans at age 89. When Domino signed a recording deal with Lew Chudd, owner of Imperial Records, pop history was in the making. The artist recorded a slew of hit singles in the 1950s,…
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Stephen Greenblatt On How The Story Of Adam And Eve Shaped History
Has there been a more consequential story to the history of humanity than that of Adam and Eve? In the assessment of Stephen Greenblatt, Shakespeare scholar and Pulitzer Prize-winning author of “The Swerve,” probably not. But for Greenblatt, the significance of the origin story of Abrahamic religions ranges past its tangibly profound impact on the…
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Fast Forward Trump says Jews would deserve much of the blame if he loses
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Culture Hitler is trending on TikTok again — and they’re trying to make him seem like a nice guy
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Opinion This GOP candidate has always been antisemitic — so why are Republicans only panicking about him now?
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Fast Forward Sitcom star encourages non-Jews like her to hang mezuzahs on their homes
In Case You Missed It
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News Analysis: Netanyahu will address the United Nations. Here’s why it’s his favorite stage.
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Fast Forward What Eric Adams’ Jewish supporters and critics are saying after his indictment
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Fast Forward Laura Loomer, Jewish activist who flew on Trump’s plane, says her ties to antisemites shouldn’t undercut her advocacy
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Opinion He’s a Muslim Israeli who was close with Hersh Goldberg-Polin. Now he’s mourning his friend — and seeking change
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