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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12 Things To Do In August That Will Make You Just A Little More Jewish
Welcome to August: You’re tired of the heat. A chance to walk romantically through falling leaves — maybe even while wearing a sweater, of all things — is beginning to sound appealing, and you’ve suffered too many sunburns to be coaxed back to the pool. Never fear! With great new television premieres, music and theater…
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Why Words Matter When Newspapers Cover Trump
I am an incurable saver of newspapers, and I just couldn’t throw out Israeli newspaper coverage of Donald Trump’s visit to Israel. Something in the language gnawed at me, and now I know what it was: the invocation of Jewish text and tradition to describe an American president who is the most divisive in recent…
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Does The White House Really Need a Jewish Liaison?
The idea of designating a White House staffer to be in charge of relations with the American Jewish community dates back to the Kennedy administration. It is based on the idea that providing a dedicated channel of communication between the administration and the Jewish community could benefit both sides. From feeling the pulse of the…
The Latest
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Why Yo-Yo Ma Is Fighting To Save Louis Kahn’s Floating Concert Hall
The late architect Louis Kahn is renowned for his impact on landscapes and cityscapes around the world, from the United States to Israel to Bangladesh. But one of his most moving creations, “Point Counterpoint II” was designed to live on the water. The bad news: It’s in immediate danger of being destroyed. The good news:…
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Sam Shepard, Playwright Of Biblical Proportions, Dies At 73
Sam Shepard, a playwright and actor whose work helped revolutionize American theater, died on July 30 at his home in Kentucky from complications of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, otherwise known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. He was 73 years old. Shepard, who won a Pulitzer Prize for his play “Buried Child” and was nominated for an Academy…
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Growing Up Latina and Jewish, I Was A Contradiction
Jewish AND Latina? When I was in junior high school in Newton, Massachusetts, a middle class suburb of Boston with a large Jewish population, my friends could not believe that I, a blonde blue-eyed Jewish girl, had a brother named Fernando. “Is he adopted? “ they would ask. This was the 80’s, and Jewish kids…
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Film & TV Yiddish Musical of ‘The Golden Land’ Emerges Somewhat Tarnished
Appropriately located at the Museum of Jewish Heritage in Battery Park within view of the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island, the National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene (NYTF) is attempting to redefine its mission and aesthetic while celebrating the Yiddish language, with few if any English words thrown in for good measure. Its renewed commitment to…
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Remembering the Jewish Voice Behind Cindy Lou Who and Rocket J. Squirrel
The American Jewish voice actor June Foray, who died on July 26 at age 99, proved that being a mensch could be a prerequisite for creating a legacy of memorable animated cartoon characters. As she noted in her memoirs, she was born June Forer in Springfield, Massachusetts, of Lithuanian and Ukrainian Jewish ancestry. She would…
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How David Axelrod Stays True To His Progressive Jewish Roots
The University of Chicago’s Institute of Politics is a hive of activity. Students are testing out a theory in the lobby; another group is peppering a visiting fellow with questions, and upstairs, staffers are researching an upcoming guest. Presiding over it all is the institute’s founder and director, David Axelrod, senior adviser to Barack Obama…
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The Trump Resistance Begins On Broadway
The telescreens mounted above the doorways from the Hudson Theatre’s lobby to its auditorium — you might call them Samsung plasmas, but you’d be missing the point — display some familiar slogans: “War Is Peace”; “Ignorance Is Strength”; “Love Is Fear.” “This Bill That Cuts Billions From Medicaid Does Not Cut Medicaid” is not among…
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Why Norman Podhoretz’s ‘Brutal Bargain’ Still Matters
Norman Podhoretz admitted it himself — the premise of “Making It” no longer holds. “I think it’s not true anymore, in fact it might be the opposite,” he told me in an interview. The neoconservative intellectual raged in his 1967 memoir about the culture’s duplicitous attitude toward success: encouraging people to pursue wealth while shaming…
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