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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The One-Woman Hebrew School
In early 2010 I received an email with the subject line “Hebrew tutor for my (awesome!) 11-year- old daughter.” The dad who had sent that email found my name through the Jewish Theological Seminary, where I had done my undergraduate studies at the Double Degree program with Barnard College back in 2003. Someone in career…
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When Jewish Colonists Prospected for Utopia in Colorado
Imagine a windswept mountain town dotted with tar paper shacks. An unscrupulous mine owner twirls his moustache as he surveys the scene. Nearby, a one-eyed farmer and his fallen bride battle the rocky soil of their ramshackle homestead. Half-starved Indians skulk in the town’s shadows. Meanwhile, priceless cargo winds its way by train and wagon…
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Meet Lyla Black, America’s Youngest Jewish Toymaker
There are no monsters living under Lyla Black’s bed, and, she doesn’t want any living under yours. Lyla, a soft-spoken 8-year-old from the Astoria neighborhood of Queens, is the inventor of the Lyla Tov (Hebrew for Good Night) Monster, a plush happy-faced, pear-shaped stuffed toy that just won her the prestigious TAGIE award for young…
The Latest
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Bess Myerson, the Bronx Beauty Who Refused To Change Her Name
The fact that Bess Myerson, whose death at age 90 on December 14 was recently announced, remains the only Jewish winner in the 90-plus year history of the Miss America pageant surely says more about that contest than it does about her. Social historians have compared Myerson’s victory in 1945 with the contemporaneous on-field triumphs…
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‘Selma’ Distorts History by Airbrushing Out Jewish Contributions to Civil Rights
When filmmakers choose what to include or exclude from the stories they tell, their choices often have repercussions beyond the drama on the screen. In films based on real-life events, omissions can seriously distort the way we remember the past. “Selma,” a film directed by Ava DuVernay, offers an ambitious portrait of Martin Luther King…
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An Autobiography in 19 Bob Dylan Concerts
A day before the show at the Beacon Theatre, I’m figuring this will be the last time I’ll see Bob Dylan perform. This doesn’t have anything to do with Dylan’s age — sure, he’s 73 and doesn’t play guitar in concert anymore, but he isn’t showing much evidence of slowing down. Just two years ago,…
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Of ‘To Kill a Mockingbird,’ Lehman Brothers and 5 Other Things About (Jewish) Alabama
1) Birmingham has contained Alabama’s largest Jewish community for nearly a century. About 5,300 Jews live there today. 2) Alabama’s first congregation was founded in 1844 in Mobile. 3) Abraham Mordecai was the first Jew to live in Alabama. In 1785 he set up a small trading post in an area which later became Montgomery….
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Deconstructing the Jewishness of the Frankfurt School
The Frankfurt School, Jewish Lives, and Antisemitism by Jack Jacobs Cambridge University Press, 268 pages, $90.00 Most accounts of the Frankfurt School of critical theory, the grouping of social and political thinkers briefly based at the Frankfurt Institute for Social Research until Hitler’s arrival to power forced them into exile, note that they were predominantly…
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Live-Blogging Jewishly in a Weird Evangelical Christian World
The Jewish community has long fretted over the so-called “December Dilemma,” in which Jewish kids are teased for not having Christmas trees and gifts from Santa. To paraphrase Kyle from “South Park,” it’s hard to be a Jew on Christmas, especially in a Christian-dominated society. Which is why you may be surprised to learn that…
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5 Albums To Pick Up in 2015
● Yiddish Art Trio BFR Music / Pattysounds /Michael Winograd, $15 ● Songs of Zebulon Jeremiah Lockwood, Frank London, and Friends Blue Thread, $18 ● Schizophonia Yoshie Fruchter Blue Thread, $18 ● Roadsides Ayelet Rose Gottlieb Arogole Music, $13.51 ● The Fallout of Dreams Dave Liebman and Steve Dalachinsky RogueArt, $15.95 As the temperatures begin…
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Of Barbie, Western Shirts, Simon Guggenheim and 8 Other Facts About Jewish Colorado
1) Colorado is home to approximately 92,000 Jews representing 1.8% of the population. 2) Denver clothing CEO Jack Weil was credited with the idea of putting snaps on Western-style shirts. 3) Born in Philadaelphia, Simon Guggenheim served for one term as a Colorado U.S. Senator from 1907-1913. 4) Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright spent…
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