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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It’s My Virginity, Not Yours
“There’s a dividing line between girls who have had sex, and girls who haven’t,” said Angela Chase, star of the cult ‘90s teenage drama “My So Called Life.” As melodramatic and myopic as Claire Danes’ Angela sounds, 21st-century popular culture still attaches transformative powers to sexual experience and views virginity (or lack thereof) as indicative…
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Spielberg’s Portrait of Lincoln Is A Bust
My suspicion that Steven Spielberg can’t really do historical films isn’t anything new, although the fact that he keeps trying shows at least how ambitious he can be. Conversely, the fact that he keeps failing, at least in my opinion, may point to a wider incapacity on the part of his audience, meaning you and…
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Books The Historian’s Challenge, Part 2
On Tuesday, Gerald Sorin wrote about ambivalence toward the genre of biography. Today, he considers the question: Can the biographer or their readers really know the subject fully? His blog posts are featured on The Arty Semite courtesy of the Jewish Book Council and My Jewish Learning’s Author Blog Series. For more information on the…
The Latest
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Books How to Succeed in Academia Without Doing Research
Earlier this week, Haim Watzman wrote about Super Tuesday, journalism, and love. His blog posts are featured on The Arty Semite courtesy of the Jewish Book Council and My Jewish Learning’s Author Blog Series. For more information on the series, please visit: “Are you a professor?” asked the woman sitting next to me on the…
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Left’s Love-Hate Relationship With Zionism
“From Ambivalence to Betrayal: The Left, the Jews, and Israel” By Robert S. Wistrich University of Nebraska Press, 648 pages, $55 Imagine this: It’s the summer of 1947 and you’re a Communist or a fellow traveler or a Socialist or another kind of anti-Stalinist. Despite myriad differences with political rivals, you share the same basic…
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Books Author Blog: The Historian’s Challenge
Gerald Sorin’s most recent book, “Howard Fast: Life and Literature in the Left Lane,” is now available. Sorin won the 2003 National Jewish Book Award in History for I“Irving Howe: A Life of Passionate Dissent.” His blog posts are featured on The Arty Semite courtesy of the Jewish Book Council and My Jewish Learning’s Author…
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Dark Days Are Here Again
From time to time I like to go to a bar on the Lower East Side of Manhattan called The Magician. It’s the décor that draws me. The Magician has the straight lines, dark wood and high polish of early-to-midcentury art deco style that make me feel, for an hour or two, like the hero…
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Books Author Blog: Super Tuesday
Haim Watzman is a Jerusalem-based writer, journalist, and translator. He is the author of “Company C: An American’s Life as a Citizen-Soldier in Israel” and “A Crack in the Earth: A Journey Up Israel’s Rift Valley,” which will be available as ebooks this week. Haim was a 2008 finalist for the Sami Rohr Prize for…
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Israelis Should Avoid Using Term ‘Apartheid’
“Most Israelis support an apartheid regime [mishtar apartheid] in Israel,” announced the lead headline in the October 23 issue of the left-liberal Hebrew daily Haaretz, Israel’s most internationally prestigious newspaper. “Survey: Most Israeli Jews advocate discrimination against Arab citizens,” was the translation of this headline in the same day’s English edition of the paper. Any…
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Music Peres Praises Abbas’ ‘Courageous’ Concession
Israeli President Shimon Peres hailed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas as a courageous partner for peace on Saturday after the Palestinian leader made clear his support for a two-state solution to the decades old conflict with Israel. In an interview with Israeli television broadcast this week, the Western-backed Abbas also hinted that Palestinians who, prior to…
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Music Bibi Skeptical on ‘Right of Return’ Concession
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu voiced scepticism on Sunday at an apparent concession from Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on a major sticking point in any future peace negotiations. Abbas’s comments on Thursday that he had no permanent claim on the town of Safed, from which he was driven during a 1948 war, were widely seen…
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