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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Books
Hidden History of Middle Eastern Jews
Earlier this week Matti Friedman, a reporter in Jerusalem for The Times of Israel, and author of “The Aleppo Codex,” wrote about the codex vs. the Kindle. 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,…
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‘Portnoy’s Prescience
Promiscuous: ‘Portnoy’s Complaint’ and Our Doomed Pursuit of Happiness By Bernard Avishai Yale University Press, 240 pages, $25 ‘Promiscuous: ‘Portnoy’s Complaint’ and Our Doomed Pursuit of Happiness” is a very serious and very funny book about a very serious and very funny book. Philip Roth’s “Portnoy’s Complaint,” published in 1969, was not only an instant…
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Books Author Blog: Codex vs. Kindle
Matti Friedman is a reporter in Jerusalem for The Times of Israel, and author of “The Aleppo Codex.” 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: Although it fell, in retrospect, at the…
The Latest
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The Biggest McMansion of Them All
In an on-camera interview, David Siegel crows that he got George W. Bush elected president. When asked how he did that, the Florida resident declines to give particulars, claiming his actions “might not have been legal.” His wife, Jackie, brags that she’s spent as much as $1 million a year on clothing, including $17,000 on…
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Interfaith Insults
From Jacob Mendlovic of Toronto comes a letter of complaint about “the intense hostility of Haredim,” or ultra-Orthodox Jews, toward gentiles as manifested in such “Jewish n-words” as sheygets (a non-Jewish boy; from Hebrew shaketz, “abomination”); shikse (a non-Jewish girl); orel (an uncircumcised man) and akum (heathen — a talmudic acronym for ovdey kokhavim u’mazalot,…
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Books Author Blog: Dating and Doctors
Earlier this week, Francesca Segal wrote about recasting a classic novel and about being asked the question “Who are your characters REALLY?” Her 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: It was several…
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Dinner with Debbie Friedman
Friedman is our go-to evening soundtrack
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How ‘Hava Nagila’ Became a Global Hit
One day, in the summer of 2008, the question “‘Hava Nagila’ — what is it?” popped into Roberta Grossman’s head. Although she was familiar with the ubiquitous song, she was clueless about its origins. Thus began the filmmaker’s four-year quest to investigate the Jewish standard’s century-and-a-half journey, from Ukraine to YouTube. The result is her…
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Bucky Shvitz in the Memory Box
Click to enlarge. In Bucky Shvitz’s latest adventure, the sociologist for hire is enlisted to help ultra-Orthodox Jews defeat the scourge of the Internet. For Bucky’s first case, click here. Eli Valley is the Forward’s artist in residence for 2011–2012. His website is evcomics.com and you can follow him at twitter.com/elivalley.
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Books Author Blog: Who Are Your Characters REALLY?
On Monday, Francesca Segal wrote about recasting a classic novel. Her 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: It’s amazing how many North Londoners have taken me aside in a furtive, conspiratorial kind…
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Looking Back: July 20, 2012
100 Years Ago 1912 After dozens of detectives searched high and low for Bronx resident Nathan Schwartz, the main suspect in the murder of 12-year-old Julia Connors, the suspect was found dead from gas asphyxiation in a room on Chrystie Street in Manhattan’s Lower East Side. Disguising himself as Max Hershkovitz and claiming to be…
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