Welcome to the Forward’s coverage of the robust lives of American Jews. Here there’s a little of everything about the multifaceted world of Jewish life. There are light-hearted Jewish celebrity stories and shocking Jewish celebrity news. Food is also plentiful,…
Life
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Why I Like Likeable Women
I like people I find likeable. This goes for men and women, as well as the fictional and the living. I also like being likeable. This all sounds pretty obvious, I know. And yet holding such an opinion these days makes one a bit of a philistine and, worse, a heretic in certain feminist circles….
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Throwback Thursday: Teenage Ambassador to Israel
Welcome to Throwback Thursday, a weekly photo feature in which we sift 116 years of Forward history to find snapshots of women’s lives. In 1952, Carole Frances Asnin of Brooklyn won the New York City-wide “Share Your Birthday” contest promoting “intergroup understanding.” The contest was organized by El Al along with Mrs. Elizabeth Heller’s “Share…
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Joseph Gordon-Levitt Uses the F-Word
Joseph Gordon-Levitt used the f-word, and he used it about himself… and we couldn’t be prouder. The actor and director (and lip syncer extraordinaire) called himself a feminist while recently shmoozing with Ellen DeGeneres. The last thing he wants is for people to confuse him with the title character in his recent film, “Don Jon,”…
The Latest
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Song of ‘Ourselves’
This hour I tell things in confidence, I might not tell everybody, but I will tell you. — Walt Whitman, “Song of Myself” In high school, I often made off with my mother’s copy of “Our Bodies, Ourselves.” The 1998 edition, on whose cover women bore protest signs and status-quo-bashing smiles, made quite a pair…
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Orthodox Woman’s ‘Move Over’ Subway Campaign
Tzipporah, a Modern Orthodox woman living in Manhattan, just couldn’t deal with the way that people misbehaved on the New York subway. She started taking surreptitious camera phone photos of the worst offenders — men who insisted on sprawling out onto multiple seats, even when the train was packed. She began posting the pictures on…
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Could Eve Have Been Happy About the Expulsion?
For so long, I took their word for it. Eve — the world’s first woman according to the creation myth of Abrahamic religions — messed up. Her punishment, two-fold. One, she was kicked out of Eden, sweet Eden, where she spent her days sauntering around naked, no shame in her step. There she led a…
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Abortion in 2014
A new year has brought with it the growing realization that in America, access to abortion is slipping and slipping away. It’s so glaringly obvious that you can access this trend in multiple different forms, from charts and graphs to quotes from national movement leaders to on-the-ground anecdotes. So, in what medium do you want…
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Rachel Azaria, Deputy Mayor of Holy Town
It was only five years ago that Rachel Azaria first got involved in local Jerusalem politics as councilwoman. Now a rising star in the municipality, she was sworn in as the city’s new deputy mayor on November 21. Azaria, 36, was first elected to Jerusalem’s city council in 2008. In elections held this past October,…
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‘Tiger Mom’ Amy Chua Roars Again
“Tiger Mom” Amy Chua has a new book out with her Jewish husband Jed Rubenfeld and in it she looks at the parenting practices of six cultural groups who, she claims, create more successful people. These include Indians, Chinese, Iranians, Lebanese-Americans, Nigerians, Cuban Exiles, Mormons and, you got it, Jews. Her thesis in “The Triple…
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Elana Sztokman To Leave Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance
Elana Sztokman is leaving the Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance after a year and a half as executive director. “It is a mutual parting of the ways,” she told the Forward. She would not elaborate on the reason for her departure, saying that her separation contract prohibits her from talking about the split. Sztokman said she…
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Throwback Thursday: Jewish Congresswoman from Utah
Welcome to Throwback Thursday, a weekly photo feature in which we sift 116 years of Forward history to find snapshots of women’s lives. Florence Prag Kahn, the first Jewish woman to serve in Congress, was a pioneer in many ways. She was born in 1866 in Salt Lake City, Utah. Her parents were Polish Jewish…
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