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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Dear Sisterhood Readers
My name is Abigail Jones, and I am thrilled to introduce myself as the new Sisterhood editor. I have always enjoyed the thoughtful, provocative conversations that take place here, and I am eager to continue the great work that Gabrielle Birkner started three years ago. I come to the Forward by way of The Daily,…
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Bar Refaeli Says ‘Lo’ to JDate
Bar Refaeli is a supermodel. She’s also Israeli. That means that questions about her Jewishness often come up in interviews. Even the lad mag “Maxim,” which named her their #1 hottest woman this week, comes off sounding like her mom when they inquire whether she’d consider setting up a profile on JDate. “Maybe if I’m…
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Coming Out of the Abortion Closet
If you had an abortion, who would you tell? Your family? Your friends? The entire world? Steph Herold has worked in direct service abortion care and reproductive health advocacy for seven years. She founded the blog Abortion Gang as a space for young people in the reproductive justice movement, and runs a tumblr that doubles…
The Latest
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The Orthodox Response to Mindy Meyer?
My mother is an Orthodox woman who was raised by Orthodox parents and married an Orthodox rabbi. She has also earned, thus far in her career, a bachelor’s degree and three postgraduate degrees. And while she has more degrees than the average Orthodox woman, she also has more degrees than the average American; as of…
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Talking ‘Trash’ With Romance Novel Queen
Blogger and self-proclaimed “man-titty media pundit” Sarah Wendell posts witty and wicked reviews of romance novels at Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, and has also written two books about the genre. The Sisterhood caught up with her to talk “trash,” sex and David Beckham in his underwear, plus what she really wants to know about “50…
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Blurry Glasses=Modesty Police
It’s not a joke, although it certainly seems like one. In some ultra-Orthodox communities in Israel, shops are now selling eye glasses with lenses that intentionally blur whatever the wearer is looking at, the web site ynet reports. The goal is to allow men to walk through their neighborhoods without having to risk getting a…
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Is Saying ‘Fiancé’ Bragging?
This post is the fourth in “Feminist, Orthodox and Engaged,” a series by Simi Lampert on love, sex and betrothal in the life of a Modern Orthodox woman. In a world where getting married is an item on most girls’ to-do lists, being engaged feels a bit like showing off. When my friend at Stern…
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Goodbye — And Good Luck! — to Joanna Samuels
When Rabbi Joanna Samuels was six years old, she drew a typical child’s picture — with stick figures and awkward shapes — and then wrote, “When I get to be a mommy, I will get a job.” That picture, which has been hanging in a frame for 35 years, moving with her from home to…
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Breaking Up Is Hard To Do
Dear Teen Me: When you were growing up in the late 1970s and early ‘80s, it was easy to have a skewed view of love, especially with all those pop love songs you listened to — and inevitably dreamed would come true. If only there had been a meeting for you like the one I…
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Where are Natan’s Women?
To anyone conscious of the paucity of women in positions of visibility and influence in the Jewish world, the lineup for the 10th anniversary celebrations of the Natan fund struck a startling note. The Natan Fund, a relatively small but influential philanthropy organization, which was started by hedge fund managers in 2002, is having two…
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The Many Reasons Why I Am a Feminist Jew
This is the sixteenth entry in an ongoing series exploring Jewish feminism. I am a feminist Jew because I view being Jewish as a gift, as I do being a woman. Neither should suffer for the sake of the other. I am a feminist Jew because I believe that Torah is our divinely-inspired central literature,…
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