T.M. Luhrmann, a Stanford University anthropologist, recently published a fascinating piece in the New York Times positing that over thousands of years, wheat people and rice people have developed distinct cultures. The cultivation of wheat depends on rainfall and individual work, while “a community of rice farmers needs to work together in tightly integrated ways,”…
Illustration by Lior Zaltzman In last week’s editorial, Jane Eisner once again fretted about the state of contemporary American Judaism, most pointedly about the purported declining fertility rate amongst non-Orthodox Jews as touted by the infamous (and frankly overplayed) 2013 Pew survey. While she proposed no actual, feasible solution to this problem (or rather, this…
By now every woman with even the slightest interest in birthing babies has probably read Jean M. Twenge’s article “How Long Can You Wait To Have a Baby”, in the July/August issue of The Atlantic. If you’ve managed to miss it, and the comments it generated in all corners of the Internet, here’s the short…
I am not a grandmother — yet! But my friends who are blessed with grandchildren tell me that grandparenthood is equal parts pure love and complete wonder. Some even tell me they wish they could have skipped parenting and gone straight to grandparenting. I can’t wait. Or maybe I can. According to an article published…
Rachel never had much of a problem conceiving children: one, two, three, four, five. But when it came to child No. 6, Rachel (who asked that we identify her by only a pseudonym) and her husband tried and tried. Five years passed, but no child came. “You have a frum issue,” Dr. Richard Grazi told…
Have you ever noticed that some of the juiciest conversations seem to pop up instantly? This mother and her twenty-something daughter frequently find themselves working in front of the computer when an instant message appears on their screen. Here’s one recent back-and-forth that grew out of an IM conversation between mother and daughter. Alexis: So…
Pressure against the Pu’ah to abstain from holding a conference for men only on fertility and Jewish law seems to be working. As of this morning, 9 out of 10 Israeli doctors scheduled to speak had withdrawn. In addition, the Ethics Board of the Physicians’ Union announced that from now on doctors will not be…
Imagine a medical conference dedicated to women’s bodies in which no women are allowed to speak or even sit in the audience. No, this is not a Victorian novel or the back room of an old-fashioned gentlemen’s club. This is Israel 2012. For the fourth year in a row, Pu’ah, a publicly funded organization dealing…
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