Letter from Malmö

By Doreen El-Roeiy July 22, 2015

On June 9 in Malmö, Sweden, 27 residents of the Rosengård neighborhood, infamous in Europe as a segregated ghetto of recent refugees, were arrested on charges of attempted murder as gunfire was heard through the city streets. Three days later, on June 12, two men were injured in a bomb explosion near the Skåne University…

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Can a Fully Feminist, Fully Traditional Jewish Space Exist? A Dialogue

By Avigayil Halpern May 12, 2015

AVIGAYIL HALPERN: When I was fourteen and just beginning to explore what it would mean to me to be a halakhic, or Jewish-law-abiding, Jewish feminist, I was delighted to stumble across a blog called Star of Davida. The blog’s author, who went by the name “Talia bat Pessi,” explored her own beliefs and experiences as…

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Is Swedish Yiddish the Key to Europe’s Jewish Future?

By Doreen El-Roeiy May 6, 2015

Much of Europe’s political toolbox for facilitating multicultural policies is rusting. One of its biggest and strongest remaining tools, call it the hammer, is the Council of Europe (CoE). This hammer is trying to nail down a web of legislation working towards more recognition for Europe’s diverse cultural heritage. Expanding on the tool metaphor, the…

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The Jews are (Not) White

By Evan Goldstein January 27, 2015

There’s a point in academic research where one becomes somewhat monomaniacal. I wouldn’t know what that word means unless it had been on an episode of The West Wing, but here I mean to say that I’ve sort of lost the ability to think about things that aren’t Jewish identity and theology (to the eternal…

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Baruch Dayan ha-Emet: A D’var Torah For a Shabbat Seeking Shalom

By Evan Goldstein January 9, 2015

As I write this Friday night, several things are true. A prolonged manhunt continues in France, pursuing suspects involved with an attack on a kosher supermarket. The Grand Synagogue of Paris is closed on Shabbat for the first time since World War II, a harrowing start to 2015 following a year of resurgent, ugly anti-Semitism….

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Reconciliation – The Only Way Forward

By Hannah Monius November 24, 2014

Last week, two Palestinian cousins, armed with a meat cleaver and a gun, attacked worshipers at Kehilat B’nei Torah synagogue in Har Nof, Jerusalem, killing four Israelis. This is the most devastating attack Jerusalem has seen since 2008 and it is now, more than ever, imperative that people start thinking about the religious and cultural…

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First Results of the Jewish Student Survey are In!

By Derek M. Kwait September 15, 2014

  Preliminary results of the Demographic Survey of American Jewish College Students 2014 are out. Started last spring by Drs. Barry Kosmin and Ariela Keysar at the Trinity College Institute for the Study of Secularism in Society and Culture, this is the first comprehensive scientific survey ever of an underrepresented and under studied demographic: American…

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Why the Search for Aaron Sofer Matters

By David G. August 27, 2014

On Friday, August 22, Aaron Sofer was taking a shortcut through the Jerusalem Forest with his friend. The two became separated when his friend wanted to try hiking up a hill, and later that evening when the friend returned home, he discovered that Aaron was missing. When I came online Saturday night, I learned about…

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Meeting New People: A Five-Step Guide for Non-Jews Meeting Jews for the First Time

By Ed Mighell August 19, 2014

  College means opening your mind and seeing a lot of new faces. You may even find yourself learning more from those around you than from of all the information in your textbooks. Of course, meeting people who think differently than you can be nerve-racking. If you’re meeting a Jewish person for the first time,…

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Stuff White People Like: Savior Complexes and Palestine

By Jonathan Katz August 15, 2014

    Some people study whales. Some people study epistemological analysis. I study white people. More specifically, I am interested in diaspora networking and migrant housing stock, but I am also interested in the way whiteness as a concept affects these in host countries. A lot of the time, that idea means things like deeply…

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My Best Friend is Anti-Semitic

By David G. August 11, 2014

Staring across a room filled with tiny chairs and colorful books, I felt a great fear. The other people there were all strangers, the person across from me had bright red spiked hair, and only about 8 teeth. He looked sort of like my glue-sniffing boss from my days as a janitor. This was way…

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We Need Arguments, Not Echos

By Derek M. Kwait July 3, 2014

I don’t know how so many pundits had reactions polished and published within hours of the announcement of the news of the murders of Gil-ad Shaar, Eyal Yifrach, and Naftali Fraenkel. I wanted to take time to let the shock dull a little, then write something about it. My thoughts are still a little disjointed,…

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On Why I Take Yiddish Now

By Dani Plung February 19, 2014

Yiddish is my favorite class. This isn’t new information, I’m sure; I’ve written about it on several occasions, including a piece entitled “On Why I Take Yiddish.”  I furthermore use Yiddish allusions and colloquialisms as a matter of practice—in writing as well as in general conversation—so I’m sure my new found passion for the language…

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Me and Mein Kampf

By Dani Plung January 22, 2014

    For the past few weeks I’ve seen from various sources on Facebook, and most recently on Tablet, a growing concern about a potentially frightening new trend:  Featured on several Amazon.com best-seller lists are e-book editions of Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf. The first responses I’ve seen have been understandably negative, coming from some reasonably…

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Eat the Food Without Drinking the Kool-Aid: How to Get the Most out of Orthodox Outreach Programs

By David G. January 21, 2014

When I first started to attend a local Orthodox shul, I approached with what could be considered a strong level of trepidation. I grew up mainly Conservative, and considered myself as falling somewhere between the lines of Conservative and Reform. When I thought of Orthodoxy, I thought of my Pop’s narrow-minded uncle who never struck…

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