by BZ · Wednesday, May 7th, 2008
As Israel prepares to celebrate 60 years of ambiguity in this department, it’s been a big week for issues of religion and state. And here’s the latest news:
Israel’s Reform Jews dedicated the first non-Orthodox synagogue to receive state funding on Monday, after a long court battle that accented the rift among streams of Judaism in Israel.
The Reform Yozma congregation fought for the better part of a decade for state funding equivalent to what Orthodox congregations receive. After arguing their case twice before the Supreme Court, they got what they wanted: a prefabricated, two-room building on a plot of land in the center of Modiin, a new town between Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.
“This is a substantial step in recognizing different streams of Judaism in the state of Israel,” said Rabbi Kinneret Shiryon, who leads the 240-family congregation. The government has long funded Orthodox synagogues, even paying rabbi’s salaries.
The Reform movement is trumpeting this as a huge victory. And I can see why it would feel good to finally get a piece of the pie. But I’m not feeling so great about it. I want to see a thriving liberal Jewish culture in Israel, but I fear that this development, insofar as it sets a precedent, is dangerous for liberal Judaism in the long run. (And if it doesn’t set a precedent, then it’s an insignificant anomaly.)
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by Kol Ra'ash Gadol · Sunday, February 17th, 2008
Recent postings on the uterus problem (see here) have been right to question the tshuvah that recently was issued from the bowels of the CJLS. I’m sorry that I got scooped on this because it’s a long standing argument that I have been having with my teachers (whom I respect very much, despite our disagreements) for years now. First of all, here is the URL for the actual tshuvah. I recommend reading it.
Secondly, I want to give kudos to Rabbi Jill Jacobs’ and Rabbi Jason Miller’s comments on the post at jspot. Both of them note that there need to be more social supports put in place for people to have children, Rabbi Jacobs noting:
–Would rabbinical students be more willing to have kids while in grad school if the rabbinical schools offered on-site child care?
–Would it be easier for Jewish women professionals (and men) to participate in professional conferences (such as the RA, from which I just returned, and where I bumped into a few poor women trying to nurse on the floor of the bathroom), if these conferences offered nursing rooms, child care, or other accommodations? (a shout out to the Wexner Foundation for being a leader in this regard)
–Would Jewish women professionals be able more easily to “have it all” if more Jewish institutions offered flex time, family health insurance, on-site child care, and paid for child care when the mom or dad is on the road?
And Rabbi Miller adding:
— not just for the women. As a 26-year-old rabbinical student whose wife was working full-time, I often felt the challenge of sitting in a class while bottle-feeding my baby son. An on-site day-care facility at JTS would have been an important resource.
He also on his own blog made some comments.
(Although I do want to note that I can’t imagine why any women were nursing on the floor of the bathroom, since the hotel in question is luxurious to the point of ridiculousness, and the WC had an anteroom with, I’m told, quite comfortable chairs and, I’m told by a nursing friend, the heat turned way up so that it was a perfectly comfortable place to strip down and nurse if necessary. Of course, the very luxuriousness of the hotel was apparently rather a sore point amongst the many, many Conservative rabbis who lack large convention stipends or, indeed, any, such as those who aren’t pulpit rabbis, or who are, but whose pulpits are more modest, say, under 500 members. A sore point indeed).
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by TheBarkin · Saturday, December 15th, 2007
This week, the lay leadership (and most of the professional leadership) of the Union for Reform Judaism converged on San Diego, CA for the 69th (heh heh) Biennial. Basically, this is the big conference where Reform leaders educate themselves and each other, meet to talk about pressing issues, conduct the business of the Reform movement, and launch new products and initiatives.
Some Biennial news bites:
• Delegates (or, rather, anyone who managed to be at this morning’s Shabbat services) got to take home their own copy of the new siddur, Mishkan T’filah, which is now — after quite a few delays — officially out and available for temples or individuals to purchase. Fully discussing the new siddur would take a separate post, but I think it’s fair to say that most people here are pretty excited about it.
• Michael J. Fox received the Eisendrath Bearer of Light award for his activist work. People seemed to be inspired by his speech. I rode in an elevator with him when he was leaving his hotel to go to the award reception thing. He is, indeed, short.
• URJ Press and the Women of Reform Judaism (the movement’s sisterhood wing) released a new women’s Torah commentary. It is a hefty book and is the product of some serious scholarship. I don’t know who’s going to use it (and for what), but the buzz is that it’s a good thing.
Of course, one of the big highlights was the traditional Shabbat morning sermon from Rabbi Eric Yoffie, president of the URJ. In these sermons, Yoffie basically picks some big issues that the Union should be focusing on, and then unveils initiatives and programs that the Union is embarking on in order to address them. You can read the whole sermon (which took him an hour to deliver) here, but here are the big points, with some commentary:
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by LastTrumpet · Wednesday, November 28th, 2007
In non-Annapolis news, the Times this morning reports:
Without a building and budget, Tikkun Leil Shabbat is one of the independent prayer groups, or minyanim, that Jews in their 20s and 30s have organized in the last five years in at least 27 cities around the country. They are challenging traditional Jewish notions of prayer, community and identity.
In places like Atlanta; Brookline, Mass.; Chico, Calif.; and Manhattan the minyanim have shrugged off what many participants see as the passive, rabbi-led worship of their parents’ generation to join services led by their peers, with music sung by all, and where the full Hebrew liturgy and full inclusion of men and women, gay or straight, seem to be equal priorities.
Members of the minyanim are looking for “redemptive, transformative experiences that give rhythm to their days and weeks and give meaning to their lives,” said Joelle Novey, 28, a founder of Tikkun Leil Shabbat, whose name alludes to the Jewish concept of tikkun olam, or repairing the world. It is an experience they are not finding in traditional Jewish institutions, she said.
In my mind, there’s nothing in the article most of us don’t already know, but hopefully publicity on this level will help the broader Jewish institutional world wake up a bit. That being said, while the Havurah movement has had notable impact on institutional Judaism, it is still around, and still countercultural. So who knows what the future will hold.
Full story.
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol · Tuesday, September 18th, 2007
“Survey finds rabbis pessimistic about future, shul attendance”
Seriously? Rabbis pessimistic about the future?
I don’t feel the need to comment further because we’ve written bookloads of words about how the mainstreams of Judaism don’t really get how vibrant Jewish life is…outside their very doors. But I just thought, “yes, rabbis pessimistic about the future. Jewish mothers, attempt guilt trip. Sun rises in morning.”
by Danya · Tuesday, August 21st, 2007
According to a recent study at Hebrew University, shulgoers have a longer lifespan than non-shulgoers. Haaretz reports,
Data showed that the death rate was 75 percent higher among the group that did not attend synagogue than it was among the group that attended synagogue regularly.
Litwin said that there is no clear-cut explanation for the synagogue attendance effect, but outlined two main possibilities.
“One explanation is spiritual, that is, the individual faith factor,” he said. “A series of studies that have been conducted in recent years,
especially in the United States, argue that faith helps people deal with psychological pressure. People who believe and pray apparently survive
longer,” said Litwin.
“Another explanation is the connection between attending synagogue and belonging to a supportive community,” he added.
Litwin said that in late old age decreased social activity is a common problem.
“A person who goes to synagogue has a function: He is called to the Torah, and he has a network of social ties in the community.”
It’s fair to note, though, that there is some chance that there’s a chicken-and-egg thing happening in the data reporting, as well. For,
Litwin also noted that since religious Jews do not drive on Shabbat, a person who goes to synagogue regularly must be able to walk, and hence is
healthier.
In any case, full story here.
(Thanks to Uri for the tip!)
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol · Wednesday, May 2nd, 2007
JTA reports that in his speech Monday to the Conservative Movement’s Rabbinical Assembly at its annual convention, the new chancellor Arnold Eisen “was given four standing ovations and received universal praise.”
In fact, it seems to me that his message is right on - (and, while I’m at it, IMO the message is, in a certain sense a continuation of BZs post below)- according to the article, he notes that “the movement has ‘largely dropped the ball’ by allowing pluralism — the notion of competing views of halacha, or Jewish law, coexisting harmoniously — to become its core message,” and suggests that
… contemporary beliefs and practices of American Jews are no longer working in the movement’s favor. Freedom and mobility have threatened the building of strong communities, which Eisen identified as a critical component in the success of Orthodoxy.
Jews are committed to the modern ideology of personal sovereignty, which rubs up against the notion of halacha as a binding set of laws. And they take their cues on the meaning of prayer and religious obligation from the surrounding Christian culture.
Changed circumstances require changes in rabbinic training and in the movement’s strategies, Eisen said. He urged Conservative rabbis to build “tight communities” in which meaningful Jewish practice is part of the broader rhythms of life. He warned them against pursuing a top-down pedagogy that begins with asserting the requirements of Jewish law.
Eisen urged the rabbis to think more broadly about the concept of “mitzvah,” which he suggested means more than simply “commandment,” as it is normally defined.
Instead of the rabbi preaching about what everyone is obliged to do, he said, rabbis need to create strong bonds of community that make obligation to one another and to God much more appealing to a contemporary person.
Eisen also argued that Jewish life must be lived inside what he called a “plausibility structure” — the social and cultural context that makes religious claims meaningful and convincing.
“Jews are living in a time and space that is not Jewish,” he said. The claims of obligation “are not plausible unless they come in a situation of community.”
Above all, the movement must intensely engage its congregants in a way that rivals what is frequently found in Orthodox communities. There is a hunger for that, Eisen said, and the Conservative movement must provide it.
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by Kol Ra'ash Gadol · Tuesday, February 20th, 2007
According to JTA, on Feb. 11th, the government of Israel and the Masorti (Israeli Conservative) movement came to an agreement so that Masorti Jews using Robinson’s Arch to pray would no longer be charged by the archaeological park until 10:30 in the morning on weekdays, Friday evenings and holidays.
The decision to have a legally sanctioned area for Jews who wanted to pray in mixed minyans, or quorums, at the Western Wall followed violent attacks on mixed groups praying with Torah scrolls in 1998 and 1999.
The worshipers were pelted with stones and reportedly even feces-filled diapers by fervently Orthodox worshipers who were enraged at the sight of women and men praying together at the rear of the Western Wall plaza.
At the time a deal was made that worshipers seeking to pray in egalitarian services would be allowed to do so at Robinson’s Arch, an archaeological site at the far southern edge of the Western Wall.
About two years ago the archaeological park that oversees the site began charging worshipers who came to pray after 8 in the morning, claiming the groups were bothersome to tourists, according to Sacks.
by zt · Tuesday, February 20th, 2007
Lots of us have been to weddings or various other lifecycle events where dancing is likely ensue. There is often a moment where people feel like there should be dancing but no one has yet struck out in that direction. A few people get out there and grab a couple other people but it still somewhat awkward. Oftentimes a bunch of people join up quickly and things get going fast, furious, and freylich. Pretty soon other folks see that it’s hot and they join up too. The dancing has quickly gone from a dozen or so to a hundred or more and it grinds to a slow crawl. The excitement of the original dancing has died down and people are taking short strides to the right, careful to avoid stepping on feet of elbowing the folks in front and behind. my grandmother’s mall-walking group has more pizazz. This may happen in cycles depending on the occasion and communal dynamics.
Rebecca Meyers suggested, that minyanim have similar cycles. I would add that this trend is not limited to minyanim though lay-leadership and thre assumption that everyone is an active member of the community may exacerbate this process.
It would seem to me that the minyan version of the trend goes something like this:
- Several people who are for some reason dissatisfied with the current options, think there is need for a new place to daven.
- A group of those people try to get something started.
- It sputters at first but the potential is recognized by those in the new minyan and some who are not yet.
- As more folks join, potential is actualized, things are rockin’.
- People start streaming in from all directions.
- What was funky and fantastic becomes overcrowded and less dynamic.
When I first heard it, this analogy struck me as quite astute and a very good fit.
It brings up a couple of questions.
- why do minyanim in step 6 get less vibrant and the davening less good?
- how can you avoid some of the problems created by step 6? what do you do if your group, despite smart community organizing reaches step 6?
(cross-posted at divinity is in the details)
by BZ · Tuesday, February 6th, 2007
(Crossposted to Mah Rabu)
Consider this the next post in the “lilmod mah shetashiv” series for supporters of independent Jewish communities. We’ve all gotten into this argument before.
Abstract: Some people argue that new independent Jewish communities are harmful to existing synagogues. They’re wrong. Other people recognize the fallacies in this argument and advance a more nuanced version. They’re also wrong.
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by Kol Ra'ash Gadol · Sunday, December 31st, 2006
TO start with, let me say that I hate calling them “messianics.” They’re not messianics (at least no more than Judaism is) they’re Christians. But mainstream Christians don’t for the most part, and especially not in Germany, engage in this kind of evil nasty behavior. So what to call them to distinguish them from real Christians and real Jews? I’m up for suggestions.
Anyway, so the point is reported by JTA, that Jews are being targeted in Germany by these folks, and as usual the vulnerable are, well, vulnerable. Russian immigrants, who are lonely and who don’t know much about Judaism are targets because they don’t feel welcomed by the Jewish community, and they don’t see why they shouldn’t join these communities which seem to treat them well.
As the article comments,
“The answer is to be more attractive than the others,” said Anat Bleiberg, head of the Jewish community of Berlin’s social work office. “Look at Chabad: They make themselves attractive and they get lots of members.”
Stephan Kramer, general secretary of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, agrees.
“If Jewish communities are not attractive enough to keep people inside the community, neither a law nor any movement will help,” he said in a recent interview. And if the messianic groups are finding lonely people, “Why are they left alone? Why are the Jewish members of the community not helping each other?”
This is a very good question - and not just in Germany. This problem has been cropping up for quite some time in Israel, where Russians feel discriminated against, where many of them are not halachically Jewish, and no one has been able to get the Orthodox hegemony to work successfully with the other movements to create a program to help them.
But this isn’t just an immigrant problem. In fact, it cuts to the heart. Despite the constant navel gazing about losing numbers (not something that I feel all that worried about personally, given that I think quality is more relevant than quantity, and moreover that quality leads to quantity, but it does seem to be the primary concern of many of our institutions), we just can’t seem to get our act together.
There’s whining about birthrates among Jewish women, but we can’t get our institutions to provide maternity leave; heck, many of them don’t even provide a living wage! There’s moaning about few people coming to services, and what do we do? We focus on the content of the services (either by doing nothing , or getting rid of whatever seems inconvenient at the moment) instead of thinking, “well, maybe there’s nothing wrong with the content; maybe it’s the culture?” Chabad actually does pretty well with this (as noted by the article) - they make sure there are friendly faces at every service, they make sure there are meal invitations, and not just once or twice. There’s tons of other things that could be done too…
I have to admit, I feel tired reading this all the time. We have plenty of money to build Holocaust museums ad nauseum, but where is the money for the day schools outside of the Orthodox community? Where is the money for those who can’t afford the unbeliveable costs of schools, camps, shul memberships, what have you?
What else can I throw into this boiling pot? I could go on, but I won’t; I’m sure readers can help out by filling in the other relevant problems, but I will close with this: When I was in high school, I knew two Jews who came from working class families. I don’t mean middle class. I mean working class. They were friends, we lived not far from one another. One of them, is still Jewish-identified, but doesn’t do anything Jewish. He and his mother never felt welcome in any synagogue, and were too proud to go through all the hoops of proving their need to ask for a handout of free membership and the like. So he doesn’t really know anything much about being Jewish, interestingly, lots of his friends were Jewish in high school, but that never became anything deeper.
The other one, was welcomed very strongly and today strongly identifies as Jewish. Her congregation welcomed her and her mother, never asked them for money, helped them out when they needed it, and they have many close friends there. Oh, yeah, did I mention, they believe in Jesus?
by YehuditBrachah · Tuesday, December 12th, 2006
[Thanks to BZ for encouragement posting this, originally given as a dvar torah Friday night.]
In my Talmud class this semester, we are studying tractate Brachot (Blessings), chapter four. In it (27b to 28a), there is an intriguing story about Rabban Gamliel, the great leader of the beit midrash, the house of study of the rabbis, right after the fall of the Second Temple.
So, Rabban Gamliel is not such a pleasant guy. He runs a tight ship. He does not allow multiple rulings in his beit midrash, at least not when the disputed one is his. He sometimes likes to humiliate his peers to make them recant their disagreements with him.
He especially has it out for Rabbi Yehoshua. One day, when Rabbi Yehoshua disagrees with him, he makes Rabbi Yehoshua stand up in front of everyone and deny the disagreement. He then makes Rabbi Yehoshua stand for the rest of Rabban Gamliel’s lecture. Just stand in the front row, in front of everyone, as an example. At this point, the other rabbis in the beit midrash have had enough. It is time for a change in leadership. It is time for a coup. They stand up and stop the lecture.
The rabbis argue amongst themselves over who will replace Rabban Gamliel, who will have enough yichus because their good family name will speak for them, or who has money so that they can be called before Caesar. Who will be impressive enough to represent them to the world. They choose a successor. This is not the most remarkable part, though.
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by Josh Frankel · Tuesday, October 17th, 2006
Check out the Beth El Synagogue in Durham, North Carolina.
Beth El is a pluralistic community and welcomes members who have diverse backgrounds, ideas, levels of knowledge, and observance. We are an egalitarian Conservative congregation and a member of the Seaboard Region of the United Synagogue for Conservative Judaism, which hosts this website.
We offer an Orthodox Kehillah affiliated with the Orthodox Union for those who wish to worship in accordance with that tradition.
Our Rabbi, Steven G. Sager, is a graduate of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College.
Beat that, indie-minyans!
by shamirpower · Sunday, October 1st, 2006
“…it’s never too late to start reclaiming your relationship with the words,” writes Jerusalemite Brian Blum:
So every year when Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur come around, I have the same problem with all those old-fashioned words. Now, before you call me a heretic, hear me out. It’s not like I’m going to stop going to synagogue or remain part of the community on these festive days: My commitment to a Jewish lifestyle transcends any transitory difficulties I may have with the liturgy. But it would be nice if the text wasn’t so archaically unapproachable.
Sound familiar? Shul may not be the choice for every Jew, but for those of us who plan on being there and may be carrying an ounce or two of dread, it’s worth a read.
My advice: take a walk, streatch, bring extra reading materials and let yourself have a day to reflect, while joining with a community of others.
To our loyal Jewschool readers, I wish you an easy and meaningful fast. May this be a Shabbat Shabbaton for you — a complete day of rest for your body, mind, and soul.
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol · Monday, September 18th, 2006
JTA has quite a few posts today to continue and add to our recent thread on indie minyans and the failings of synagogues.
On synagogues who have multiple offerings. I will note that this is frequently not an option in small communities. One of the things that those of us who are committed to enlivining traditional Judaism will have to deal with is that in many communities, there simply isn’t any way to have multiple options at once - once you start splittling people up into mini-minyans, you often have barely enough to count a minyan, let alone give it the kind of energy that brings people in.
-In Boston
-In Manhattan
-On writing your own siddurim
-What matters?
“Programs come and go. But experts agree that the key intangible that makes synagogue transformation possible is strong rabbinic and lay leadership — the human catalyst that links the pulpit to the congregation. ”
-Does any of this stuff actually work?
by YehuditBrachah · Thursday, September 14th, 2006
I have to admit that I’m surprised and delighted at how much conversation the JTA article has produced both on Jewschool (see “Trifecta” and “indie minyans”) and across the spectrum (rumor has it that the Shefa Network’s email list is afire with discussion about independent minyanim). As someone interviewed in the article who is also a rabbinical student, I want to pose the question to the Jewschool community: what is the role of the person who has completed rabbinical training in all this?
I have a very good idea of my critiques of the mainstream Jewish community’s passivity and hierarchy, its funding priorities, as well as the “wine and cheese party” focus for people in their 20s and 30s (I wanted her to use my other quote in which I said, “They’re so concerned with making Jewish babies that they forget about making Jewish lives,” but I digress).
But, at the same time as I am fully engaged in building a vibrant, authentic, empowered (read: non-hierarchical) Jewish expression and community(ies), I have a little “problem”:
I am going to be a rabbi. I have actually chosen to go to many years of schooling in the Jewish tradition, and to devote my professional life to realizing change in the Jewish world and beyond. As some commentators on “indie minyans” were mentioning, a non-Orthodox rabbinical student (and many Orthodox) comes out of school today with lots of debt because of lack of funding, which makes it impossible for her or him to work for free with a little minyan or to do part-time work in community-based groups without significant other funds.
Looking at the commentators’ discussions on these two Jewschool posts, I want to summarize the multiple definitions of what these minyanim are doing and present the question. Commentators here have thrown out different constitutive definitions of these minyanim as:
being lay-led
being spirited with an empowered approach to organizing
being for a specific age demographic
informality
providing Jewish religious experience without demanding high fees
small, tighter community that cares about each other
Kol Ra’ash Gadol said in “indie miynans”:
Recently the gaze seems to be upon the fact that many of the attendees are Conservative Jews, rabbinical students and rabbis. Why this seem to be so shocking is a bit bemusing to me: the fact that young Conservative Jews aren’t getting what they want from synagogues is not news.
Perhaps it isn’t having a building fund and membership sign-up — having the trappings of being “official” — that makes us run away.
I assert and believe (and hope?) there are ways that the current generation of rabbis-in-training who are on board with and are in fact co-creating these independent communities can actually join with good holy souls to *gasp* bring these visions into the batei knesset of American Judaism (and further). The above qualities that are to describe these minyanim need not exclusively apply to unfunded minyanim that don’t own meeting space and lack a sisterhood.
They are mistaken, those in the movements who, because they can’t hear the critique the minyanim are launching against the mainstream, are gleefully and ominously predicting the downfall of these independent minyanim once we grow a little older. But I challenge us: What are the next steps? What kind of shteiblach might we create — ones with all the qualities listed above, but in which we can mark life cycle events, raise kids, be cared for in our old age?
More to the stated topic of this post: What IS the role of the rabbi in the independent minyan movement? I truly hope that the rest of us who are creating these communities can think about ways that we rabbis-to-be and recently ordained rabbis can actually serve as resources for these communities. Because, just as one cannot learn quantum physics without a teacher, it is also extremely difficult to learn/create a spritual practice without teachers. I wouldn’t be the person I am today without important Jewish teachers who have changed my life (both with and without official titles). We are all teachers and learners.
It also happens to be true that some of us have spent 5+ years in school so that we can serve the rest of us as resources for building our Jewish lives. Please. Please! Use us as such. And help us all figure out a way that we rabbis don’t have to take a job in a large, impersonal, suburban temple in order to pay off our school loans.
Won’t you come to my small, spirited, lay-empowered, caring, justice-motivated, pluralistic store-front shteibl? Oh, and help me create it?
by BZ · Tuesday, September 12th, 2006
Wow, this is the third time in less than a week that the JTA is reporting on the independent minyan/havurah scene!
This time around, as a sidebar to the independent minyan article featuring the Mission Minyan, they cover the “trichitza” phenomenon and its historical origins, and they even have a shout-out to Mah Rabu’s Hilchot Pluralism series.
To clarify what I meant in my quote:
Trichitzas are groovy, but they’re not the be-all and end-all solution that will make it possible for all Jews to daven together. They don’t address the egal/non-egal question at all. But if you can decouple the issue of where people are sitting from the issues of who’s leading what / who counts in the minyan / etc., and come up with solutions to the latter issues that work for your community, then trichitzas are groovy. The “mix and match” part refers to the fact that there are minyanim with mixed seating that are entirely non-egal, minyanim with mechitzas and egalitarian Torah services, and minyanim with trichitzas and various configurations of who can lead what, etc.
by Ari · Wednesday, August 16th, 2006
So, here’s my current excuse for not posting for ages:
On Wednesday last week, the Jewish Women’s Archive launched an exciting (to me as a staffmember, especially) new project called “Katrina’s Jewish Voices.” The project lets us dive into something we call “online collecting” - the ability of individual people to participate in an exhibit by contributing their own images, documents, thoughts, media files, etc. It also lets viewers of the exhibit, as well as participants, do something that is increasingly common elsewhere in the web world: tag items, as well as to store favorites onsite.
As an archive dedicated to uncovering, chronicling, and transmitting Jewish women’s experiences, it is especially exciting to be extending the concept of “archive” beyond the limits imposed by internal resources and whatever selection process. And, by having this particular archive address the stories of both men and women, we are able to focus on the issue itself—the history of Jewish communities along the Gulf Coast, as well as the changes hastened or created by the impact of Hurricane Katrina last year (yahrzeit in two weeks).
Members of the Jewish community in New Orleans and across the country may now contribute their stories and photographs to an interactive website and browse the existing collection. Documents such as emails describing people’s experiences of evacuation, resettlement, and rebuilding efforts; photos of their homes and businesses; High Holiday and Shabbat sermons; and blogs and web pages are all important parts of the historical record.
Here’s the press release part: ‘If there is one message JWA wants to communicate, it is DON’T DELETE ITEMS—CONTRIBUTE THEM! “We encourage everyone to search their computers for materials they think may be of interest,” says Jayne Guberman, the archive’s Director of Oral History. “We can accept any digital file or people can type in their story directly.” Contributors can categorize, or tag, their items with search terms ranging from “dreidel” to “displacement” and “acts of heroism” to “Katrina fatigue.”’
‘JWA has also partnered with the Goldring/Woldenberg Institute of Southern Jewish Life in Jackson, Mississippi on the oral history component that complements the website. Dr. Rosalind Hinton, project oral historian, will conduct 100 digital video interviews with members of the local Jewish communities. The public is invited to suggest names of family, friends and colleagues by using the nomination form at www.jwa.org/research/kjv.’
Do come visit katrina.jwa.org and let us know what you think!
