Slogans can be great: a few words or a short phrase can give us the essence of a matter. Sometimes, though, they can be counterproductive, especially if you think about them in any depth. After all, what does “Coke: It’s the real thing” mean? We think we know because the ads featuring …
Good-bye 2020! This year, we saw the impeachment trial of Donald Trump, a worldwide pandemic that has killed hundreds of thousands of U.S. lives alone and sent our economy into a tailspin, a divisive U.S. presidential election like no other, and nationwide unrest as we struggle to define our…
Before I request a review copy of a novel, I check to see if it contains Jewish content. At a minimum, there has to be at least one Jewish character. If religion plays a role in the book, that’s even better. When looking at works by Israeli authors, though, the same rules don’t always ap…
Russian or Jewish, or a combination of both? That’s the question often raised in works about Russian Jews, whether they live in the former Soviet Union, the United States or Israel. In two recent novels, the emphasis often falls on the Russian aspect of their identities, even after they’…
For my part-time chaplaincy job, I recently taped a 10-minute video about grieving and loss that was sent out to staff members. When I introduced myself, I found myself speaking about two different identities, saying that some people know me as a chaplain and others as the sister of my late …
