One of the core educational questions related to Jewish Peoplehood is how to cultivate it. A recent blogcast convened by CASJE – the Consortium for Applied Studies in Jewish Education, raised this very question. The blogcast brought together several educators and policy-makers with an interest in the Peoplehood practice of Jewish educational travel. Over the course…
I love my nuclear family. I also love my extended family. And I particularly love the way they celebrate Thanksgiving. When I was living in New York, our family of five would go to our first-cousins home every year. It was just about as “Americana” as you could get, with the traditional Thanksgiving foods, the…
Taken straight from the headlines: Website Offers Virtual Seder Dancing Bar Mitzvah Boy Donated his $36,000 gift money to Charity Virtual Judaism: Finding Second Life in Online Community Should Auschwitz be a Site for Selfies? When you read these headlines are you confused? concerned? angered? Or are you curious? hopeful? inspired? If you were one of…
The recent policy piece published in eJewishPhilanthropy, “Strategic Directions for Jewish Life: A Call to Action” offers a credible roadmap for the next decade, at least, for the American Jewish community. And its signatories offer much food for thought for those of us engaged in Jewish education and leadership. And yet, as I read the…
We are delighted to release the latest edition of the Peoplehood Papers, which focuses on developing teen leadership with a Peoplehood orientation. This edition is a partnership with the Diller Teen Fellows Program, and contains 11 articles by a wide variety of educators and Jewish professionals engaged in teen leadership and empowerment. As Adam Weisberg…
The most overused and abused word in the Jewish world must surely be “community.” Here in Los Angeles, we’re often told that we’re all part of some grand “Jewish community,” but deep down, we know better. If by community we mean a group of like-minded people whose company we enjoy, then the only communities we…
The past year has been a very productive one for the Center for Jewish Peoplehood Education and we'd love to share some of the highlights from the past 12 months: Two new editions of the Peoplehood Papers: #13 on Jewish Peoplehood: What does it mean? Why is it important? How do we Nurture It?; #14, inspired by the…
Thanks to our talented friends at G-dcast we are delighted to launch six new short videos that explain and focus on the six core themes of Jewish Peoplehood. These themes, which are the central focus of the Education Toolkit, combine to create the multi-faceted concept that is Jewish Peoplehood. Check out the video below –…
Every High Holiday season a powerful sound momentarily causes we who experience it to pause. Tekiah. Shvarim. Truah. Tekiah Gedolah. Those sounds, stirring and dramatic, lead to personal reflection about how we missed the mark in the previous year and how we want to improve in the coming year. But shofar is about more than…
We have chosen some ready-to-use educational resources from the Peoplehood Education Toolkit that bring together themes of Jewish Peoplehood and the High Holiday season. Check them out: Collective Prayer – A text study and activity based on the Vidui (Confession) liturgy of the High Holidays. How do we understand the language of "we" in relation to our…
I recently visited the POLIN Museum for the History of Polish Jews and discovered an innovative new museum that I believe will change the ways we tell Jewish narratives and educate about the past and present. Let me begin with a confession. This was my first trip to Poland ever. The first because my late…
Check out the new media resources in the CJPE Toolkit for Jewish Educators. We are curating and organizing selections of short video clips that educators can use to explore the themes of Jewish Peoplehood. With each video clip we also offer you suggestions for activities to use with those clips, and all part of our interconnected…
In a recent talk Noam Pianko, a contemporary scholar of Jewish Peoplehood, and professor of Jewish Studies at the University of Washington, offers a stimulating and thoughtful challenge to those of us interested in the future of Jewish Peoplehood, both as a concept and as a way of building collective Jewish identity. See here for…
Six months ago, I began teaching a premarital class to intrafaith and interfaith couples being married by clergy at my synagogue. The impetus for the class was the increasing disaffiliation and disconnection of Jewish young adults from Jewish life. Regardless of whether couples were endogamous or interfaith, we believed that marriage presented an opportunity to…
With the Israeli elections just days away, Israeli voters are making their final decisions about the party and candidates they will support. Or maybe they are just deciding what to do with an unexpected mid-week day off (Election Day is a public holiday, after all). What is pretty certain is that very few Israeli voters will…
Check out the latest resources in the Toolkit focusing on the theme of Collective Identity. We have some great new activities for you. They include activities using debate and discussion, reflection and some creative arts, as well as those based around stimulating texts and movies. And for a great Passover-themed activity, check out "Collective Memory…
The inaugural conference on the topic of “Israelis and Jewish Peoplehood” drew 250 people this week to Beit Hatfutsot in Tel Aviv to discuss the theory and the practice of Jewish Peoplehood in the context of Israeli society. Organized by the Center for Jewish Peoplehood Education and Beit Hatfutsot – the Museum of the Jewish…
זוהי אסופה של ח"י מאמרים המתמודדים עם שאלות היסוד של התחום: "מה משמעותה של העמיות היהודית? מה חשיבותה? כיצד יש לטפח אותה?" באופן לא מתוכנן התפתח באסופה זאת שיח בין דורי בסוגית העמיות…
The Center for Jewish Peoplehood Education, together with Beit Hatfutsot, is proud to be hosting a ground-breaking conference entitled "Israelis and Jewish Peoplehood: The Challenge of Jewish Peoplehood in Israeli Society", to be held on February 9th in Tel Aviv. Gathering at Beit Hatfutsot on the campus of Tel Aviv University, from 9:30-16:00, the Conference will focus on…
Check out David Zvi Kalman's contemporary midrash (Jewish legend), published in the Peoplehood Papers volume #13, in which he imagines the Jewish People standing at Sinai and receiving the Torah. In this modern midrash, Kalman uses his imagination and knowledge of Jewish texts to create his own interpretation of one of the central collective memories of…