How Iraqi-Jews Became Strangers, Judeo-Persian Women Painters, Sephardi Lives, and an Atlas Mountain Piyyut

6 November 2015  In Honor of Robert Kahen, President of the Iranian Jewish Federation of New York, on the success of IAJF’s 14th Annual Gala

“The Strangers We Became, by Cynthia Kaplan Shamash” By Rachel Sara Rosenthal, Jewish Book Council   Cynthia Kaplan Shamash’s The Strangers We Became tells the story of her “journey from childhood in Iraq to adulthood as a practicing dentist in New York,” with pit-stops in Turkey, Israel, the Netherlands, and England. Read in light of today’s Middle Eastern refugee crisis, Shamash’s memoir is a reminder that the region’s contemporary decline into brutal intolerance can be traced back to the mid-20th century attacks on the region’s Jews.

ASF is hosting Cynthia for a book talk at The Center for Jewish History on 12 November. Click here to RSVP. (Photo courtesy of University Press of New England/Brandeis University)

“The Strangers We Became, by Cynthia Kaplan Shamash”
By Rachel Sara Rosenthal, Jewish Book Council

ASF is hosting Cynthia for a book talk at The Center for Jewish History on 12 November. Click here to RSVP. (Photo courtesy of University Press of New England/Brandeis University) Piyyut of the Week (Video): “By Us, in the Village of Todrah”
 

Judeo-Persian artist Shulamit Nazarian (Photo courtesy of Farhang Foundation)

“Persian-Jewish women keep tradition alive on canvas”  By Bill Boyarsky, Jewish Journal  Painting by Persian-Jewish women in the United States has become “a distinct part of the many-faceted community.” Why do so many Persian-Jewish women paint? Two possible reasons: 1.) painting was a kind of liberation “from the rigid life of the Persian-Jewish community,” and 2.) they are channeling to the canvas an existing Persian-Jewish love of art, from “the design of homes, architecture … (to) poetry, books, (and) drawing.”

Judeo-Persian artist Shulamit Nazarian (Photo courtesy of Farhang Foundation) “Persian-Jewish women keep tradition alive on canvas” 
By Bill Boyarsky, Jewish Journal 

Painting by Persian-Jewish women in the United States has become “a distinct part of the many-faceted community.” Why do so many Persian-Jewish women paint? Two possible reasons: 1.) painting was a kind of liberation “from the rigid life of the Persian-Jewish community,” and 2.) they are channeling to the canvas an existing Persian-Jewish love of art, from “the design of homes, architecture … (to) poetry, books, (and) drawing.”

“Sephardi Lives: A Documentary History, 1700-1950” By Julia Phillips and Sarah Abrevaya Stein, eds., Reviewed by Ralph Tarica, Sephardic Horizons   What was Sephardi life like in the Ottoman Empire? Sephardi Lives: A Documentary History, 1700-1950 is a study of the various dimensions of Ladino-speaking Jewry, including “everyday life, violence and societal transformation, movements and ideologies, World War II, the diaspora and émigré circles, and the emergence of Sephardi studies.” The book shines a light on “Sephardi Jewish engagement with the modern world,” such as “an editorial in 1900 condemn[ing] Jewish women for singing in cafés on the Sabbath,” and, “in 1904 a Sephardic lawyer writ[ing] of his hostility to the notion that the Jews should reconcile with Spain.”

Sephardi Lives Co-Editor Sarah Abrevaya Stein, Maurice Amado Endowed Chair in Sephardic Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles (Photo courtesy of UCLA)

“Sephardi Lives: A Documentary History, 1700-1950”
By Julia Phillips and Sarah Abrevaya Stein, eds., Reviewed by Ralph Tarica, Sephardic Horizons

Sephardi Lives Co-Editor Sarah Abrevaya Stein, Maurice Amado Endowed Chair in Sephardic Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles (Photo courtesy of UCLA)  Donate now and your tax-deductible contribution will help ASF “Connect, Collect, and Celebrate” Sephardi culture throughout the year with engaging programs and compelling publications. 
 

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Copyright © 2015 American Sephardi Federation, All rights reserved.

Thank you for opting (on our websites, at an event, or by email) to receive American Sephardi Federation Programming Updates and Publications. We apologize if this message was sent in error.

The American Sephardi Federation’s Sephardi House is located at the Center for Jewish History (15 West 16th St., New York, New York, 10011).

American Sephardi Federation | http://www.AmericanSephardi.org | info@Sephardi.House | (212) 548-4486


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