Stay the Course
Additional resources
We’ve gathered some resources that will keep the learning going in your community. We will periodically post webinars, podcasts, videos, articles and what reading lists that can be used for text studies in your Tzedek groups. Let us know how you used them!
Holiday Resources that Reflect The Multitudes
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Experience DANCING IN-BETWEEN, The LUNAR Collective's 5783 Haggadah. Created by a committee of 17 Asian Jews, this new Haggadah is a joyful celebration of being both Asian and Jewish amidst powerful Passover rituals.
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Here are some articles that will give some ‘food for thought’ around your seder table:
What if we’re the Egyptians? (Podcast)
It’s time to retire ‘Go Down Moses’ at the Passover seder
Passover Song Acknowledgment Project
Blackness Deserves a Seat at the Seder
Despite 10 years of promises, Jewish leaders have failed to make space for Jews of color
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We’re always looking for ways to enhance how we represent the multitudes at our seder tables
“The Beijing Haggadah” Weaves Chinese Culture Into the Passover Story
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Beyond Juneteenth
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Juneteenth FAQ answering many questions that folks have about marking Juneteenth in Jewish spaces along with a list of resources!
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As a Black ADOS Jew and descendant of Juneteenth, Rabbi Heather has co-created resources that allow for solidarity building and a way to process the generational trauma of American slavery
Bringing Juneteenth onto the Bimah by Rabbi Heather Miller and Rabbi Lev Meirowitz Nelson
Supplemental Juneteenth Reading Source Sheet
Updated Haggadah for Juneteenth for 5783
A Haggadah for Juneteenth by Rabbi Heather Miller (2022)
Kiddush Over Red Drink by Gulienne Rollins Rishon
What Juneteenth Means to my Black Jewish Family by Marcella White Campbell
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Judaism Unbound: Beyond the Count- Ilana Kaufman & Ari Kelman
Ilana Kaufman is the Executive Director of the Jews Of Color Initiative, which recently commissioned a study entitled Beyond the Count: Perspectives and Lived Experiences of Jews of Color. Ari Y. Kelman was a member of the research team that conducted the study. The two of them join Dan and Lex for a conversation about this new study, and how we might apply its findings to American-Jewish life, now and in the future.
Certain parts of this episode reference particular parts of the study, and it may be helpful to have the study open on your computer as you listen. You can access the full study by clicking here.
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Judaism Unbound: The Jewish-Asian Film Project
LUNAR: The Jewish Asian Film Project, cultivates connection, belonging and visibility for Asian American Jews through authentic multimedia storytelling and intersectional community programming. Jenni Rudolph, LUNAR's Executive Creative Director, and Gen Xia Ye Slosberg, LUNAR's Executive Producer, join Dan and Lex to explore the origin and first season of LUNAR. They also offer a sneak preview of season 2, to be released on October 6th, 2021 (just a few days after this podcast episode's release!).
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Judaism Unbound: The Power of Should
Ginna Green and Lynn Harris, co-hosts of A Bintel Brief, explore their evolution from an advice column from over 100 years ago to an oral podcast. They also consider the value of one of the scariest words, in Jewish communities and in our broader society, “should.”
[1] Learn more about Ilana Kaufman here, and learn more about the work of the Jews of Color Initiative at JewsOfColorInitiative.org.
[2] Kaufman references the 2019 study Counting Inconsistencies: An Analysis of American Jewish Population Studies, with a Focus on Jews of Color. Access it by clicking here.
[3] See Ilana Kaufman’s 2015 Eli Talk, entitled Racism in the Jewish Community: The Uncomfortable Truth, by clicking the video on the right.
[4] Kaufman closes the episode by referencing a number of partner-organizations working to empower and celebrate Jews of Color. Learn more about them at this link.
[1] Learn more about Ammud: The Jews of Color Torah Academy at Ammud.org. Check out Arielle Korman’s bio here, and Mira Rivera’s here.
[2] Listen in to previous episodes in this ongoing series, spotlighting organizations empowering Jews of Color, by clicking on any of the following links: Episode 231: A JCC for JOCs (Jews of Color) - Yitz Jordan, Episode 232: Why the Uncounted Count - Ilana Kaufman (more episodes to come in the next few weeks).
[3] Learn more about Bend The Arc’s Selah Leadership Program (and its cohorts specifically designed for Jews of Color), which played an influential role in the story of Ammud, by clicking here.
[4] For a recent article looking at Ammud’s work, along with the work of many other organizations, see a recent JTA piece by Josefin Dolsten, entitled “Jewish communities are finally paying attention to Jews of color. Here’s the long road to how they got there.”
Whitman College's Helen Kim and Noah Leavitt (Associate Professor of Sociology and Associate Dean of Students, respectively), join Judaism Unbound for an episode on their book, entitled JewAsian. [1] The book discards the idea that provides an in-depth exploration of two important groups of people: couples made up of one Jewish partner and one Asian partner (the Asian individuals may or may not be Jewish themselves) and the children of such relationships. Kim and Leavitt discuss their findings with co-hosts Dan and Lex, along with a wide variety of related topics as they relate to the ever-shifting landscape of contemporary American Judaism.
The doll test
The "doll test" is a psychological experiment designed in the 1940s in the USA to test the degree of marginalization felt by African American children caused by prejudice, discrimination and racial segregation. These implicit bias tests show just how young we are when we start breathing the ‘smog.’
Love Thy Neighbor
Thirty years ago, in the Brooklyn neighborhood of Crown Heights, a car accident set off four days of unrest. Two people died. Dozens were injured. Hundreds were arrested. In this Pineapple Street Studios series, journalist Collier Meyerson explores what came to be known as the “Crown Heights Riot.” It’s a story about immigration, New York City’s first Black mayor, the rise of Rudy Giuliani, and the Lubavitch Jewish and Caribbean-American communities sitting at the center of it all. To Meyerson, the Crown Heights Riot can help us unlock and understand so many of our modern dilemmas: from police violence and racism to the persistence of antisemitism.
Race: the power of an illusion
The division of the world's peoples into distinct groups - "red," "black," "white" or "yellow" peoples - has became so deeply imbedded in our psyches, so widely accepted, many would promptly dismiss as crazy any suggestion of its falsity. Yet, that's exactly what this provocative, new three-hour series by California Newsreel claims. Race - The Power of an Illusion questions the very idea of race as biology, suggesting that a belief in race is no more sound than believing that the sun revolves around the earth.
Yet race still matters. Just because race doesn't exist in biology doesn't mean it isn't very real, helping shape life chances and opportunities.
Watch the trailer to the left and the link to the full documentary is in the title.
Looking Back at Jews and the Civil Rights Movement
with Dr. Jason Schulman
From the JTS Series: The Other in Jewish Text and Tradition
Download presentation slides
Download text only (for printing)
reading lists
adult reading
Christian Supremacy: Reckoning with the Roots of Antisemitism and Racism by Magda Teter
Blacks and Jews in America: An Invitation to Dialogue by Terrence L. Johnson and Jacques Berlinerblau
Caste by Isabel Wilkerson
The Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel Wilkerson
The Color of Law by Richard Rothstein
My Grandmother’s Hands by Resmaa Menakem
The Color of Love by Marra B. Gad
Black Power, Jewish Politics: Reinventing the Alliance in the 1960s by Marc Dollinger
How Jews Became White Folks & What That Says About Race in America by Karen Brodkin
The Soul of Judaism: Jews of African Descent in America by Bruce D. Haynes
Stamped From the Beginning by Ibram X. Kendi
Four Hundred Souls by Ibram X. Kendi
The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander
So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo
What Does It Mean to Be White?: Developing White Racial Literacy by Robin D’Angelo
White Fragility by Robin D’Angelo
parenting
Raising White Kids: Bringing Up Children in a Racially Unjust America by Dr. Jennifer Harvey
for kids
Workitu’s Passover: A Story from Ethiopia by Zahava Workitu Goshen & Maayan Ben Hagai
The Very Best Sukkah: A Story From Uganda by Shoshana Nambi
Hanukkah Moon by Deborah Da Costa
Jalapeno Bagels Natasha Wing
A Synagogue Just Like Home by Alice Blumenthal McGinty
The Secret Shofar of Barcelona by Jacqueline Dembar Greene
Falasha No More: An Ethiopian Jewish Child Comes Home by Arlene Kushner and Amy Kalina
My Name is Rachanim by Jonathan P. Kendall
Passover Around the World by Tami Lehman-Wilzig and Elizabeth Wolf
The Colors of Us by Karen Katz
Yaffa and Fatima: Shalom, Salaam by Fawzia Gilani-Williams
Hanukkah: Eight Lights Around the World by Susan Sussman
Osnat and Her Dove by Sigal Samuel and Naomi Samuel
Buen Shabbat by Sara Aroeste
A Key From Spain by Debbie Levy
The Cross by Day, Mezuzzah by Night by Deborah Spector Siegel
Let’s Talk About Race by Julius Lester
Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You by Jason Reynolds and Ibram X Kendi
Baby Goes to Market by Atinuke
Sulwe by Lupita Nyong’o
Sofia Valdez, Future Prez by Andrea Beaty
A Way With Wild Things by Larissa Theule
I Am Enough by Grace Byers
Be Kind by Pat Zietlow Miller
Thank You, Omu! by Oge Mora
Saturday by Oge Mora
Once Upon a World: Cinderella by Chloe Perkins
Julian in a Mermaid by Jessica Love
Pink is for Boys by Robb Pearlman
Once Upon a World: Rapunzel by Chloe Perkins
articles
Skin in the Game: How Antisemitism Animates White Nationalism by Eric K. Ward
Statistics one-pager on Jews of Color and Multiracial Jewish Families
My Son was Racially Profiled at his Day School. Here’s How they Handled It.
DEI in Jewish Schools: What’s at Stake for Jews of Color by Heather Miller
At the new Museum of the Southern Jewish Experience, seder plates and slave receipts by Carly Berlin
I Helped Coin the Term 'Jews of Color.' It's Time for a History Lesson by Shahanna McKinney-Baldon
Jewish Word | Jews of Color The power—and limitations—of a porous term by Sarah Breger
Raising Asian Jewish Kids in the U.S. Has Never Been More Scary by Melody Muhlrad
The Real Reason People Question My Judaism by Esther Malka Issever
How Antisemitism Fuels White Nationalism
Antisemitism has been called the oldest hatred in the world. How does it adapt and why does it endure? SET THE WORLD ON FIRE is a virtual town hall on conspiracy theories that never die and ancient hatreds that harm us all. Learn more at https://www.pbs.org/wnet/exploring-hate/ “Conspiracy theories give people a way to think they’re responding to the real anxieties and suffering of our times but in misplacing accountability, they only serve to increase the danger.” – Racial Justice Activist Eric Ward Bringing new insights to urgent problems, Hari Sreenivasan, PBS NewsHour Weekend anchor and contributor to Amanpour and Company, moderates a conversation between racial justice activist Eric Ward, American University Professor Pamela Nadell, former Homeland Security analyst Daryl Johnson, and former white nationalist Derek Black.
The Largest study ever of jews of color. what did it find?
The Jews of Color Initiative published the findings of its "Beyond the Count: Perspectives and Lived Experiences of Jews of Color" survey, the largest survey of Jews of Color to date. It found most of us experience discrimination, only half of us feel like we belong, and only a minority of us are converts. What does this mean for Jewish communities and Jewish institutions? Y-LOVE gives his take on this historic undertaking.
Lunar: THe asian Jewish film project
23 Asian American Jews examine identity through the lens of food. Through sharing memories of foods from our Asian and Jewish cultures, the LUNAR cast discusses Asian and Jewish food philosophies, intertwined food history, and the many possibilities (and limitations) of Jewish-Asian fusion food.
We Are Family: Rethinking Race in the Jewish Community | Rabbi Angela Buchdahl |Yom Kippur 5781/2020
"I'm suggesting that it is time to stop thinking of Jewish Peoplehood as a race. Instead, think of Jewish Peoplehood as a family."
Rabbi Angela Buchdahl's powerful and personal Yom Kippur sermon, "'We Jews Are Not a Race': A Rabbi of Color Speaks Personally on Yom Kippur," examines how Jews have evolved to include many people that don't necessarily "look Jewish."
Racism in the jewish community: the uncomfortable truth
The racial and ethnic makeup of America is changing, and with it the face of the American Jewish community; are our communal institutions equipped to deal with this change? In a powerful and personal talk, Ilana Kaufman makes the case for counting - and accounting for - all the Jewish people.
Intersectionality as a Jewish Practice
Yavilah McCoy speaks on "Intersectionality as a Jewish Practice" during Avodah's speaker series, Speak Torah to Power. Yavilah McCoy is the CEO of the international diversity consulting group, VISIONS Inc. in Boston. She is also the founder of Ayecha, one of the first nonprofit Jewish organizations to provide Jewish diversity education and advocacy for Jews of Color in the United States.
What Makes This Jew Different Than All Other Jews? Race, Difference, and Safety in Jewish Spaces
We are a people of questions, but perhaps certain types of questions directed at certain kinds of people diminish the safety of all of us. A modern liberal idea? MaNishtana thinks not; he explains that checking people at the door is not something we Jews can or should recognize as traditional.