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This forum brings together eight scholars of various disciplines who take stock of queer perspectives on Jewish Studies, introduce new lines of research, and show the many ways in which queering Jewish Studies energizes the field. The authors also discuss the particular promise of Jewish trans studies as well as the nexus of queers and Jews in the age of rising populism. Overall, the forum serves as a primer for those interested in how to teach or do queer Jewish Studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article draws attention to the distortions and falsehoods that appear in the 1976 Jewish Social Studies article "Political Antisemitism in Minnesota during the Great Depression" by Hyman Berman. It identifies and corrects the many errors on two of its pages. In addition, the role of Berman's article in a student movement at the University of Minnesota to remove names on four campus buildings of administrators who engaged in racist and antisemitic policies is explored. Berman's work was both a catalyst for an exhibition about this period, which inspired the movement, and then when its flagrant errors were brought to light, was used to try to discredit it. The consequences of Berman's misconduct had consequences more than forty years after its publication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The second half of the nineteenth century saw the development of statistical studies about Jewish populations written by Jewish authors. Jewish enthusiasm for statistics gave rise to what historians have called Jewish social science or Jewish statistics. This article contributes to scholarship on Jewish social science by challenging the assumption in the literature that statistics was inherently essentialist and drew on race science. This case study is based on an analysis of early twentieth-century socioeconomic studies in Jewish statistical periodicals and, in particular, discussions of Jewish employment structure, or how the Jewish workforce was divided between the main economic sectors. Although this body of statistical research does not necessarily represent Jewish social science as a whole, it offers an opportunity to analyze the relationship between essentialism and statistics. I argue that Jewish social science did not favor the typological thinking that was inherent to race theory in the early twentieth century. Instead, most Jewish statisticians rejected the biologically determined concept of race and were much more inclined toward explanations framed in cultural terms. Yet these explanations also conveyed essentialist tropes about the productive capacities of Jewish workers that were consistent with the language and framework of racial thinking. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the effort of Pauline Wengeroff, backed by key Jewish cultural figures in Europe and the United States, including Solomon Schechter and Israel Eriedlaender, to have an English translation of her Memoirs of a Grandmother published in the US by the Jewish Publication Society. Despite favorable initial contacts after the work's publication in Germany in 1908, the project was ultimately rejected, ostensibly because Wengeroff's translator was her brother, a Christian convert who missionized Jews. Did Wengeroff know this when she reported in Memoirs that he had reverted to Judaism, or whib she puisued contacts with the Jewish Publication Society ? Once the Jewish Publication Society burned the translator's identity, a full-scale debate about Memoirs ensiwd, with the woik characterized as an apobgia both for excessive traditionalism and for conversion and assimilation. This article explores how the same work could be read in contradictory ways and how cultural anxiety about the Jewish future in the United Statess led to a panicked leading of Memoirs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines and contextualizes two artful Yiddish literary revisions of folktales about Sabbath observance by the Bundisl educator Yankev Pat and the poet and cultural Zionist Ya'akov Fichman as a means to rethink regnant understandings of the relationship between the religious and the secular in 1920s Jewish eastern Europe. Produced or reproduced for use in Poland's secularist Yiddishist schools, these aeslheticized folktales prominently foregrounded robustly religious imagery of traditional Sabbath observance, complete with points of halakhic precision. Moving through comparative and genetic analyses of the texts and situating them in relation to developments both in interwar folkloristics and in Yiddishist pedagogical theory and practice, the article elaborates the ways in which the East European Jewish secular intelligentsia's socialist, nationalist, and more generally humanist principles could be reframed or refracted by new assumptions about childhood development to allow a more accomodating relationship to traditional Jewish religiosity than previously imagined. This process, the article argues, entailed an aeslheticizalion of religious experience that was intended to counter secular disenchantment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This response piece meditates on the achievements of and the challenges that face contemporary scholars of Sephardi history and culture. In particular, it considers the advantages of permeating the boundaries that demarcate this field and that divide it from Jewish Studies, Mediterranean and Middle Eastern Studies, and other cognate fields. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This special issue of Jewish Social Studies presents a number of studies first discussed at a workshop held at Stanford University in the spring of 2007. The introduction briefly engages the question of the ambiguity of Sephardi identities, which is explored from a variety of perspectives by the contributors to this volume. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a Jewish social study by Leyla Neyzi entitled "Strong as Steel, Fragile as a Rose: A Turkish Jewish Witness to the Twentieth Century." It offers an overview of Jewish experience in the Ottoman Empire and the Turkish Republic and discusses the oral history and military journal of Yasar Paker. It states that the Jewish experience in modern Turkey attracted much less interest than the history of Jews in the Ottoman Empire and one of the reasons for this is the silence of the Turkish Jewish community to be in the public.

The article presents a Jewish social study by Berel Lang entitled "Hyphenated-Jews and the Anxiety of Identity." It states that the hyphen in an uncharacteristically influential role begins with two American presidents in a time when elected officers could still admit openly that political power directly affects public discourse. Woodrow Wilson and Theodore Roosevelt's statements produces a number of issues reacting to the waves of large-scale immigration to the United States. American-Jews nowadays wanted to be characterize themselves as Jewish-American and the pattern of locutions means is a matter for discussion, because it refers to "anxiety of identity."

The article presents a Jewish social study by Minna Rozen entitled "Jews and Greeks Remember Their Past: The Political Career of Tzevi Koretz (1933-43)." It states that Tzevi Koretz, the last chief rabbi of the Jewish community of Salonika, is engraved in the memory of the survivors of Salonikan Jewry and by extension the foreign traitor who joined the Nazis in order to save himself and his family. It also seeks to share light not only on the history of Salonikan Jewry and in general of the countries of the former Ottoman Empire in the first half of the twentieth century.

The article presents a Jewish social study by Jay Geller entitled "Spinoza's Election of the Jews: The Problem of Jewish Persistence." It states that the study is based on the third chapter of Spinoza's Tractatus Theologico-Politicus, and that the chapter argues that the claim that the Jews are God's chosen people is no longer valid. Spinoza's examination of the divine election causes Jewish persistence converge on a text that refers to as "Spinoza's Testament." The Testament had large effects on the perception of those relations and identities that were molded by the emergence of nationalism in the late eighteenth century.

Introduces articles related to social studies of Jews in the March 2005 issue of the "Jewish Social Studies."

The article reports on how Jewish is Jewish Budapest. The history of Central and East European Jewry has often neglected and isolated the history of Hungarian Jewry. On the other hand, Jewish identity, culture, and history were taboo topics in socialist Hungary until the mid 80s when Jewish topics started to emerge again from their controlled existence. It was a momentous event when the Center for Jewish Studies at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences was established and the Jewish cultural journal and publishing house started.

The article examines the different concepts of who are the Polish Jews, using the author's experiences as a visiting student at Warsaw University's Mordechai Anielewicz Center for the Study of Polish Jewry. Aside from the conflicts with regards to geography and politics in defining Polish Jews, there are also linguistic and cultural factors that determine the nature and composition of the Polish Jewry. It is observed that the specific image of Polish Jewry in various cultures serves each respective society's requirements and indirectly creates two different academic discourses.

This article examines the essay The Last Trial, by Shalom Spiegel, translated by Judah Goldin. It was said that most Jewish Studies scholars and rabbis admire it but relatively few American Jews have ever heard of it. Marginal to the articulated mainstream concerns of American Jewry, it is a foundational text of Jewish Studies in the second half of the century. It was argued that the essay raises a host of intriguing questions about historical consciousness and identity that should occupy any serious student of the American Jewish scene. Spiegel represented something new in the world of Jewish scholarship. Goldin suggests that Spiegel is driven by his years of reflection, the Binding of Isaac, the Akedah, which has haunted the Jewish imagination since its first inscription in Genesis 22.

The article discusses the impact of the historian, Gerhard Scholem on the course of Jewish Studies. The first volumes of Scholem's letters and diaries are discussed. Scholem's fear of being accused of self-aggrandizement can be well understood if one continues to read his diary. Scholem approached Jewish messianism and mysticism as an unaffected outsider who is unable to participate in a practical dialogue. The changes that Scholem sparked in the field of Jewish scholarship were a true fulfillment of his childhood dreams. Scholem wants to be a Jewish revolutionary.

The article examines some books which will remind readers of both the freedom and the entanglement that Jewish Studies has experienced. Some of these books include Robert Lieberles' "Salo Wittmayer Baron, Architect of Jewish History," Jacob Katz's "With My Own Eyes: The Autobiography of a Historian," Paul Ritterbans and Harold S. Wechsler's "Jewish Learning in American Universities," Moshe Davis' "Teaching Jewish Civilization: A Global Approach to Higher Education" and David Myers' "Re-Inventing the Jewish Past: European Jewish Intellectuals and the Zionist Return to History."

The article focuses on the study of Jews and Judaism from the perspective of corporeal and sexual experience. Several books are cited for their discussions and comments concerning carnal knowledge, sexuality and humanities of the Jewish studies. One book focuses on the medieval Christian women who used eating and abstaining from food as a physical channel for religious experience rather than as a means of abstaining from physical pleasure. The author focuses on the the source of interest in Jewish sexuality and accounts for its development as a popular topic of study.

The article presents an essay that explores the incongruity between J. A. Hobson's humanity as social theorist and his antisemitism. Hobson developed an alternative theory of welfare economics, to which were linked his more specific doctrines of organic surplus value, underconsumption crises, economic imperialism and participatory democracy. In line with these theories, this study investigates a sketch of the history of Hobson's times in so far as this relates to the "Jewish Question," his comments on the Jews to determine whether they are typically antisemitic and the turning point in his thinking about the Jews.

The article focuses on the life and works of Edward Sapir, linguist and anthropologist in the U.S. Sapir was regarded as one of the greatest linguists and anthropologists of the 20th century, with his seminal contributions. In addition to his scholarly contributions, Sapir was a poet, a pianist and a composer. Also, Sapir was among the founders of the Conference on Jewish Social Studies Inc., which in 1939 launched the publication of Jewish Social Studies.

The article studies the conditions of Russian Jews who immigrated to the United States. The study focuses on the socioeconomic adjustments; nature and strength of the Jewish identities of Russian immigrants; cultural life; and its relationship with the American Jewish community. Concluding, that the older respondents who have stronger attachments than the younger ones as measured by their subjective definitions, their observance of Jewish practices and their insistence for their children's in adapting a Jewish identity.

The article examines the role of Palestine and Zionism in pre-1948 Jewish education in the U.S. The author discusses the ideological stances toward Palestine and Zionism as reflected in curricula and courses of study. They have also examined the patterns of adjustment of these various curricular stances in order to determine the emergent mainstream theory and practice of teaching Palestine and Israel in the Jewish school. They also mentioned the importance of the analysis of curricula and courses of study of American Jewish schools in the investigation.

The article analyzes philosopher Morris Raphael Cohen's Judaic value judgments. The author offers information on the ways in which Cohen lived his philosophy of Judaism. They have also provided an overview of Cohen's most frequently reprinted essay "The Dark Side of Religion," which condemns religious fanaticism and recalls how often deeds of violence and cruelty are considered virtues when committed in the name of religion. Cohen also points out the intimate connection between religion and supernaturalism, and the passionate attachment to the old ways which every religion intensifies, cannot but strengthen superstition and hinder the progress of science towards the attainment of new truth as to human affairs.

The article investigates the degree of antisemitism and the degree to which Jews are accepted into the local economic and social elite in two neighboring southern cities Greensboro and Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Inorder to measure the degree of antisemitism, a network analysis was conducted based on membership in the Jewish congregations, country clubs, city clubs and boards of directors. Results show that Jews are consistently overrepresented in the higher circles of Greensboro, but predominantly underrepresented in Winston-Salem

The article discusses the impact of modernization on the social epistemology of Judaism. It traces the epistemological dimensions of the conflict between emanation and evolution by citing the aphorism "Dwarfs on the Shoulders of Giants." The aphorism is also related to Pinhas Elijah Hurvitz of Luthuania and Menahem Mendel Lefin of Galicia, the nineteenth century popularizers of natural science. Information regarding the involvement of the aphorism in the publications during the nineteenth century is offered.

The article features Jewish Political studies as a field of inquiry knowledge. Intellectual concerns and understanding of political matters deserves to be elevated to a prominent position in Jewish studies. It is a matter of recognizing and analyzing the political dimension present in a tradition devoted to the creation of the good commonwealth on earth. An understanding of the influence of Jewish political ideas on Jewish public affairs during the epochs of Jewish national independence and communal self-government can be useful in our efforts to meet the problems of Jewish public affairs and communal organization in the modern voluntary communities of the diaspora.

The article focuses on a study regarding the changing ethnic identity of Canadian Jewish youth. Adolescent Jewish boys and girls were involved in the study. They were given eighteen questions seeking information about their background and social and religious life. Three Jewish groups may be hypothesized, including those who identify mainly with Jewish ethnic groups, those Jews who more often identify with non-Jewish groups and mixed Jews who identify equally with both Jewish groups and gentiles.

A biography of Joseph Salvador, a nineteenth century French Jewish scholar, is presented. He was born and raised in Montpellier, France to a liberal Jewish father and a Catholic mother. He turned from his study of medicine at the University of Montpellier to the study of the antiquity of the Jewish people. He devoted himself to scholarship and to the care of his nephews. His accomplishments include bridging the duality of Jew and European by uniting them through their past.

The article profiles the late Herman N. Finkelstein, chairman of the Board of Directors of the Conference on Jewish Social Studies from 1967-1971. He also became the treasurer of the board 1964-1966. On his time of service, he brought to the Jewish tradition, his passionate concern for the Jewish community. One of his delusion was to become a law professor. He received a doctorate degree in the law and was able to published a standard work on commercial law in 1930. On his death, people who worked with him, held him in even higher esteem than his acquaintances who knew him from a distance.

The article presents a list of books related to Jewish studies, including "The Jewish Woman in America," by Charlotte Baum, Paula Hyman and Sonya Michel, "Essays in Jewish and Comparative Legal History," by Bernard S. Jackson, and "Fatherland or Promised Land. The Dilemma of the German Jew, 1893-1914," by Jehuda Reinharz.

The article offers information on the conference on Jewish social studies "Third World and Other New Attitudes Toward the Jew" to be held in School of International Affairs Columbia University, in March 23,01975. There are two papers presented in the conference one by Feliks Gross of Brooklyn college of the University of New York, talks on the attitudes of the Iron Curtain satellites and another by Uzi Arad of Hudson Institute, talks on the oil producing countries. These two papers were read during the first conference on antisemitism held in 1935 and published in 1942 by the conference in a volume entitled "Essays on Antisemitism."

The article explains how articles should be submitted for possible publication in "Jewish Social Studies," offers advertisements for journals including "European Judaism: A Journal for the New Europe," and presents information on applying for a 2015-2016 post-doctoral fellowship at the Herbert D. Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies at the University of Pennsylvania.

This article presents information on the responses of Jews to two questions which formed part of a questionnaire on Jewish identification in Johannesburg, South Africa. It says that the questionnaire was administered to a stratified random sample of 283 Jews. The questions asked were: (a) in what ways, would you say, do Johannesburg Jews, in general, resemble one another and differ from non-Jews? (b) in what ways would you say that you resemble other Jews and differ from non-Jews? In conclusion, it says that there are three aspects of the South African condition which appear to be relevant to the understanding of the Jewish self-image.

This article presents the results of a series of experiments which investigated the role of predisposition in identifying Jews. It says that the experiments show that subjects are fairly successful in identifying which of a series of photographs are of Jewish or non-Jewish models. It notes that subjects are predisposed to identify a Jew based on whether the model has dark hair. Without this predisposition the subject might not perceive the model as Jewish. It details the number of subjects in each experiment.

The article presents instructions for contributors submitting manuscripts and also presents information on various publications relating to Jewish studies, including the periodicals "Israel Studies Review: An Interdisciplinary Journal," "American Jewish History," and "The Jewish Quarterly Review."

The article presents a bibliography on Jewish studies featuring articles to be published in forthcoming issues, including “Leon Pinsker and ‘Autoemancipation!’: A Reevaluation,” by Dimitry Shumsky, “Scholars and Knights: W. E. B. Du Bois, J. E. Spingarn, and the NAACP,” by Lori Harrison-Kahan, and “Rescue or Theft? Zosa Szajkowski and the Salvaging of French Jewish History After World War II,” by Lisa Moses Leff.

The article offers brief profiles of Jewish scholars Yael Chaver, Joel Rosenberg, and Benjamin Schreier, who contributed to the writing of the journal.

The article offers brief profiles of Jewish scholars Yael Chaver, Joel Rosenberg, and Benjamin Schreier, who contributed to the writing of the journal.

A list of articles to be published in forthcoming issues of "Jewish Social Studies" is presented on topics including the Zionist movement from 1882 to 1956, Jewish Anticlericalism during the Enlightenment, and the history of Jews in Spain.

Information regarding the editorial policies for contributions to the journal "Jewish Social Studies" is presented.

Information regarding the editorial policies for contributions to the journal "Jewish Social Studies" is presented.

A list of articles to be published in forthcoming issues of "Jewish Social Studies" is presented on topics including the Zionist movement from 1882 to 1956, Jewish Anticlericalism during the Enlightenment, and the history of Jews in Spain.