Shavuot, which was originally an ancient pilgrimage festival, has gone through many changes over the years – as has Judaism itself.
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Articles on Jewish history
Displaying 1 - 20 of 40 articles
Recent generations of Jewish women have looked to reinvent rituals marking the most meaningful moments in their lives, especially childbirth and motherhood.
Yom HaShoah, which falls on April 17-18, 2023, pointedly commemorates Jewish resistance to the Nazis.
The memorialisation of the Holocaust was key to the ideas and practice of the popular Australian Jewish antifascist left in the 1940s and 1950s.
Badges and other wearable markings had a long history of being used to target Jewish people in Europe.
A scholar of Jewish history explains how the term ‘pogrom’ lives in Jewish collective memory and why its use can be highly contentious.
Tu BiShvat has religious roots, but early Zionists embraced the day in new, more secular ways.
A German town needed to relocate a medieval graveyard to build a parking garage. A positive side effect: Scientists got to sequence the DNA of Ashkenazi Jews who lived more than 600 years ago.
Mala, a Polish Orthodox Jewish woman, escaped the Warsaw ghetto early in the second world war and survived by passing as a Catholic. A new book tells her story.
People across much of North Africa were subject to racist laws and suffering at the hands of European powers during the Second World War.
Many Americans know a simple version of Holocaust history, in which their country played the savior. The reality isn’t so comfortable, a historian writes.
The Ukraine war has prompted thousands of Russian Jews to flee the country, an expert investigates why.
During the Cold War, Russia’s refusal to allow Jews to leave the country reflected its political aims. The same is likely true today, a Jewish studies scholar explains.
A collaboration between advertiser Joseph Jacobs and the famous coffee company produced the classic U.S. haggadah. The book sets out the ceremony for the Seder meal.
Judith Kaplan became the first American bat mitzvah in 1922. The Jewish coming-of-age ceremony has become more popular for girls ever since.
A Holocaust historian explains why Ukrainian history needs to be understood in terms of both past violence against Jews as well as the state’s pluralistic vision.
While Australians’ general knowledge of the Holocaust is high, few people knew who William Cooper was or that Australia refused to accept more Jewish refugees in 1938.
Yom HaShoah is a day to commemorate the murder of 6 million Jews – but also their lives. Yizker bikher books lovingly document Jewish communities across Europe.
Bevis Marks – the cathedral synagogue of British Jewry – is one of the few remaining traces of the historic Jewish presence in the City of London. As a national heritage site, it has no parallels.
The increased prominence of antisemitic incidents may have you wondering: has antisemitism always been part of the Australian social fabric, or are we facing a newer, more sinister trend?
Top contributors
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Professor Emeritus of Modern European History, University of Essex
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Professor of Sociology, Rowan University
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Professor, Department of Global Studies, University of North Carolina – Charlotte
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Director of the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute, Brandeis University
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Lecturer in International Studies, University of Technology Sydney
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Historian, The University of Melbourne
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Senior lecturer in Sociology, Deakin University
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Professor of Post-Biblical Jewish Literature, University of Manchester
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Director, Centre for Cultural Materials Conservation, The University of Melbourne
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Emeritus Professor of Holocaust and Genocide Studies, Kingston University
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Professor of Art History, California State University, Chico
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Associate Professor of Modern Continental European History, University of Warwick
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Professor of Contemporary Jewish Studies and Linguistics, Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of Religion
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Honorary Research Associate, Department of History, SOPHI, Faculty of Arts and Social Science, University of Sydney
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Professor of Sociology and Social Research, Deakin University
