In her debut novel, Ellen Umansky emphasizes the evolving legacy of the Holocaust and the power of grappling with the past to better understand the present.
Sharon Salzberg helped bring Theravedic Buddhism, one of the most conservative Buddhist dsiciplines, to America as one of the three co-founders of the Insight Meditation Society in 1974.
Allegra Goodman centers her acclaimed novels and short stories on deep, nuanced depictions of Jewish characters and Jewish families grappling with the problems of the larger world.
Edith Head’s brilliant eye for design earned her a record eight Oscars for Best Costume Design for movies that included Roman Holiday (1954) and The Sting (1974).
Known as much for her signature men’s jackets, cowboy boots, and tortoiseshell glasses as for her stunning (and often scathing) social commentary, Fran Lebowitz has spent a lifetime critiquing cultural norms.
Rachel Calof’s memoir of life as a mail-order bride in Devils Lake, North Dakota vividly depicts the hardships of life as a western pioneer through the unique lens of a Jewish woman’s experience.
As a Talmud scholar and a member of the progressive Israeli political party Yesh Atid, Ruth Calderon has sought to break down the traditional divide in Israeli society between right-wing Orthodoxy and secular liberalism.
Through her genealogical program Routes to Roots, Miriam Weiner helped Jews access historical records that had survived the Soviet suppression of information throughout Eastern Europe.
In her wildly popular 1958 debut novel, The Best of Everything, Rona Jaffe captured the struggle of women working in New York before the women’s liberation movement.
Rachel Kadish’s fiction focuses on the ways Jewish women struggle to fulfill their longings and dreams despite the limitations of the times and places in which they live.
Through her ongoing advice column “Ask Polly,” collected in the 2016 book How to Be a Person in the World, Heather Havrilesky offers advice on love and life to millennials.
Rabbi Elaine Zecher uses her own experiences of illness and struggle to counsel congregants and craft prayers for Mishkan T’fillah and Mishkan HaNefesh, the prayer books of the Reform Movement.
As both one of the first women and one of the first openly gay rabbis to be ordained in Britain, Elli Tikvah Sarah has profoundly reshaped the liberal Jewish community of Britain.
Rabbi Haviva Ner-David chronicled her struggles to become an Orthodox woman rabbi in her celebrated book Life on the Fringes: A Feminist Journey Toward Traditional Rabbinic Ordination before finally achieving her dream in 2006.
Throughout her career, Rabbi Avis Miller has searched for new ways to educate, engage, and support unaffiliated Jews and those on the margins of the Jewish community.
In teaching liturgy to rabbinical students from around the world, Rabbi Dalia Marx is shaping how the next generation of rabbis interprets the tradition.
Rabbi Zoe Klein’s fascination with the language and emotion of the biblical books of the prophets led her to craft Drawing in the Dust, a novel imagining the prophet Jeremiah’s private life.
As one of the leaders of the Liberal Jewish Movement in France, Rabbi Delphine Horvilleur is working to bring a progressive mindset to the more traditional French Jewish community.