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Activism

Content type
Collection

Mildred Zanditon

Project
Women Whose Lives Span the Century

Ellen Rovner interviewed Mildred Zanditon on November 10, 1997 in Brookline, Massachusetts, as part of the Women Whose Lives Spanned The Century Oral History Project. Zanditon recalls learning how to make challah with her daughter, her advocacy work for institutionalized individuals and the founding of the non-profit Vinfen, and her pride in passing on values of tzedakah and Tikkun Olam to her daughters.

Judy Somberg

Project
Women Who Dared

Judith Rosenbaum interviewed Judy Somberg on July 18, 2000, in Boston, Massachusetts, as part of the Women Who Dared Oral History Project. Somberg recounts her activism through the years, reflecting on her involvement in anti-war movements, women's rights, and the Cambridge Sister City Project, advocating for human rights and supporting affected communities.

Carol Smokler

Project
Katrina's Jewish Voices

Jayne Guberman interviewed Carol Smokler on August 13, 2007, in Lenox, Massachusetts, as part of the Katrina's Jewish Voices Oral History Project. Smokler discusses her Jewish upbringing, community involvement, experiences during Hurricane Katrina, and her feelings about the government's response to the disaster.

Madalyn Schenk

Project
Katrina's Jewish Voices

Rosalind Hinton interviewed Madalyn Schenk on July 25, 2006, in New Orleans, Louisiana, as part of the Katrina's Jewish Voices Oral History Project. Schenk talks about her upbringing in a tight-knit Jewish community in Chicago, her move to New Orleans, her leadership during Hurricane Katrina, and her involvement in civic organizations and fundraising for the city's rebuilding efforts, as well as her approach to Jewish identity through activism.

Barbara Gaffin

Project
Women Who Dared

Judith Rosenbaum interviewed Barbara Gaffin in Boston, Massachusetts on July 11, 2000, as part of the Women Who Dared Oral History Project. Gaffin, raised in a Jewish community, recounts her career in Jewish organizations, her perspective on the relationship between American Jews and Israel, her work in Ethiopia, and the prejudice and contradictions she encountered while helping others.

Frances Addelson

Project
Women Whose Lives Span the Century

Rochelle Ruthchild interviewed Frances Addelson on October 18, November 14, and December 10, 1997, in Boston, Massachusetts, as part of the Women Whose Lives Spanned The Century Oral History Project. Addelson shares her life journey from childhood experiences in a Jewish orphanage in Boston to her education at Radcliffe College, a career in social work, and active involvement in social justice, despite not being particularly religious, until an accident in the late 1990s.

Maayan Zik named one of The Jewish Week’s "36 under 36"

July 12, 2021

Maayan Zik is a community organizer, activist, and proud Black Jewish woman within the Brooklyn Crown Heights community. After the murder of George Floyd in May of 2020, she founded several initiatives, including the “Tahalucha for Social Justice,” in order to mobilize her community to advocate for positive change. Since beginning her activism, she has been nationally recognized by prominent organizations such as The Jewish Week’s “36 under 36” for her important social action and community impact.  

Hedy Ratner

Project
Women Who Dared

Rosalind Hinton interviewed Hedy Ratner on January 31, 2007, in Chicago, Illinois, as part of the Women Who Dared Oral History Project. Ratner shares her journey from her childhood in Chicago as an immigrant's child to her experiences with Jewish education, women's liberation, social justice activism, and her evolving relationship with Judaism, highlighting the influential figures and moments in her life.

Photo of someone's hands holding ground cherries

This Sukkot, Let’s Commit to Respecting and Caring for Our Land

Savoy Curry

Sukkot is an urgent reminder not to take our land for granted.

Muriel Pokross

Project
Women Whose Lives Span the Century

Ellen Rovner interviewed Muriel Pokross on December 20, 1996, and June 30, 1997, in Belmont, Massachusetts, for the Women Whose Lives Spanned the Century Oral History Project. Pokross reflects on her experiences during significant historical events, her efforts to aid Jewish refugees, and her career as a rehabilitation counselor, while emphasizing the passing down of values and her close family bonds.

Beatrice Levi

Project
Weaving Women's Words

Marcie Cohen Ferris and Brenda Rever interviewed Beatrice Levi on February 4 and November 8, 2002, in Baltimore, Maryland, as part of the Weaving Women’s Words Oral History Project. Levi reflects on her childhood, family life, involvement with the League of Women Voters, experiences during the Great Depression, academic pursuits, marriage, volunteer work, and pride in her daughters' achievements.

Nathan Rothstein

Project
Katrina's Jewish Voices

Rosalind Hinton interviewed Nathan Rothstein on July 22, 2007, in New Orleans, Louisiana, as part of the Katrina's Jewish Voices Oral History Project. Rothstein talks about his family history, parents, Jewish upbringing, his experience in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, his work with nonprofit organizations, and his efforts to foster interfaith collaboration in the city, providing insights on race and the Jewish community.

Marcia Greenberger

Project
Washington D.C. Stories

Deborah Ross interviewed Marcia Greenberger on June 27, 2011, in Washington, DC, as part of the Washington D.C. Stories Oral History Project. Greenberger reflects on her experiences of encountering discrimination against women and Jews, her commitment to social change during the turbulent '60s, and her admiration for her mentor, Justice Arthur Goldberg, as she pursued a legal career.

Nadia Fradkova

Project
Soviet Jewry

Nadia Fradkova was interviewed in Massachusetts as part of the Soviet Jewry Oral History Project. Fradkova shares her experiences of growing up in the Soviet Union, facing antisemitism, resistance from her father, imprisonment in a labor camp and psychiatric hospital, and eventually immigrating to Israel and the United States.

Abortion Stories

Do you have an abortion story that you’d like to share? JWA, in partnership with National Council of Jewish Women (NCJW), is collecting the following kinds of stories: a story about your own experience of having an abortion, a story of helping someone else secure an abortion, a story of advocating for abortion rights. (JWA reserves the right to share your submission and contact information with NCJW and with scholars for research purposes.)

Analucía Lopezrevoredo Founds Jewtina y Co.

September 15, 2019

On September 15, 2019, the first day of Latinx Heritage Month, Dr. Analucía Lopezrevoredo founded Jewtina y Co., an organization for Latinx Jews. Lopezrevoredo is a Peruvian-Chilean-Quechua-American Jewtina who is passionate about preserving Latin Jewish heritage and culture and claiming her identity as both Jewish and Latina. She founded Jewtina y Co. to provide a space for other Latin Jews to do the same.

Tamara Bunke, AKA Tania the Guerrillera, is killed by Bolivian Army

August 31, 1967

Haydée Tamara Bunke Bider, known as Tania the Guerillera, was a German-Jewish guerrilla fighter in the National Liberation Army of Bolivia, led by Che Guevara. As the only woman guerilla fighter, much rumor and mystery surround her life and role in the Marxist revolutionary movement in South America.

Ruth Zakarin, a community organizer, and her daughter at a March For Our Lives rally in Boston.

Watching with Pride and Sadness as a New Generation Takes up the Fight

Ruth Zakarin

I’m proud that my children are fighting for gun violence prevention and abortion rights. But I wish they didn’t have to.

Shannie Goldstein

Project
Women Who Dared

Abriel Louise Young interviewed Shannie Goldstein on January 12, 2005, in New Orleans, Louisiana, as part of the Women Who Dared Oral History Project. Goldstein explores her family history, childhood in Lowell, Massachusetts, her Jewish education, her involvement in the Soviet Jewry movement, her undercover trips to the Soviet Union, her views on feminism, her battle with breast cancer, and her engagement in the Jewish community.

Lynn Amowitz

Project
Women Who Dared

Judith Rosenbaum interviewed Lynn Amowitz on July 31, 2001, in Providence, Rhode Island, as part of the Women Who Dared Oral History Project. Amowitz reflects on her childhood experiences of antisemitism, her parents' establishment of a synagogue for her bat mitzvah, the influence of family history on her career choice, her work in human rights investigations, and her aspirations to impact policies and methodologies in her field.

Randi Abramson

Project
Washington D.C. Stories

Deborah Ross interviewed Randi Abramson on January 22, 2011, in Bethesda, Maryland, as part of the Washington D.C. Stories Oral History Project. Abramson, a doctor at Bread for the City in Washington, D.C., discusses her experience as a minority Jew, challenges in the medical field, commitment to community service, and imparting Jewish values to her children.

Toni Weiss

Project
Katrina's Jewish Voices

Rosalind Hinton interviewed Toni Weiss on July 11, 2007, in New Orleans, Louisiana, as part of the Katrina's Jewish Voices Oral History Project. Weiss discusses her upbringing in Tucson, her experiences during Hurricane Katrina, rebuilding her life as a single mother, career transitions, remarriage, and her commitment to community and spirituality.

Carol Wise

Project
Katrina's Jewish Voices

Rosalind Hinton interviewed Carol Wise on July 8, 2007, in New Orleans, Louisiana, as part of Katrina’s Jewish Voices Oral History Project. Wise discusses her involvement in the New Orleans Jewish community, particularly her experiences during Hurricane Katrina and the subsequent rebuilding efforts, emphasizing the importance of including women and addressing racial tensions.

Ennis Bashe and the cover of their book Scheme of Sorcery.

Interview with Disabled, Non-Binary, Jewish Poet and Novelist Ennis Bashe

Jen Richler

JWA talks to Ennis Bashe about how their different identities intersect, and what they want every disabled and able-bodied person to know.

Collage with Image of Molly Picon from "Yidn Mitn Fidl," Background of Wallpaper of Shooting Stars

Activism Through Art: Molly Picon's Legacy

Abigail Gilman

I think about Molly Picon, and how she utilized her love of storytelling to bring laughter to those who needed it, to foster pride and compassion in the Jewish community, and to fight to keep Yiddish theater alive.

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