In the 1970s, in the wake of an emerging second-wave feminism, women's magazines were expanding rapidly with a unique style. Their focus, however, tended to exclude minorities. Jewish women were seen as privileged "others", not facing the same constraints as their gentile peers. That's why the Winnipeg-born Susan Weidman Schneider founded Lilith, a Jewish feminist magazine, out of New York City in 1976.

Lilith was radical in many ways, tackling taboo subjects like abortion and gay rights from a female Jewish perspective. Now celebrating its 50th anniversary, Lilith has persevered as a community of literary, engaged and often mature Jewish women, hosting salons and creating a space for Jewish women to express themselves freely. To reflect on its impact, Weidman Schneider joins Phoebe Maltz Bovy on this week's episode of The Jewish Angle.

Credits

• Host: Phoebe Maltz Bovy
• Producer and editor: Michael Fraiman
• Music: " Gypsy Waltz " by Frank Freeman, licensed from the Independent Music Licensing Collective

Support our show

• Subscribe to The CJN newsletter
• Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt)
• Subscribe to The Jewish Angle

When best-selling author Meg Keene tried to pitch her latest novel, she was told—outright, by multiple people in the industry—that her book wouldn't sell. Not because it was too controversial, or violent, or suggestive, but because Keene herself is openly Zionist, and her book included authentic, lived-in Jewish and Israeli references and personalities.

Keene isn't the only one facing this. In the last two years, mainstream book publishers have barely released any Jewish fiction—and the only Jewish fiction that does make it through tends to be anti-Zionist or hyper-progressive. It's left Jewish authors in a difficult spot, having to choose sides or be ostricized from their audiences and peers.

On this week's episode of The Jewish Angle, host Phoebe Maltz Bovy speaks with Keene about the pressures facing Jewish authors today, from editorial demands to erase cultural specificity to an industry climate shaped by fear of backlash and organized boycotts. Keene worries about the future of Jewish literature and doesn't see the trends reversing any time soon, which would result in a literary ecosystem where Jewish stories are not just harder to tell, but in many cases, disappearing altogether.

Credits

• Host: Phoebe Maltz Bovy
• Producer and editor: Michael Fraiman
• Music: " Gypsy Waltz " by Frank Freeman, licensed from the Independent Music Licensing Collective

Support our show

• Subscribe to The CJN newsletter
• Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt)
• Subscribe to The Jewish Angle

Graham Platner is a progressive populist running to unseat longtime Republican Susan Collins in Maine. The military veteran's campaign has been fiery, to say the least, riddled with attacks about his past online comments and—notably for Jews—a tattoo that bore a resemblance to a Nazi symbol, which he's since covered up.

But his Nazi-adjacent imagery didn't damage his reputation in the way people expect. Instead, Platner's continued railing against billionaires and "the people in power", with antisemitic undertones, has bolstered his support. So American Jewish voters lose in both ways: either because Platner does indeed harbour antisemitic beliefs, or because he rallies his base against them with dog whistles and quiet accusations.

David Schraub, an associate professor of law at Lewis & Clark Law School, joins The Jewish Angle with Phoebe Maltz Bovy to break down the ramifications of this controversy—and how Jewish Americans also find themselves caught in the awkward middle of President Donald Trump's war on Iran (which some accuse them of starting, by way of Israeli affiliations) while simultaneously not voting for him in the first place.

Credits

• Host: Phoebe Maltz Bovy
• Producer and editor: Michael Fraiman
• Music: " Gypsy Waltz " by Frank Freeman, licensed from the Independent Music Licensing Collective

Support our show

• Subscribe to The CJN newsletter
• Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt)
• Subscribe to The Jewish Angle

Earlier this month, British vandals defaced a new location of Gail's, a bakery chain with 170 locations across the U.K. They smashed the store's windows, splattered it with red paint, and left pro‑Palestinian and anti-Zionist messages on its doors. One such message: "F*** Bain Capital." It refererred to an investment firm that manages USD$215 billion in global assets, including investments in Israeli security companies and, in some other far corner of the company's wide reach, the Gail's brand.

Gail's was also founded by an Israeli baker in the 1990s. So even though the business is not exactly Jewish, it is Jewish enough by vandals' standards—and this new location happened to be opening a few blocks away from a popular Palestinian cafe. After the week of on-and-off violence, a columnist named Jonathan Liew justified the acts of hatred in The Guardian, describing Gail's opening as an act of "aggression" towards its Palestinian neighbour. (The Guardian has since redacted that phrase and others; the piece remains online.)

At The CJN, opinion editor Phoebe Maltz Bovy had reached out to prominent British Jewish writer Hadley Freeman to discuss Woody Allen's new novel, which she'd recently reviewed. But then the Gail's controversy came up, and they pivoted. This week, Freeman dissects the issue and explains how British progressive movements have evolved over the years—and, yes, they'll discuss Woody Allen, too.

Credits

• Host: Phoebe Maltz Bovy
• Producer and editor: Michael Fraiman
• Music: " Gypsy Waltz " by Frank Freeman, licensed from the Independent Music Licensing Collective

Support our show

• Subscribe to The CJN newsletter
• Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt)
• Subscribe to The Jewish Angle

Judy Blume, the acclaimed author of young people's novels, saw resurged interest in her work in 2023. One of her most famous books, Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret, hit the big screen as an acclaimed feature-length film; that same year, Amazon released a documentary about her, Judy Blume Forever. Meanwhile, Mark Oppenheimer—a writer, podcaster, editor and teacher at the John C. Danforth Center on Religion and Politics—was asked by the author herself to write her biography.

Months after the Blume bonanza, Oct. 7 happened. And while this has little bearing on the public's appreciation of Blume work, The CJN's opinion editor, Phoebe Maltz Bovy, got to wondering: would the world be so excited about a Jewish writer (who writes openly Jewish characters) if her movies were slated for 2024 instead?

It's one of many questions Maltz Bovy asks Oppenheimer on this week's episode of The Jewish Angle, which hones in on Blume's role in the broader Jewish literary canon. Despite selling around 90 million copies of her books, and even after the revived interest in her work, Blume is rarely granted the same literary standing as her Jewish male contemporaries. But Oppenheimer's book, Judy Blume: A Life, which comes out March 10, may help to change that.

Credits

• Host: Phoebe Maltz Bovy
• Producer and editor: Michael Fraiman
• Music: " Gypsy Waltz " by Frank Freeman, licensed from the Independent Music Licensing Collective

Support our show

• Subscribe to The CJN newsletter
• Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt)
• Subscribe to The Jewish Angle

Kat Rosenfield doesn't write Jewish fiction. Her forthcoming book, How to Survive in the Woods, is a thriller set in the wilderness of Maine—not very Jewish. But that hasn't stopped random internet users from noticing her surname and making the link, sometimes with prejudice.

The idea that an artist must be inextricably linked to their identity politics—and that Jews are inherently Zionists—is not exclusive to Rosenfield, though it is a topic she has touched on often, both as a columnist with The Free Press and as a podcaster on Feminine Chaos, alongside The CJN's own Phoebe Maltz Bovy. Now the podcasting duo is hopping onto The CJN's network to talk about the role of Jews in this neverending conversation, particularly in light of controversies in Canada and Australia. The Art Gallery of Ontario declined work by acclaimed Jewish photographer Nan Goldin because of her anti-Zionist (antisemitic?) views, while in the Southern Hemisphere, a literary festival in Adelaide, Australia, was forced to cancel its entire program after it retracted an invitation to a Palestinian author—sparking the cancellations of 180 other writers in solidarity.

What do we risk when art becomes stringently political, and institutions only accept art from certain people on certain sides of the political spectrum? Rosenfield joins to discuss.

Credits

• Host: Phoebe Maltz Bovy

• Producer and editor: Michael Fraiman

• Music: " Gypsy Waltz " by Frank Freeman, licensed from the Independent Music Licensing Collective

Support our show

• Subscribe to The CJN newsletter

• Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt)

• Subscribe to The Jewish Angle

Earlier this month, the federal Canadian government announced it would dissolve the offices of two anti-hate envoys: one for combatting antisemitism, and the other for combatting Islamophobia. In their place, the Heritage ministry said it would fold both into a new advisory council on equal rights reporting to the minister of cultural identity.

If you ask Jonathan Kay, an editor at Quillette and former columnist with The CJN, this is a good idea. It scraps offices—and excessive budgets—who were never equal to begin with, owing to the fact that only two minorities were represented. (What, no Special Envoy on Combatting Anti-Hindu Racism?) Further, Kay argues, these posts were vestiges of an old political world, the Justin Trudeau era of national repentance and bemoaning so-called "Canada" as nation founded upon racism and genocide. After the re-election of U.S. President Donald Trump, nationalism and civic pride have soared to new heights—and with it, a newfound sense of unity against a greater enemy.

Kay digs into the deep political history behind the rise and fall of anti-hate special envoys in the latest episode of The Jewish Angle with Phoebe Maltz Bovy.

Credits

• Host: Phoebe Maltz Bovy
• Producer and editor: Michael Fraiman
• Music: " Gypsy Waltz " by Frank Freeman, licensed from the Independent Music Licensing Collective

Support our show

• Subscribe to The CJN newsletter
• Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt)
• Subscribe to The Jewish Angle

In Canada, Jewish girls seen as uppity and privileged have a nickname: the JAP, which stands for Jewish American Princess. Meanwhile, around the world, the stereotype persists, even if the name changes: spoiled Jewish girls have been called JPs and Becks in the U.K., or even Kugels in South Africa.

Having lingered for decades, the stereotype has shaped both how Jewish women are perceived by non-Jews and how many come to see themselves. It seeped into pop culture, embodying mid-1990s sitcom characters like Fran Fine and Janice from Friends, and has been reclaimed at times, like in Rachel Bloom's JAP rap battle. But is all this just dressing around an inherently misogynistic and antisemitic caricature?

Becky Aizen has thought intensely about this subject, having written her PhD on Jewish identity in pop culture and focusing largely on the JAP stereotype. She joins Phoebe Maltz Bovy on this week's episode of The Jewish Angle to dig into the messy history and modern-day implications of the phrase.

Credits

• Host: Phoebe Maltz Bovy

• Producer and editor: Michael Fraiman

• Music: " Gypsy Waltz " by Frank Freeman, licensed from the Independent Music Licensing Collective

Support our show

• Subscribe to The CJN newsletter

• Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt)

• Subscribe to The Jewish Angle