Category
lectures
Mrs. Smiles, You’re on the Air
While the Los Angeles community has it share of rabbis and teachers who can teach a great class or two, there is always an allure of having someone come in from overseas as a special guest speaker. But now, airplanes are no longer necessary to get an overseas speaker to talk in Los Angeles.
Finding a Role for Woznica
David Woznica was anything but a model Hebrew school student.
East Meets West
About six months ago, Gregory Rodriguez, a contributing editor to the Los Angeles Times opinion section, phoned his friend, Rabbi Gary Greenebaum, West Coast regional director of the American Jewish Committee (AJ Committee). Rodriguez had attended events purported to promote intellectual fellowship among diverse Angelenos, but had found them not-so-diverse. \”There\’s a lot of lip service paid to crossing barriers in this city, but many gatherings are organized around political or ethnic lines,\” Rodriguez said.\n\nTo mix things up a bit, the two friends went on to launch a program, co-presented by the Los Angeles Public Library. The series, Zócalo, which means \”public square\” in Spanish, will gather Eastsiders and Westsiders for private discussions and public lectures on crucial civic issues. It kicks off at the downtown Central Library\’s Mark Taper Auditorium on April 9 at 7 p.m., when the Economist\’s Washington correspondent Adrian Wooldridge, co-author of \”The Company: A Short History of a Revolutionary Idea,\” will describe his take on the corporation as \”an engine that can work for the public good as well as ill,\” Greenebaum said.
Light and Thanks
I spent most of this past week at the United Jewish Communities (UJC) General Assembly (GA), the annual gathering which, this year, brought nearly 4,000 Jewish communal representatives (and journalists) from North America, Israel and elsewhere overseas.
Losing the War for the Temple Mount
While the military conflict between Israel and the Palestinians continues, there is one war the Jewish state appears to have lost — without even a struggle.
Community Scholar
Driven by a personal desire for intellectual growth, Arie Katz set out last year to attract to Orange County the sort of eminent Jewish scholars that few synagogues can afford to woo on their own. With little more than his own chutzpah and considerable networking skills, the Newport Beach attorney won support and financial backing from the area\’s most influential Jewish agencies to establish a community scholar-in-residence program. Its first event, at 7 p.m. Jan. 28, will kick off at the Jewish Federation Campus in Costa Mesa with the arrival of Avigdor Shinan, an Israeli professor and author.
Arnold, ‘Moses und Aron’
Los Angeles largely ignored Arnold Schoenberg, arguably the most influential and controversial composer of the 20th century, when he labored at USC and UCLA during the last 17 years of his life.\n\nAs if to make up for the slight, the city\’s musical and cultural institutions will commemorate the 50th anniversary of Schoenberg\’s death with an array of concerts, lectures and symposia through next March.
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The Nazis at George Washington U.
Elisha Wiesel and the Elie Wiesel Foundation Host Disrupting Uyghur Genocide Conference
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