SUNDAY, MAY 15 • 2PM Red Kaddish Walking Tour The stories and voices of past Jewish and Russian radicals come to life on this combination walking tour/performance art piece visiting sites of political radicalism of 19th-century Lower East Side. Fiks maps the Lower East Side of Emma Goldman via writings by Russian anarchist Pyotr Kropotkin, Abraham Cahan’s via Russian revolutionary…
Author: mira
Mira Z. Amiras is Professor of Comparative Religious Studies and founder of the Middle East Studies Program at San Jose State University. She is past-president of the Society for the Anthropology of Consciousness, and has served on the Executive Council of the American Anthropological Association. She is co-founder, with Ovid Jacob, of Beit Malkhut, a study group in Jewish sacred text. She's most attached to the creatures of her body and her household — first and foremost, her kids, of course: Michael and Rayna — and then the other folks large and small of various species, including Roshi and Vlad, a whole lot of hummingbirds, the old parrot who lives next door, and a beautiful garden that does what it will.
the heart of the matter
I used to be able to spend decades not thinking about my own demise, although as a teen thoughts of mortality were a constant companion. But in recent years, watching the death and dying of family members and friends, the mortality thing seemed to dominate absolutely everything else. Still, ‘my own demise’ is a fairly…
the sjsu parking garage shooting — a kaddish —
I’ve never worried about the SJSU parking garages. All these many years of night classes, of colleagues and students getting police escorts back to their cars at night — I’ve never once seen the necessity. And I don’t see it now, either. And yet, last night, while I was heading for my own car in…
a kaddish for hindy nobler
The funeral was so fast! Her brother was leading people off to head for a gathering at the house, one last time. One of the chapel people, said “Stop — we haven’t said a kaddish!” Some of us had been waiting for a kaddish. But he was adamant — she wouldn’t want a kaddish. Just…
a kaddish for the happiest couple in america and really bad books
That’s what he called them. “The happiest couple in America.” And as soon as the words were out of his mouth, the spell was broken and she was gone. I mean, where do you go from there? Repeat cycle? Which would mean more of the same. And if there was more of the same, would…
the tzaddik and the negotiator — a mother’s day meditation
Malkah was in such awe of the tzaddik that she spent most of her time with him asking questions, and nodding at the wisdom of his responses. Of course, his responses generally started with the need to do more research. Look things up. Even go to the library, when he was stumped. But most of…
closure, or something like it — a kaddish for milton g. nobler
People say you need closure. But does that mean that there are no more stories to be told? I woke up this morning with two imperatives: 1) a sense of real or imminent closure, and 2) the need to tell this tale. It’s a tale biofather told me, and I’m pretty sure he never told…
on the transmigration of souls (jewish deli style)
You wouldn’t think that the Jewish tradition was big on transmigration of souls — but it is. I’m not even sure this concept is taught much anymore in more mainstream non-Orthodox and Hassidic circles. But what do I know? I’ve not set foot in a shul for a very long time. And even then,…
a kaddish for Osama bin Laden
بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم The goal of building (or rebuilding) an Islamic State is something as yet under-appreciated in the West. Do we in the West ask what kind of State is it? Or do we just assume it’s the oppressive, misogynistic monolith that we have dubbed it? Do we even ask ourselves if there…
voices in the volvo
There’s something I really don’t like about finishing things. Good at starting. Good at ongoing. Good at thinking about. Finishing: very depressing. So. I had just finished organizing the entire program for a SWAA conference one year, along with two colleagues. SWAA would be the Southwestern Anthropological Association. And we planned some real conference treats….