New speaking dates
August 10, 2010. McNally Jackson book store, New York City.
August 11, 2010. Museum of Jewish Heritage, New York City.
August 12, 2010. bookthugnation, Brooklyn, NY.
“Seymour Krim: Jewish, Not Beat.” American Literature Association annual conference. May 30, 2010. San Francisco.
Topics
Missing a Beat: Seymour Krim and Jewish New Journalism
The once-celebrated, unhappily Jewish, self-proclaimed failure Seymour Krim has been left out of recent Beat anthologies, though in 1960 he edited one of the best. It seems that Krim’s 20 years of angry, insightful, and outrageous writing about Jewish identity finally got him kicked out of the club. It is time for Jewish readers to welcome him in.
My Fair Sadie: Allan Sherman and the (Jewish) American Musical
Sherman’s parodies of Broadway show tunes were the first to point out the Jewish contribution to the American musical.
Zelig and his Friends: The Giants of Jewish Assimilation
Zelig the chameleon man may have been a Woody Allen creation, but he had real-life cousins. Many changed their names, religion, and languages, illuminating a time in Jewish history when the goal was to be invisible.
Long Live the King: Women in Power in Sephardic Folktales. From Ulysses to James Bond, we love a hero with a trick up his sleeve. Nearly always, it is a role reserved for men. But in these three Sephardic tales, it is the women who get to do the lying, the spying, and the double-crossing.
How the West Won: Teaching French to Spanish Jews. Fights about Jewish education are fights about the Jewish future, and those fights have sometimes been ruthless. Learn how Western reformers and Sephardic traditionalists met for a 19th century showdown.
What Can We Learn From this Story? A Personal History Lesson. Cohen’s research into his grandmother’s Sephardic community led him to the source of some unfortunate personal traits, and taught him that the burdens of history are sometimes offset by its consolations.
Appearances
April 15, 2009. “My Fair Sadie: Allan Sherman and Jewish-American Culture.” Dickinson College.
October 26, 2008. “How the West Won: French Schools Arrive in the Sephardic World.” UCLA.
November 1, 2007. “Missing a Beat: The Forgotten Writings of Seymour Krim, the Once Celebrated and Unhappily Jewish Beat Writer, Editor, and (Self-Proclaimed) Failure.” Jewish Community Library, San Francisco.
March 1, 2006. “Zelig and His Friends: A Look at Some Giants of Jewish Assimilation.” Jewish Community Library, San Francisco.
Nov. 12, 2005. “Long Live the King: Women in Power in Sephardic Folk Tales.” Etz Chaim Sephardic Congregation, Indianapolis.
Nov. 10, 2005. “How the West Won: The Victory of the Alliance Over the Talmud Torah in the Sephardic Community of Monastir.” Indiana University.
Sept. 15, 2005. “.Howl” (a high-tech parody of Allen Ginsberg’s poem “Howl”). San Francisco Public Library, main branch.
June 21, 2005. “How I Wrote My Lost Family History.” Association of Jewish Libraries Conference, Oakland, Calif.
March 11-12, 2005. “Long Live the King: Women in Power in Sephardic Folk Tales” and “How the West Won: The Victory of the Alliance Over the Talmud Torah in the Sephardic Community of Monastir.” Scholar-in-Residence, Shomrei Torah Synagogue, West Hills, Calif.
March 3, 2005. “Long Live the King: Women in Power in Sephardic Folk Tales.” MID Lecture Series, Temple Beth Sholom, San Leandro, Calif.
Feb. 9, 2005. “Giants of Assimilation: A Rogues’ Gallery of A Vanishing Jewish Type.” Berkeley/Richmond JCC.
Jan. 27, 2005. “Long Live the King: Women in Power in Sephardic Folk Tales.” Magnes Museum, Berkeley, Calif.
Dec. 6, 2004. “Long Live the King: Women in Power in Sephardic Folk Tales. ” Jewish Community Agency, Sonoma County, Calif.
Oct. 26, 2004. “Long Live the King: Women in Power in Sephardic Folk Tales.” California State University, Northridge.
Oct. 10, 2004. “The Unorthodox Lessons of Sephardic Folk Tales.” Berkeley/Richmond JCC’s, “Kol Sippur: A Festival of Jewish Storytelling.”
Oct. 8, 2004. “Long Live the King: Women in Power in Sephardic Folk Tales.” Marin Osher JCC, San Raphael, Calif.
Aug. 19, 2004. “Writing My Lost Family History.” Marin Osher JCC, San Raphael, Calif.
April 25, 2004. “The Destruction of the Sephardic Jews of Monastir.” Stroum JCC, Seattle.
March 23, 2004. “Long Live the King: Women in Power in Sephardic Folk Tales.” Jewish Community Library, Los Angeles.
March 9, 2004. “Long Live the King: Women in Power in Sephardic Folk Tales.” Contra Costa JCC, Walnut Creek, Calif.
March 3, 2004. “Long Live the King: Women in Power in Sephardic Folk Tales.” Berkeley/Richmond JCC.
Nov. 5, 2003. “Writing My Lost Family History.” Jewish Community Library, San Francisco.
October 17, 2003. “Long Live the King: Women in Power in Selected Sephardic Folk Tales.” Presented at the North Shore Towers Community Center, New York.
October 16, 2003. “How the West Won: The Victory of the Alliance Over the Talmud Torah in the Sephardic Community of Monastir.”Center for Jewish History, New York.
October 15, 2003. “Searching for the New Eden: The Emigration of the Monastir Sephardim in the Early 20th Century.” Sephardic Temple, Cedarhurst, New York.
July 8, 2001. “Crisis and Change in an Ottoman Sephardic Community: Moses Montefiore and the Monastir Fire of 1863.” Presented at the Sephardic Studies session of the AATSP (Am. Assn. of Teachers of Spanish and Portuguese).
