As Gorsky pointed out, this is far more common among Jews of Color. “I think there are so many people that don’t even know it’s possible to be not white and be Jewish,” they said with comedic bafflement.
2020
Building pathways for Jews of Color to be decision-makers in Jewish communities—not only for matters of diversity and equity, but all facets of Jewish life—can ensure that we build a beautiful second chapter that will sustain and transform the Jewish people.
As a Philadelphia-based non-profit organization, ALEPH focuses on deepening Jewish connection and spirituality through a trans–denominational approach known as Renewal.
Pettis and Webster are focused on understanding how Jews of Color experience identity not only through internal understandings of oneself but in relation to other people.
Changing our institutional structures can be an overwhelming task. Perhaps many of the innovations that come from brainstorming sessions, workshops, and meetings end up as crumpled paper, forgotten, or labeled too challenging to legitimately undertake. We want to change that.
In order to build a community focused on Earth, unity, movement, and Judaism, Silverstein wanted his collective to be guided by “the ability to connect to nature, to get your hands dirty, and then to have shared meals and to have access to delicious, nutritious, locally-resourced food together.”
“I really believe that the best ways to which stories can change our lives is when people tell their own stories and really decolonize that idea of storytelling, especially within the Latino community that is so diverse and so complex,” said Lopezrevoredo. Her extensive background in ethnographic storytelling, gained through her research and studies in academia, shapes her approach to the life stories of others.
Spanning a variety of religious backgrounds, the speakers discussed not only how racism rears its head in their communities, but also how faith traditions can offer road maps for advancing racial justice.
There are at least one million Jews of Color in the United States. That’s what the Jews of Color Initiative’s study, Counting Inconsistencies, found. From social media users to other Jewish population researchers, this number has been restructuring perceptions about Jews of Color.
I knew that the Jewish community held much more diversity than I was seeing in offices, meetings, and board rooms. Instead of asking “where are other Jews of Color?” I instead asked, “what is keeping Jews of Color away, and how can we change that?” It was with this genuine desire for change that I mapped the early stages of what would become the Jews of Color Initiative.
Arielle Korman and Yehudah Webster decided to build an organization free from prejudice, and where Jews of Color can learn in community with others who know first-hand the beauty and challenges of being a Jew of Color.
Without having the number of Jews of Color in the U.S., we would continue to face that recurring question, continue to be dismissed as just a tiny fraction of the community. Establishing a data-driven analysis of the number of Jews of Color also helps direct resources toward the community.
Faced with the reckoning with racism across time and the call to action from the Black Lives Matter movement in our present moment, Kaufman tasked any white Jewish webinar attendants and viewers to ask themselves: “What am I willing to give up? What am I able to learn, and what am I willing to contribute to halt the perpetuation of racism and white supremacy in this country?”