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The Light of the Revival: Stained-Glass Designs for Restituted Synagogues in Ukraine
No full textThe catalogue for the exhibition The Light of the Revival: Stained-Glass Designs for Restituted Synagogues in Ukraine by Eugeny Kotlyar held at Fordham University from September 10-December 10, 2023 offers a broad perspective on the revival of Ukrainian synagogues after Ukraine’s independence. It showcases three sets of stained-glass windows, which were designed by Eugeny Kotlyar and partially implemented in Ukrainian synagogues in the period from 1995 to 2005. Two early works shown here were the first samples of stained-glass designs for modern Ukrainian synagogues, which set a new trend. The first of them—the stained-glass windows for the Kharkiv Choral Synagogue (1995) on the theme of Jewish Holidays. The second project—an ensemble of stained-glass windows for the Kyiv synagogue in Podil (2002)—focuses Holy Places of the Land of Israel and the Tribes of Israel. The third work highlighting Jerusalem and the Tribes of Israel is a part of the original design of the Torah Ark itself in the Galitska synagogue in Kyiv (2005). In Kotlyar’s artistic vision, the stained-glass window projects the light, turns the metaphysical into the physical, materializes the speculative image, and, ultimately, fills the prayer with color and light.Eugeny Kotlyar is a professor at the Department of Art History and the chair of the Department of Monumental Paintings at the Kharkiv State Academy of Design and Arts (KSADA). He is also a curator of the Center for Eastern Studies of KSADA and the chair of the Academic Board of the Ukrainian Association for Jewish Studies (UAJS). His research focuses on Jewish art, Jewish heritage in Ukraine, synagogue decorations, and Kharkiv Jewish local lore. Trained as an artist and art historian, Kotlyar designed stained-glass windows for synagogues and Jewish community centers in many cities of Ukraine. In 2022-2023, he was a virtual fellow in the AAJR-Fordham-NYPL Ukrainian Fellowship Program
Virtual Communities of Practice as Responses to the Turbulence of 2020: Developing Equity and Justice Leadership
No full textPurpose – Virtual communities of practice (VCoPs) supported educators during the COVID-19 pandemic and the resurgent movement for racial justice that arose in 2020. Four VCoPs offered a venue for practitioners and researchers to develop social capital in the face of pandemic and persistent institutional racism.
Design/methodology/approach – Researchers conducted semi-structured interviews with organizers of four VCoPs and collected supporting documentation from those organizers.
Findings – VCoP organizers created opportunities to develop bridging and bonding capital of equity- and justice-focused educators.
Research limitations/implications – The analysis points toward the affordances of VCoPs in crisis response and equity leadership.
Originality/value – This original analysis extends work on communities of practice, generally, virtual communities of practice, and equity leadership development
The Worlding of Arabic Literature: Language, Affect, and the Ethics of Translatability
No full textCritics have long viewed translating Arabic literature into English as an ethically fraught process of mediating between two wholly incommensurable languages, cultures, and literary traditions. Today, Arabic literature is no longer “embargoed” from Anglophone cultural spaces, as Edward Said once famously claimed that it was. As Arabic literary works are translated into English in ever-greater numbers, what alternative model of translation ethics can account for this literature’s newfound readability in the hegemonic language of the world literary system?
The Worlding of Arabic Literature argues that an ethical translation of a work of Arabic literature is one that transmits the literariness of the source text by engaging new populations of readers via a range of embodied and sensory effects. The book proposes that when translation is conceived of not as an exchange of semantic content but as a process of converting the affective forms of one language into those of another, previously unrecognized modalities of worldliness open up to the source text.
In dialogue with a rich corpus of Arabic aesthetic and linguistic theory as well as contemporary scholarship in affect theory, translation theory, postcolonial theory, and world literature studies, this book offers a timely and provocative investigation of how an important literary tradition enters the world literary system.
The Worlding of Arabic Literature: Language, Affect, and the Ethics of Translatability is available from the publisher on an open-access basis
Navigating Ideals: Latter-Day Saint Women and Latter-Day Saint Cultural Master Narratives
No full textCultural master narratives are a primary way that cultures proscribe how and who cultural members are supposed to be. This study coupled cultural consensus analysis and cultural consonance analysis with the master narrative framework to identify Latter-day Saint (LDS) cultural master narratives that emerge from the perspectives and lived experiences of Latter-day Saint women. Building upon the findings from a previous study that identified descriptions of an ideal LDS woman, a pile sorting analysis was conducted with LDS women (N = 30) living in the United States. The findings from pile sorting analysis were used to create a cultural master narrative survey. The responses from survey by LDS women in the United States (N = 2,436) were analyzed using cultural consensus analysis and cultural consonance analysis. This study successfully identified nine Latter-day Saint cultural master narratives. The research design demonstrated that cultural consensus analysis and cultural consonance analysis combined with the master narrative framework effectively identify cultural master narratives. The consensus analysis successfully attended to the master narrative principles of ubiquity, invisibility, utility, and rigidity. The remaining principle, compulsory, as well as utility, were addressed through cultural consonance analysis
Conducting a Principal Professional Learning Community as a Retention Strategy
No full textPrincipals are leaving their schools at an alarming rate each year, and this turnover can have detrimental effects on school culture and student achievement. The aim of this study was to improve principal job satisfaction, in an effort to increase retention in the position at Vision Schools where there have been 14 principals in eight years for four different schools in their district. The six-week intervention was a multipronged intervention that involved creating and running a principal professional learning community, as well as peer mentoring, in the form of shadowing, to provide professional development for principals, and to increase the support for principals while reducing isolation. Six school principals from the same district participated in the intervention. This mixed methods study used open-ended survey questions, as well as the principal section of the Met Life Teacher: Challenges for School Leadership Survey, and the Managerial Skills Assessment Instrument (MSAI) to measure job satisfaction, leadership skills, and potential retention. Data showed that the participants felt a strong sense of community, a minimal positive impact on job satisfaction, and a decrease in leadership skills during this cycle of the intervention. Retention data is a lagging indicator, and exact data will not be available until the next school year. At the end of this study, 5 out of the 6 participants reported that they will return to their positions as principals at Vision schools
From Monolingual to Bilingual: Educator Language Ideologies and a New Dual Language Program
No full textThe present dissertation study explores the language ideologies of teachers and administrators at one public school, pseudonym PS NYC, that was required to implement a Spanish-English dual language program. Language ideologies are deeply held beliefs about language use and are often considered “common sense” ideas by those who espouse them. I utilize a continuum of three language ideologies which are subtractive/assimilationist, additive, and holistic/dynamic to understand and classify the informants. This study employs a qualitative case study methodology and utilizes a questionnaire and two interviews for each of the nine informants during data collection. There were three administrators, including the principal, and six teachers who participated, all with diverse license areas and backgrounds. The findings suggest that there is potential for a divergent ideological landscape at PS NYC during the time of implementation of a new bilingual program. Furthermore, educators employ their complex language ideologies at different times and within different roles in the school. In addition, there was much variation within the language ideologies of the educators, even for those who I classified with same ideology. All of these findings were explored through the two theories constructivism and critical theory, which provide the framework for the study. Recommendations for practice are that the ideologies of local educators should be taken into consideration when implementing bilingual programs. Last, further research should be conducted that includes the voices of the families of students in bilingual programs in order to expand on the present study’s description of the ideological landscape of the school
Western Corporations and Colombian Labor: Cycles of Transhistorical Colonial and Economic Oppression in Colombia
No full textThe relationship between colonial and colonized nations is entrenched in modern politics and history; remaining a transhistorical site of economic, social, and political imbalance. The United States and Colombia have a trans-colonial relationship that is shadowed by colonial gains at the expense of colonized livelihood. Western corporations mimic the patterns of the governments that preside over them, using the land and labor of the colonized “Other” to maximize profit. I investigate postcolonial Colombia through the lens of the transhistorical United Fruit Company and the mass corporation Coca-Cola. The accountability of these corporations and the systems that have allowed them to maintain power remain uncontended, which I believe must change in order to end cycles of subjugation. American corporations and the United States government have held Colombia in a chokehold since the origin of colonialism, creating a disillusioned economy that finds itself catering to the United States at the expense of Colombian bodies. The United Fruit Company and Coca-Cola serve as case studies that prove that labor exploitation emerges as a result of the cycle of oppression that began with imperial naval expeditions in Spain. Colombian laborers are made disposable by the transhistorical functions of colonialism that refuse to humanize the non-western Other. I call attention to the importance of breaking cycles of repression that began with invasion and settlement. Until the companies and systems that created these uneven power structures acknowledge their responsibility, colonization will be allowed to self-disguise in the name of capitalism and human hierarchy
A New Cold War: How West Africa Has Become the New Stage for Power Politics Between the West and China
No full textThis thesis seeks to determine how French influence in West Africa will impact a US-China power competition in the region. Senegal and Côte d’Ivoire served as case studies for the evaluation of French influence in the region since many consider these former colonies to have the most French influence. French economic, political/military, and socio-cultural influence was analyzed in each case study, as well as this influence in the context of US-China competition. Although France influences both countries, France has more influence in Côte d’Ivoire and may be able to influence decisions there, more so than Senegal. Nevertheless, China has become a popular figure in both countries as France has decreased in popularity. French and US coordination in West Africa will need to address infrastructure, investment, and other political demands of Africans to counter Chinese influence in the region
Flashpoints in Small State Diplomacy: The Effects of Strategic Alignment, Democratic Norms, and Domestic Support in Ukraine and Taiwan on US Commitments
No full textIn the field of international relations, the fate of small and mid-sized nations is often analyzed through the lens of great power politics, but this perspective misses half of the story. In this paper, I ask the question: what factors internal to smaller states affect their ability to court Western support? I compare the cases of Ukraine and Taiwan, as both are geopolitical flashpoints with a much larger aggressor, are widely researched for their implications on the global balance of power, yet lack sufficient research regarding their own actions on the world stage. Looking at the history of both states since democratization (the early 1990s in both cases), three variables–international/democratic norms, strategic alignment, and domestic support–have been relevant to the success of each state in realizing security agreements and military support from the United States. Yet the way these variables affect outcomes reveals interesting nuances in the cases examined. I argue that Ukraine and Taiwan find diplomatic success in achieving security partnerships with the US by emphasizing different norms and employing different messaging around strategic alignment, while domestic support is a prerequisite for diplomatic success in both cases. These findings should inform how scholars understand the factors internal to smaller nations which have a real and lasting impact on geopolitics, in particular by highlighting the underlying conditions which make adherence to democratic and international norms effective for some states and not others, and which influence the calculus for strategic alignment. These findings open up possibilities for further examination of small and mid-sized states to delineate these dynamics with greater clarity
Braunstein, Beth
No full textBeth Anshen Braunstein was born in the Bronx 1954. Both sets of her grandparents immigrated from Russia, with one grandmother stopping in Alexandria, Egypt along the journey and learning Italian, which she used to communicate with Italian families in the Bronx. Her mother’s family lived and had a children’s clothing store on Bathgate Avenue. His father had a store next door and, after they were married, her parents had a health food store off of Pelham Parkway. Braunstein first lived on Bathgate before the family moved to Thieriot Avenue, near Parkchester. In her teenage years she became more religious, attending Temple Emmanuel, the Conservative synagogue in Parkchester, with her sister, before then switching to the Young Israel of Parkchester, which was Modern Orthodox. They attended Hebrew school and junior congregation, including socializing over tea and cake after Shabbat services.
Braunstein remembers the area as primarily Jewish, with most attending public school. She attended PS 102 and Junior High School 127, where her SP classes had a few African American and Hispanic students and the rest were white. She wonders what role, if any, racism had to play in this arrangement. In elementary school she made the music class, learning to play the flute and having the opportunity to gain culture like seeing Leonard Bernstein at Lincoln Center. At James Monroe High School she was in the honors classes, so most of her exposure to different ethnicities was through gym class. By high school she remembers some racial tensions, particularly being asked for money because she was white and assumed to be wealthier. Braunstein also went through a religious shift in high school, attending Jewish summer camp, Hebrew High School, and deciding to become shomer Shabbos.
After attending Queens College, Braunstein was a librarian at various yeshivas in Manhattan and the Bronx. Her time at the Abraham Joshua Heschel School opened her up to the philosophy of social justice, and she took that with her to SAR Academy in Riverdale. Today, after living in a house on Pelham Parkway and raising her family, she still lives in the Bronx in Riverdale, deeply involved in her children and grandchildren’s lives. Her strong Jewish identity has been imparted on the subsequent generations, with all of them being shomer Shabbos, traditional yet modern and open Jews.
Keywords: Thieriot Avenue, Riverdale, Pelham Parkway, Modern Orthodox, Conservative, Parkchester, Co-op City, family, James Monroe High School, Queens College, race, education, yeshiva, social justice, Bathgate Avenue, summer camp, 1967/1968 Teachers Strikes, 67 War, Israel, Holocaus