Hosted by Courtney Hazlett, Rabbi Diana Fersko, and Josh Kross, each episode of How to Be a Jew takes a look at a current, cultural topic and what it means for us as Jews, and how we react to it because we are Jews. We interview actors, artists, and other creators about their work, Jewish thinkers about the most pressing problems facing us today, and once in a while, the Jewish-adjacent icons who occupy an interesting space in our world.
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Hosted by Courtney Hazlett, Rabbi Diana Fersko, and Josh Kross, each episode of How to Be a Jew takes a look at a current, cultural topic and what it means for us as Jews, and how we react to it because we are Jews. We interview actors, artists, and other creators about their work, Jewish thinkers about the most pressing problems facing us today, and once in a while, the Jewish-adjacent icons who occupy an interesting space in our world.
For more than 3,000 years, prohibitions against eating pig has been central to Jewish dietary laws, but it’s also been a potent symbol of Jewish identity. Other non-kosher animals, like horses, rabbits, squirrels, and even vultures don’t carry the same weight that the pig does in the Jewish imagination.
Jordan Rosenblum, Jewish Studies professor at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, joins us to talk about why. His new book, Forbidden—A 3,000-Year History of Jews and the Pig, traces the history of the pig as a symbol of Jewish identity, and recently won the National Jewish Book Award for Food Writing and Cookbooks.
How to Be a Jew
Hosted by Courtney Hazlett, Rabbi Diana Fersko, and Josh Kross, each episode of How to Be a Jew takes a look at a current, cultural topic and what it means for us as Jews, and how we react to it because we are Jews. We interview actors, artists, and other creators about their work, Jewish thinkers about the most pressing problems facing us today, and once in a while, the Jewish-adjacent icons who occupy an interesting space in our world.
