// editor's note //
Fall 2012
What We Do
Jeremy Liss
Admittedly vague, The Current’s subtitle offers an interpretation of our publication’s purpose: a journal of contemporary politics, culture, and Jewish affairs. What constitutes these different items is a question I am often asked by prospective writers. I usually struggle to find an answer. Charged words like “culture” always seem somehow dishonest to me. After all, is culture not redefined inductively on a constant basis? During my tenure with The Current, I have learned to suspend the compulsion to fit what we do into taxonomic boxes, and simply accept each issue as a new opportunity to expand our scope.
This issue represents one of those moments when loose categorical criteria wind up being helpful to us editors. I might presume to liken the fall 2012 issue of The Current to a great novel, which uses situational narratives to articulate a compelling understanding of the universe in ways that brute dialectic and academic philosophy often fail to replicate. Through creative storytelling, historical reimagining, and a healthy dose of literary finesse, this issue you are about to read attempts to participate in a similar project, circumventing the rawness of speculative argumentation in order to penetrate more deeply that ever-elusive “culture” we so proudly purport to document.
Beginning this issue of the The Current is our Creative section. In it, we have two Boroughings and two Far Flungs. Dara Marans recounts her experiences at a Williamsburg speakeasy for Orthodox Jews; David Fine describes conversations with fellow audience-members at a taping of America’s Got Talent; Eric Shapiro regales us with his exploits in Spain; and Andrea Garcia Vargas writes in harrowing detail about her attendance at a flag-burning in Jordan.
Following the creative section are essays by Gilana Keller and Maddie Wolberg. Keller examines the actions of Columbia’s administration in the 1950’s, which fired a professor as a result of her Communist connections, while Wolberg recounts the surprising rise of Jewish women in the Argentine Leftist political establishment. Both authors hearken back to decades-old traditions of liberal change in the New World, and through the narratives they construct offer tremendous insight into the underpinnings of our current age.
In our Literary and Arts section, we have several reviews. Hannah Novack writes about Faking It: Manipulated Photography Before Photoshop, a new exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art that showcases how photographers have manually manufactured visual realities for the artistic and mass-consumer publics for over a century.
Divya Subramanian reviews Michael Chabon’s newest novel Telegraph Avenue. Although Subramanian claims that it does not live up to the Chabon’s ambitions, the book does bear the characteristic flair of the author’s earlier works.
Joshua Fattal writes about two exhibits of Jewish Manuscripts, one at the Columbia University Libraries and one at the Jewish Museum. In his review, he explains how the two venues showcase their respective collections with very different methodologies. Each exhibition has its own shortcomings, but Fattal argues that the two ultimately complement one another.
Finally, our End of the World features a fictional piece by myself entitled “True Story.”
This issue invites the reader to define the parameters of our submissions for themselves, tracing each piece as it dances around the indeterminate core of what we aim to do. We believe these impressions of events and experiences, past and present, provide a detail-oriented account of the broader cultural strokes that add color to university, American, Jewish, and human life. We hope you’ll agree.
This issue represents one of those moments when loose categorical criteria wind up being helpful to us editors. I might presume to liken the fall 2012 issue of The Current to a great novel, which uses situational narratives to articulate a compelling understanding of the universe in ways that brute dialectic and academic philosophy often fail to replicate. Through creative storytelling, historical reimagining, and a healthy dose of literary finesse, this issue you are about to read attempts to participate in a similar project, circumventing the rawness of speculative argumentation in order to penetrate more deeply that ever-elusive “culture” we so proudly purport to document.
Beginning this issue of the The Current is our Creative section. In it, we have two Boroughings and two Far Flungs. Dara Marans recounts her experiences at a Williamsburg speakeasy for Orthodox Jews; David Fine describes conversations with fellow audience-members at a taping of America’s Got Talent; Eric Shapiro regales us with his exploits in Spain; and Andrea Garcia Vargas writes in harrowing detail about her attendance at a flag-burning in Jordan.
Following the creative section are essays by Gilana Keller and Maddie Wolberg. Keller examines the actions of Columbia’s administration in the 1950’s, which fired a professor as a result of her Communist connections, while Wolberg recounts the surprising rise of Jewish women in the Argentine Leftist political establishment. Both authors hearken back to decades-old traditions of liberal change in the New World, and through the narratives they construct offer tremendous insight into the underpinnings of our current age.
In our Literary and Arts section, we have several reviews. Hannah Novack writes about Faking It: Manipulated Photography Before Photoshop, a new exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art that showcases how photographers have manually manufactured visual realities for the artistic and mass-consumer publics for over a century.
Divya Subramanian reviews Michael Chabon’s newest novel Telegraph Avenue. Although Subramanian claims that it does not live up to the Chabon’s ambitions, the book does bear the characteristic flair of the author’s earlier works.
Joshua Fattal writes about two exhibits of Jewish Manuscripts, one at the Columbia University Libraries and one at the Jewish Museum. In his review, he explains how the two venues showcase their respective collections with very different methodologies. Each exhibition has its own shortcomings, but Fattal argues that the two ultimately complement one another.
Finally, our End of the World features a fictional piece by myself entitled “True Story.”
This issue invites the reader to define the parameters of our submissions for themselves, tracing each piece as it dances around the indeterminate core of what we aim to do. We believe these impressions of events and experiences, past and present, provide a detail-oriented account of the broader cultural strokes that add color to university, American, Jewish, and human life. We hope you’ll agree.