Conversations about antisemitism often go badly. Some build understanding; others leave people feeling isolated. Why do arguments that persuade within the Jewish community so often fail outside it, and can familiar approaches make understanding harder? How can people talk about Jewish identity, Israel, Zionism, and antisemitism without every conversation turning into a fight?

This two-session online workshop works through real situations from schools, workplaces, civic organizations, and everyday relationships. Participants will look at where people agree and where they genuinely disagree, and practice responses that invite curiosity without minimizing legitimate Jewish concerns. The workshop is open to Jewish and non-Jewish participants alike. Underneath it is one question: can relationships across political, religious, and communal divides make Jews safer, and how do we reach people who see the world differently?

Who this is for:

• Anyone who has struggled to answer a hard question about antisemitism, Israel, or Zionism
• People addressing antisemitism in schools, workplaces, or community organizations
• Non-Jewish friends and colleagues who want to know how to help

What you'll leave with:

• Ways to answer hard questions that keep the conversation open
• A clearer sense of where people agree and disagree about when criticism of Israel or Zionism becomes antisemitism
• Practice with responses that don’t ask Jews to minimize their own experience

Two Wednesdays: October 21 & 28, 6–7:30pm Pacific Time

Questions? Our FAQ covers registration, recordings of missed sessions, refunds, and financial assistance.

Erich Gruen (UC Berkeley), has spent decades studying Jews in the Greco-Roman world, and much of his work questions popular assumptions about Jewish isolation, religious purity, and political resistance in antiquity. In four sessions he takes up some of the most debated episodes in ancient Jewish history.

Each session takes on a question that has divided scholars and puzzled general readers alike: Were Jews in antiquity accused of ritual murder, the charge later known as blood libel? Did they reject Greek mythology as incompatible with their traditions, or engage with it in surprising ways? And what is the history behind Hanukkah?

Who this is for

• Anyone curious about Jews in the ancient world
• Students of classical antiquity who want to go past the standard accounts
• Anyone who has wondered where Hanukkah comes from

What you'll leave with

• Answers to four contested questions about ancient Jewish history, and the evidence behind them
• A way of telling historical evidence apart from later myth-making

Four Sundays: November 1, 8, 15, and 22, 2–3:30pm Pacific Time

Questions? Our FAQ covers registration, recordings of missed sessions, refunds, and financial assistance.

California has passed a law requiring state agencies that collect ancestry or ethnicity data to include a separate category for Jewish ancestry or ethnicity beginning in 2029. What changes when the state counts Jews as an ethnic group?

The panel brings together Ari Y. Kelman, director of the Berman Archive at Stanford; Keith Feldman, professor of ethnic studies at UC Berkeley; Aliya Saperstein, professor of sociology at Stanford; and David Bocarsly of Jewish California, who helped draft Senate Bill 1387. Asaf Elia-Shalev, editor in chief of J. The Jewish News of Northern California, moderates. After the panel, each table continues the conversation with a facilitator.

Presented with J. and cosponsored by Stanford’s Taube Center for Jewish Studies, the Berman Archive, and the Center for Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity.

Who this is for:

• Anyone curious how governments define and count Jewish identity
• Californians who want to know what SB 1387 does
• Anyone who would rather join a small-group conversation than listen to a lecture

What you'll leave with:

• A clear account of what SB 1387 changes in how California collects demographic data
• Several views on whether, and how, Jewishness works as an ethnic category

Monday, November 2, 5:30–7pm Pacific Time

Questions? Our FAQ covers registration, recordings of missed sessions, refunds, and financial assistance.