Mara W. Cohen Ioannides Books

Set on the island of Rhodes during the interwar period, the narrative explores the lives of a Jewish family amid a backdrop of economic hardship and cultural coexistence between Christian and Jewish Greeks under Italian rule. As families face the harsh realities of sending loved ones abroad for work, the story reveals the complexities of their relationships, the impact of the Holocaust, and the intergenerational struggles between tradition and modernity. Through the eyes of the youngest child, themes of bigotry, adolescent dreams, and familial bonds are intricately woven with the use of Ladino and local sayings, culminating in an epilogue that reflects on the family's fate post-Holocaust.

Creating Community expands the written histories of Springfield that have long overlooked this minority in the local community. It also adds to the growing study of small Jewish communities around the United States. Springfield is both Southern and Midwestern in flavor and this is reflected in the Jewish community's development that has examples of both. Jews have been part of the economic development of the town since the 1860s. Since then, they have also been involved in fraternal and social organizations, politics, and education. This is not a complete history, but its purpose is not to be encyclopedic, rather it is to exemplify how this minority group were part of the growth the Queen City of the Ozarks.

This volume examines the development of the non-liturgical parts of the Central Conference of American Rabbis’ Haggadot. Through an understanding of the changes in American Jewish educational patterns and the CCAR's theology, it explores how the CCAR Haggadah was changed over time to address the needs of the constituency. While there have been many studies of the Haggadah and its development over the course of Jewish history, there has been no such study of the non-liturgical parts of the Haggadah that reflect the needs of the audience it reaches. How the CCAR, the first and largest of American-born Judaisms, addressed the changing needs of its members through its literature for the Passover Seder reveals much about the development of the movement. This in turn provides for the readers of this book an understanding of how American Judaism has developed.