Since World War II there has been a growing sense among many that anti-Semitism would not destroy the Jews after all; rather, it would be through assimilation, intermarriage and general indifference. By the 1990s, when the Jewish population survey noted an alarming drop in the number of American Jews, a full-scale panic set in among those concerned with the future of the Jews. Birthright Vegas will look at one moment in this panic and its aftermath: a moment in which the Jewish relation to Israel, to religion, and to Las Vegas is wildly in flux.
About the Speaker: DANIEL ITZKOVITZ is Professor of English at Stonehill College. He is writing a book entitled Fixing the Jews, which examines 21st century attempts to fix the meanings of Jewishness, and in the process, to fix what’s wrong with the Jews