Loca­tion: Room 407, Lev­el Two, Los Ange­les Con­ven­tion Center

Mizrahi (East­ern) Jews have had a con­sis­tent pres­ence in the Mid­dle East since antiq­ui­ty. Their cul­tur­al and his­tor­i­cal mem­o­ry pre­dates the advent of both Chris­tian­i­ty and Islam. Their cumu­la­tive expe­ri­ence fos­ters a unique under­stand­ing of the forces at play in the region. Today, the Unit­ed States is home to the sec­ond-largest Mizrahi Jew­ish com­mu­ni­ty in the world. How can writ­ers with first­hand expe­ri­ence of the region con­tribute freely their under­stand­ing of the post – Octo­ber 7, 2023 events?

Loca­tion: Petree Hall C, Lev­el One, Los Ange­les Con­ven­tion Center

Five poets whose books have been hon­ored by the Nation­al Jew­ish Book Awards come togeth­er to read from their col­lec­tions and dis­cuss what it means to write on Jew­ish themes today. The poets reflect on their writ­ing rela­tion­ships with Jew­ish his­to­ries, joy, trau­ma, and polit­i­cal injus­tices and bru­tal­i­ties. The read­ing includes both win­ners and final­ists of the Nation­al Jew­ish Book Award in the cat­e­go­ry of poet­ry between 2018 and 2023.

Pre­sen­ters: Car­lie Hoff­man, Eri­ka Meit­ner, Michael Duma­n­is, Jared Harél

Mod­er­a­tor: Maya Pindyck

A Nar­row Bridge: Jew­ish Writ­ers on Resilience in an Anti­se­mit­ic Climate

Loca­tion: Room 405, Lev­el Two, Los Ange­les Con­ven­tion Center

Since Hamas attacked Israel in Octo­ber 2023, Jews have been increas­ing­ly tar­get­ed for exclu­sion in both the jour­nals and events of Amer­i­can let­ters. In this pan­el, Jew­ish Amer­i­can and Israeli authors will dis­cuss how this has affect­ed their work and the recep­tion of that work, as well as share strate­gies for resilience in the face of overt hos­til­i­ty to Jew­ish voices.

Pre­sen­ters: Susan Shapiro, Howard Lovy, Elis­sa Wald, Jen­nifer Lang

Mod­er­a­tor: Sarah Einstein

Israeli Writ­ers on Iden­ti­ty & Home

Vir­tu­al, Ses­sion Code: V107

Lumi­nar­ies of the Hebrew and Israeli lit­er­ary scene dis­cuss their lat­est work, home and home­land, Jew­ish and Israeli iden­ti­ty, liv­ing in Israel and the dias­po­ra, and the role of the writer and lit­er­ary world in such a time as this. 

Pre­sen­ters: Ayelet Tsabari, Maya Arad, Iddo Gefen

Writ­ing Jewishly

Fri­day, Mar 28, 2025 9:00 AM — 10:15 AM PDT

Loca­tion: Room 405, Lev­el Two, Los Ange­les Con­ven­tion Center

For cen­turies, Jews have writ­ten sto­ries inspired by their own cir­cum­stances, mak­ing art out of the real­i­ties of Jew­ish life. The styles and specifics dif­fer, but the sto­ries endure. Today a new gen­er­a­tion of authors con­tin­ue the rich tra­di­tion of Jew­ish sto­ry­telling, bring­ing com­pelling, mod­ern nov­els to life. In doing so, they sus­tain a lega­cy of thought­ful and inquis­i­tive conversation.

Pre­sen­ter: Sasha Vasi­lyuk, Jes­si­ca Eli­she­va Emer­son, Ben­jamin Resnick

Mod­er­a­tor: Stephanie Butnick

Spir­i­tu­al Out­siders Unit­ed: Writ­ing Our Way to Col­lec­tive Liberation

Fri­day, Mar 28, 2025 3:20 PM — 4:35 PM PDT

Loca­tion: Room 405, Lev­el Two, Los Ange­les Con­ven­tion Center

This multi­genre pan­el brings togeth­er Mus­lim and Jew­ish authors with com­plex cul­tur­al, eth­nic, or racial iden­ti­ties at a time of esca­lat­ed anti­semitism and Islam­o­pho­bia. Each will reflect on what it means to be a Jew­ish or Mus­lim author now, the strug­gles of belong­ing that inform their work, and how lit­er­ary art fos­ters under­stand­ing amidst height­ened con­flicts. Join us to grap­ple with what it means to be an out­sider with­in and beyond the com­mu­ni­ties we inhab­it while work­ing to build sol­i­dar­i­ty and col­lec­tive lib­er­a­tion through literature.

Pre­sen­ters: Sarah Ein­stein, Sufiya Abdur-Rah­man, Aisha Sharif, Rose­bud Ben-Oni

Mod­er­a­tor: Mag­in LaSov Gregg