Muse & the Marketplace 2018

This is an exceedingly fraught moment for many American Jewish writers. Like writers of other marginalized backgrounds, Jewish writers have long confronted challenges of cultural and linguistic translation as we craft our work; we have encountered problematic reactions to us and our writings that can be grounded in ignorance, bias, and hatred. But in 2018, some are sensing a new urgency to these concerns—without a corresponding growth in venues to discuss them, despite the writing world's general emphasis on diversity and inclusion.


We hope to foster a candid conversation in which we can air and explore dilemmas we tend to face alone. When do we declare ourselves simply to be "writers," and when might it be important to self-declare as "Jewish writers"—and what are the implications when others do the declaring for us? Which parts of our selves are welcome in the classroom, on the page, and in the academy, and which are we expected to mute? When politics is overlaid on art, what are the costs and benefits of speaking up? Finally, what resources might help us speak freely as both artists and Jews?


Readings distributed and recommended will include a report from the Anti-Defamation League ("Anti-Semitic Targeting of Journalists During the 2016 Presidential Campaign") and essays by Taffy Brodesser-Akner ("I Probably Won't Share This Essay on Twitter"), Junot Díaz ("MFA vs. POC"), and others.