Sections

Articles

The editors welcome submissions of fully drafted articles, or abstracts for articles, that touch on any aspect of Canadian Jewish life, from any disciplinary perspective. We are particularly interested in essays that focus on comparisons and interactions between Canadian Jews and Jews from other countries, and in essays that focus on comparisons or interactions between Canadian Jews and other religious or ethnic groups in Canada.

Archives Matter 

The Oxford dictionary defines “archives” as a collection of historical documents or records providing information about a place, institution, or group of people. The place where these archival documents are housed, and from which they are catalogued, digitized, or otherwise made available, is also referred to by the name “Archives.” Archival sources are usually unique documents, often created at the time an event occurs (such as a photograph or a recording), or in the immediate aftermath of an event (such as a letter or a diary entry.) This type of “matter,” or material, therefore has the ability to speak across time to the reader, showing us what the author experienced as if those events were unfolding only days before. This feeling of immediacy is characteristic of the excitement of using archival materials.

In this regular sub-section of the journal we highlight thematic selections of primary matter from Archives across Canada. For each edition a cross-country call goes out to repositories which house documents of Canadian Jewish interest. Three to five participants lend their voices and illustrations to each instalment.

Those interested in participating in creating a future instalment of the Archives Matter sub-section are encouraged to contact the section editor, Janice Rosen, at jrosen@cjarchives.ca.

Book Reviews 

The journal reviews scholarly works that address, analyze, compare, or substantially include the Canadian Jewish experience. We consider academic studies from any discipline or field. We do not review original works of fiction, poetry, memoirs, films, visual arts or museum exhibitions. Reviews are typically between 1000 and1500 words, address the contribution of the work to the field, and situate these texts within their broader scholarly context. Authors and publishers who wish to have their books reviewed in our journal should write to vlight@umd.edu.

Field Notes

Field Notes features essays on contemporary literary, cultural, intellectual, and communal events of interest, such as art and museum exhibitions, film and theatrical productions, popular fiction and nonfiction, memoirs and poetry, podcasts and digital humanities projects, and more.

We encourage non-standard academic writing (think the New York Review of Books, the Literary Review of Canada, or the Jewish Review of Books) and welcome pitches and inquiries from English- and French-language writers both inside and outside academia. The section is also open to other contributions, including research and teaching reflections written for a popular audience, literary travelogues, photo essays, etc. Click here for more information. 

Translations 

The Translations section features recent translations into English or French of texts originally written in other languages and which are pertinent to Canadian Jewish studies. The section publishes the original source material, an original translation into French or English, and an introduction by the translator. The section aims to highlight the fact that Jewish life in Canada happened, and continues to happen, in many languages: English, French, Hebrew, Yiddish, Ladino, Russian, Arabic, Farsi, Spanish, Georgian, and so on. Secondly, the Translations section aims to promote the important work of translators in promoting access to relevant historical and cultural resources.

We welcome contributions of texts that speak to any aspect of Canadian Jewish life, letters, or history. If you have access to a language that Jews spoke in Canada other than French or English and have found interesting and relevant source material that you would like to translate, be in touch with koffman@yorku.ca or jtapper@yorku.ca.