Adventures in American Judaism (Part 7)
This week's topic: Basketball Politics, Yarmulke Wars, and the Dynamics of Halakhic Change
In the early-1980s, two Jewish day schools in Chicago took a high school basketball league to court for the right to play basketball while adorning kippot. The testimony and judgment suggests a lot about the American Jewish expectations of external religious pride, identity, and sports.
Meet the speaker
Rabbi Dr. Zev Eleff
Rabbi Dr. Zev Eleff is president of Gratz College. He was previously chief academic officer of Hebrew Theological College and vice provost of Touro College Illinois. A prolific scholar, he is the author or editor of nine books and more than fifty scholarly articles in the fields of Jewish Studies and American Religion. His most recent book is Authentically Orthodox: A Tradition-Bound Faith in American Life (Wayne State University Press, 2020). Zev's research in American Jewish history has received numerous awards,…