Guest Scholars

Bio

Rachel Schreiber is gender historian, artist, and design. She is University Professor of Art, Media, and Cultural History and Director of the Gender & Sexuality Studies Institute at The New School in New York City. Elaine Black Yoneda: Jewish Immigration, Labor Activism, and Japanese American Exclusion and Incarceration (click here to purchase) is her third book. She is also the author of Gender and Activism in a Little Magazine: The Modern Figures of the Masses and the editor of Modern Print Activism in the United States. More information on her work can be found at www.rachelschreiber.com.

Misogyny and Antisemitism Are A Toxic Brew

Friday, March 7 at 7:00pm

Dr. Schreiber will speak briefly about a recent Opinion piece she co-authored for the New York Times with Dr. Natalia Mehlman Petrzela, titled “Misogyny and Antisemitism Are A Toxic Brew” (December 1, 2024).

Elaine Black Yoneda

Saturday, March 8 following worship

Join Rachel for a book club style discussion of her book, Elaine Black Yoneda. All are welcome – whether you have read the book or simply want to learn more about how a Jewish woman came to spend time in a concentration camp in California during WWII.

About The Book - Click on the Cover to Purchase

During World War II, Elaine Black Yoneda, the daughter of Russian Jewish immigrants, spent eight months in a concentration camp—not in Europe, but in California. She did this voluntarily and in solidarity, insisting on accompanying her husband, Karl, and their son, Tommy, when they were incarcerated at the Manzanar Relocation Center. Surprisingly, while in the camp, Elaine and Karl publicly supported the United States’ decision to exclude Japanese Americans from the coast. (click on the book cover to purchase)

Elaine Black Yoneda is the first critical biography of this pioneering feminist and activist. Rachel Schreiber deftly traces Yoneda’s life as she became invested in radical politics and interracial and interethnic activism. In her work for the International Labor Defense of the Communist Party, Yoneda rose to the rank of vice president. After their incarceration, Elaine and Karl became active in the campaigns to designate Manzanar a federally recognized memorial site, for redress and reparations to Japanese Americans, and in opposition to nuclear weapons.

Schreiber illuminates the ways Yoneda’s work challenged dominant discourses and how she reconciled the contradictory political and social forces that shaped both her life and her family’s. Highlighting the dangers of anti-immigrant and anti-Asian xenophobia, Elaine Black Yoneda recounts an extraordinary life.