Booknik, Jewish Texts and Themes is an Internet publication in Russian on Jewish literature and culture. Its Editor In Chief is Sergey Kuznetsov. Prominent authors, journalists, literary translators, philologists, Hebraists, historians, etc. are contributing to the resource.

History

Booknik was launched in 2006 by Sergey Kuznetsov Content Group (SKCG) with the financial support of the international AVI CHAI Foundation

AVI CHAI Foundation

AVI CHAI is a private foundation endowed in 1984 by Sanford Bernstein, a well-known successful investor who become a Modern Orthodox Baal teshuva and who had wanted to further the cause of outreach to alienated and assimilated Jews worldwide. Avi-Chai functions in the United States and in Israel...

 and The Chais Family Foundation

Stanley Chais

Stanley Chais , was a Beverly Hills, California investment advisor who operated "feeder funds" which collected money for funds related to the Madoff investment scandal. He was born in Bronx, New York....

. The original idea was suggested by the AVI CHAI Foundation director for the former Soviet Union David Rozenson. The launching day was July 2, 2006, however Booknik’s Birthday is celebrated in July and not tied up to any specific date.

Ideology

Booknik is an interdisciplinary web resource on the Jewish literature and culture in general. According to the official information, “the goal of the project is to use multitudes of examples to demonstrate various trajectories of the national and global cultures’ mutual influence.”

Booknik covers literary and cultural events by placing them into the broad context of the contemporary and classical literatures, as well as the Jewish and Jewish themes-related culture.

Thus, Booknik touches upon many aspects of Jewish and global cultures, ranging from ritual arts to neo-klezmer music, Judeo-Christian polemics to Kabbalah

Kabbalah

Kabbalah/Kabala is a discipline and school of thought concerned with the esoteric aspect of Rabbinic Judaism. It was systematized in 11th-13th century Hachmei Provence and Spain, and again after the Expulsion from Spain, in 16th century Ottoman Palestine...

 studies, Biblical studies

Biblical studies

Biblical studies is the academic study of the Judeo-Christian Bible and related texts. For Christianity, the Bible traditionally comprises the New Testament and Old Testament, which together are sometimes called the "Scriptures." Judaism recognizes as scripture only the Hebrew Bible, also known as...

 to Reform Judaism

Reform Judaism

Reform Judaism refers to various beliefs, practices and organizations associated with the Reform Jewish movement in North America, the United Kingdom and elsewhere. In general, it maintains that Judaism and Jewish traditions should be modernized and should be compatible with participation in the...

, and anti-Semitism to gender studies

Gender studies

Gender studies is a field of interdisciplinary study which analyses race, ethnicity, sexuality and location.Gender study has many different forms. One view exposed by the philosopher Simone de Beauvoir said: "One is not born a woman, one becomes one"...

.

The project originators declare their intentions in this way, “We are as free of religious, political, territorial, language, and other commitments, as we can be, with all due respect to all groups and trends. We are equally interested in both mainstream and marginal aspects of the Jewish culture, in friendly attention and hostile stereotypes.”

The web site’s editorial board shares the paradigm of anti-victimity

Anti-Victim

Anti-victim is a term used to describe an individual who pro-actively develops and uses protective and problem-solving behaviors to prevent, avoid, and prepare to act against violent or abusive encounters.-History:...

 firmly set now in the field of Jewish studies

Jewish studies

Jewish studies is an academic discipline centered on the study of Jews and Judaism. Jewish studies is interdisciplinary and combines aspects of history , religious studies, archeology, sociology, languages , political science, area studies, women's studies, and ethnic studies...

, and the Jewish culture. According to this trend of thinking, the Jewish role in history and civilization is considered as active and creative rather than passive..

Sections

Booknik materials are arranged by genre (in sections), and by theme (in tags). Booknik has seven principal sections:

Books & Reviews: book reviews, and the catalogue of publications covered by Booknik.

Articles & Interviews: analytical materials, interviews with arts and culture luminaries, collections of thematically united materials.

Events & Reports: latest news of Jewish culture in the context of the global culture.

Columns & Columns: thematic and personal columns by the web site contributors.

Stories & Essays: preprints from books, essays, features, translations of poetry and prose, and stories originally written for Booknik.

Contests & Quizzes: the interactive section, including contests, polls, quizzes, tests, etc.

Audio & Video: Booknik’s video blog.

“Booknik Reader”

Since November 2007, the hard-copy edition of the resource has been published in the form of 16-pages full-color quarterly newspaper “Booknik Reader.” Since November 2008, its run has been 50 thousand copies. The distribution is free by subscription. The paper is also distributed in Russian and Israeli clubs and bookstores.

“Booknik Jr.”

In August 2008, the “Booknik Jr.” was launched, the web site for children and their parents. The site creators describe it as a resource “about good books, both fresh ones and those we loved when we were kids ourselves. It is also about shows and concerts that could make all of us a little bit better. And we write about different cities and countries where you can travel with all your family, and no one will be bored.”

“Booknik Show”

Several times a year, Booknik arranges “Booknik Shows,” thematic offline events coinciding with significant events of Moscow’s cultural and literary life, like the NON/FICTION International Book Fair, the Moscow International Book Fair, the series of club events for the “Read, City” program organized by the Knizhnoye Obozrenie newspaper, etc. Booknik also celebrates its birthday in early July. More often than not, Booknik’s events are musical concerts, literary evenings or a combination of the two.

Over the years, “Booknik Shows” featured such prominent performers as Psoy Korolenko

Psoy Korolenko

Psoy Galaktionovich Korolenko is a pseudonym of a Russian Jewish song writer and performer by the name of Pavel Eduardovich Lion . At the same time Pavel Lion is a slavist with a Ph.D...

, Lev Rubinstein, Umka

Anna Gerasimova

Anna Gerasimova , also known by her nickname Umka , is a Russian rock singer-songwriter, the leader of the group Umka and Bronevik. She is also a poet, literary translator, literature researcher, traveler and a significant person in the Russian hippie movement.-Songs:Songs written and sung by Umka...

, Garik Osipov, “’Appy New Year,” “Der Partizaner Kish,” Alla Ioshpe and Stakhan Rakhimov, Alexander Levenbuk, and many others.

The Spirit of the Web Site

Being the name of the project, Booknik is also the name of a virtual character who writes some materials for the web site. This character is considered the web site’s spirit by the project originators.

External links

• Booknik’s Official Site
• Booknik in the Yandex.ru media database
• Galina Zelenina interviewed by polit.ru about Booknik (in Russian)
• Booknik Will Find out about the Real Jewish Woman, Pravda.ru, September 7, 2007 (in Russian)
• Booknik’s Jewish Woman. The International Jewish Paper, September 2007 (in Russian)
• Booknik’s birthday, NG Entr’acte, July 27, 2008 (in Russian)
• Booknik.ru’s birthday party, Time Out, July 4, 2008 (in Russian)
• Alla Ioshpe and Stakhan Rakhimov. The Soviet Pop Music in the New Context, chitaygorod.ru, September 2008 (in Russian)