Trudging up or down Bruin Walk, one sees students advertising events or organizations, hawking wares, or simply skirting gaggles of visitors to UCLA. However, those passersby on Oct. 15 and 17 witnessed a campus-wide march to protest California’s Proposition 206, which in part prohibits affirmative action, in light of the upcoming United States Supreme Court case Schuette v. Coalition to...

To many, college is a time to take classes, join interesting clubs, land dream internships, and meet soulmates/hook-up buddies/Saturday night dates — not necessarily in that order. But for one who grew up in the Jewish tradition that firmly stresses the mitzvah of going forth and multiplying, the latter might be the most under-appreciated and under-stressed of the bunch. He...

The perpetuation of Judaism throughout the millennia has largely relied on one of its most important tenets: education. The Talmudic tractate Kiddushin (“Consecrations”; 29a) dictates that a father is obligated to teach his child three things: how to earn a living, how to learn Torah and, most oddly, how to swim. Although ensuring that Jewish youth are familiar with the...

In Israel, your politics determine everything — where you sit in synagogue, what falafel stand you frequent, and especially what football (soccer) team you support. Israeli football culture, stemming from longstanding traditions of European football hooliganism and city pride, takes on a new level in a country whose geographical area is small but rich in human capital. FOOTBALL IN ISRAEL...

It is natural that in times of war the voices of moderation are stifled. A threat to the health of the community awakens a deep internal defensive stance while the scrutiny of one’s peers only reinforces this attitude. For over a century, the Israelis and Palestinians have been at war with one another, further entrenching the feelings of animosity with...

Sabbath, Shabbat, Shabbos, and the less-common Shabbath and Shabbas (an attempt to reconcile Eastern European consonant pronunciation with North African and Middle Eastern vowel vocalization) are all examples of the futility of attempts to standardize the transliterated pronunciation of a language whose speakers were dispersed from their homeland for a millennium and a half. Splintered elocution, however, takes a backseat...

It's been a long year at UCLA, marked by special Hillel bashes (such as Joe Bruin's Bear Mitzvah), USAC elections, and USAC- and BDS-related drama. To wrap up the year, Ha'Am has compiled a list of some of the most significant events of 2014, both globally and Jewishly. We'd like to extend a big yashar koach (congratulations) and mazal tov...

Joke of the Day: Sheldon visited mama and papa. He said: “Finally, I’ve found my soulmate. Just for fun, I'm going to bring over three women and you guys guess which ‘the one’ is.” Mama and Papa agreed. The next day he brought three beautiful women who sat on the sofa and chatted with Mama and Papa over a little...

For the generic college bro on campus, nothing is as terrifying as the concept of commitment; even the occasional bout with alcohol poisoning or the gnarly digestive feedback from old and crusty pizza is no match for the fear of getting tied down. For most, a 10-week-long, once-a-week symposium course tests the outward limitations of commitment. Speaking from anecdotal evidence,...

According to the Avi Chai Foundation, a small, but growing, percentage of the Jews in America attend private Jewish schools. In general, these schools are much smaller than private secular schools and even smaller in comparison to most public schools. Imagine going to a school where you know every single student can identify their classmates' siblings, can tell where they...