From 1929 until the mid 1950s, Molly Goldberg was America’s favorite Jewish mother. Her character was written, acted, and embodied by Gertrude Berg, the first female showrunner and the first woman to win an Emmy for television. First on radio, then on television, The Goldbergs was a hit show and the first family sitcom. In this episode of Can We Talk?, New Yorker staff writer Emily Nussbaum introduces us to Gertrude Berg and her lovable character Molly Goldberg. We talk about how Molly remade the image of the Jewish mother, how McCarthy-era persecution led to the show’s downfall, and how the show still resonates today.

While the podcast is on summer hiatus, we're listening back to some of our favorite Can We Talk? episodes. First up, an episode from 2022 all about the word yenta: where it came from, what people think of it, and how its meaning changed over time. Enjoy!

In this special Mother’s Day episode, Nahanni interviews her mother, Emma Rous, who died this winter. They talk about how Emma’s teenage activism in a Protestant youth group influenced her politics, her conversion to Judaism in 1971, memories of her first Yom Kippur, what it was like to invent her own Jewish identity, and how Judaism eventually became her home.

This Sukkot, we're welcoming a special guest into Can We Talk?’s virtual sukkah: the Talmudic “femme fatale” Homa, one of the women featured in her new book, "The Madwoman in the Rabbi's Attic." In this episode, Talmud scholar Gila Fine tells Homa’s story, reinterprets it from Homa’s perspective, and explains why she thinks Homa makes a fitting symbolic guest for Sukkot.