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From The Globe and Mail “This hundred days has moved with incredible velocity,” said Jonathan Kaufman, one of the professors of the course and the director of the university’s School of Journalism. “When we got to 93 days I thought we had gone through eight years. But unlike eight years ago, there was a sense among students of outrage and going to the barricades. This year they are more reflective. They’re trying to figure out what it means rather than automatically go into o

From Market Scale The world of journalism is in a state of flux, driven by the rapid evolution of technology and the shifting dynamics of how the public consumes news. In an era where algorithms and social media dominate the dissemination of information, the role of journalism in society is under more scrutiny than ever. As we navigate these changes, the fundamental principles that have guided journalism for centuries—ethics, fairness, and the importance of in-person reportin

From Northeastern Global News Photo by Matthew Modoono/Northeastern University Since the Oct. 7 surprise attack on Israel, the Associated Press and most American news organizations have defined Hamas as a “militant group.” But not all news organizations. More than 60 dailies owned by Alden Global Capital ran an editorial urging the news media to describe Hamas a “terrorist organization.” Who’s right? It depends who you ask, says Jonathan Kaufman, director of Northeastern’s S

From WCVB Boston President Joe Biden is confirming that U.S. citizens are among the hostages captured by Hamas in this weekend’s attack on Israel. Hundreds of civilians have been killed, including at least 14 American citizens. Biden condemned the militant group for "sheer evil." A Belmont, Massachusetts, man who lives in Israel and another man whose family has been captured by Hamas are sharing their stories. More Here...

From The Guardian For two decades, Fox News has reigned supreme as America’s number one cable news channel. Until January, that is, when the network dropped to a once unthinkable third place in the ratings. The response from Fox News has not been a period of sombre self-reflection. Instead, the network seems to have made a chaotic lunge towards the right wing in recent weeks as hosts have dabbled in conspiracy theories and aggressively attacked the Joe Biden administration. M

From LA Review of Books AS A SHANGHAI-BORN WRITER, when I was invited to review journalist Jonathan Kaufman’s new biographically driven history of the city’s pre-1949 era, I readily agreed. One reason was its title, The Last Kings of Shanghai: The Rival Jewish Dynasties That Helped Create Modern China, which led me to assume, correctly, that it would deal in part with the Sassoon family. I knew the Sassoon name from a book series I read in my childhood titled Shanghai Stories

From Jewish Book Council If a Jew­ish his­to­ri­an were to advance a claim for the diver­si­ty of the expe­ri­ence of the dias­po­ra, the case would rest with the saga of the Sas­soons and the Kadoories. Once based in Bagh­dad, these two clans (and, yes, they were dis­tant­ly relat­ed) relo­cat­ed to Chi­na in the mid-nine­teenth cen­tu­ry. Instead of the mate­r­i­al strug­gles that, until the last cen­tu­ry, marked the mil­len­nia of exile for near­ly all of Jew­ry, these tw

From The Wall Street Journal Shanghai in the 1920s and ’30s was one of the world’s most modern, vibrant cities. And the city’s richest man was Victor Sassoon, a Jazz Age Richard Branson who gave costume parties in the ballroom of his swanky Cathay Hotel. Another local tycoon, Elly Kadoorie, built himself a palace modeled on Versailles, and his family moved around in a fleet of Rolls-Royces. The opulence of the Sassoons and Kadoories is all the more remarkable considering the

From NPR Illinois A new book looks at the history of China’s development and the important role played by two Jewish families with massive business empires. Here & Now’s Robin Young speaks with Jonathan Kaufman, author of “The Last Kings of Shanghai: The Rival Jewish Dynasties That Helped Create Modern China.” He is also director of the journalism school at Northeastern University. More Here...

From Asian Review of Books Chinese often claim a special relationship, sometimes verging on kinship, with Jews. The origins and reasons remain unclear but it may be at least in part due to two Jewish families—the Sassoons and their rivals, the Kadoories—both of whom played lasting roles in the development of two of China’s most modern cities: Shanghai and its rival, Hong Kong. Jonathan Kaufman’s new book, The Last Kings of Shanghai: The Rival Jewish Dynasties That Helped Crea

From The Boston Globe Jonathan Kaufman's book almost certainly will revive interest in a much-forgotten wrinkle of Jewish and Chinese history. More Here...

From Kirkus Reviews Historical account of two significant Jewish families who built wildly prosperous financial empires in Shanghai and Hong Kong that lasted for nearly two centuries. From opium trading to banking to real estate, the Sassoon and Kadoorie families “helped open the world to China—and opened China to the world.” As Pulitzer Prize–winning reporter Kaufman notes, they were “taipans,” alternately revered, feared, and loathed by the Chinese, who have largely “obscur

From Library Journal Kaufman (journalism, Northwesten Univ.; A Hole in the Heart of the World) unearths a hidden history with ties to the current global market in this account of the investments of two Jewish families who form an unexpected foundation for modern-day China. Both the Kadoorie and Sassoon families fled persecution in Iraq, escaping to China. Elias Sassoon arrived in Shanghai in 1850, trading opium. Elly Kadoorie settled in Hong Kong in 1880, as a Sassoon employe

From The Wall Street Journal For more than a century, the fortunes of the powerful Kadoorie family have been a barometer of Chinese openness to the world. Michael Kadoorie (second from left) with David Li, CEO of the Bank of East Asia (fourth from left), and other guests at the opening of the Peninsula Shanghai Hotel in 2010. Alamy Since 1880, when an Iraqi Jewish refugee named Elly Kadoorie arrived in Hong Kong, China has gone through a series of revolutions—from domination

From Northeastern Global News Fear of a global pandemic is one of the factors driving China’s surprising decision to shut down airports in the hope of containing a dangerous virus. The Chinese government also appears to be influenced by the failure of its response in 2002-03 to the outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome, says Jonathan Kaufman, director of the School of Journalism at Northeastern and former China bureau chief for The Wall Street Journal. The SARS epidem

From The Boston Globe Thirty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the revolutions in Eastern Europe, a reporter who was on the ground weighs the fallout. Presidential candidate Vaclav Havel waves to his supporters from a balcony in Prague in December 1989.REUTERS On a chilly November evening in the fall of 1989, I stood on a busy street in Prague and wondered if spring would return. Twenty-one years earlier, in 1968, the “Prague Spring” had brought students and workers

From Yahoo! Sports Scroll through the messaging app Signal, and it reads like a Page Six of the sports world. The boldfaced names span from the underworld to the executive suites, encompassing those on the biggest stages to the players behind the scenes. There's the father of the country's top basketball recruit, and he's listed alongside top executives in the NFL and NBA. There are plenty of college football and basketball coaches, mixed in with the agents, runners and stree

From HuffPost Banning the Washington Post from covering his campaign rallies isn't just a sign of Donald Trump's distrust of the press. Reporters are an early warning system. History shows that politicians who turn against the media and cut off their access don't stop there. Banning the Washington Post from covering his campaign rallies isn't just a sign of Donald Trump's distrust of the press. Reporters are an early warning system. History shows that politicians who turn aga

From PBS News PHILADELPHIA — More white Americans now share the view, long held by minorities, that racism is a national problem and should be confronted, according to an analysis of recent public opinion polling. The review, compiled by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation in conjunction with the Northeastern University School of Journalism, concludes that a majority of Americans across racial groups think more should be done to end racism. To that end, the foundation announced Thurs

From The Wall Street Journal Barack Obama's rise is driving a sometimes uncomfortable debate in the black community: What does it mean to be black in America? Sen. Obama embodies contradictions in the community that are starting to bubble to the surface -- largely out of the earshot of whites. He is the biracial son of an African father and a white mother in a community where most people are descended from slavery or whose ancestors had direct experience with segregation. He