Lawrence Baron

Laurie Baron

Lawrence (Laurie) Baron, now retired, served as the Nasatir Professor of Modern Jewish History at San Diego State University. He served from 1988 to 2006 as director of SDSU’s Lipinsky Institute for Judaic Studies. He was the founder in 1995 of the Western Jewish Studies Association.

He writes two satire columns for San Diego Jewish World: “Humoring the Headlines” under his byline, and “Hounding the Headlines,” under the byline of his dog Elona.

Books to his credit, available on Amazon, include:

Projecting the Holocaust into the Present: The Changing Focus of Contemporary Holocaust Cinema

The Modern Jewish Experience in World Cinema

The eclectic anarchism of Erich Muhsam (Men & movements in the history & philosophy of anarchism)

His most recent articles are:

“Making Room for the Jews: The House I Live In (1945),” AJS Perspectives, Summer 2023, 86-88.  

The Revolt of Job: Salvaging the Lost World of Rural Hungarian Hasidim,” Journal of Jewish Identities, 16:1-2 (January/July 2023), 181-198.

“Persistent Parallels, Resistant Particularities: Holocaust Analogies and Avoidance in Armenian Genocide Centennial Cinema, in Armenian and Jewish Experience between Expulsion and Destruction, ed. Sarah M. Ross and Regina Randhofer (Berlin: De Gruyter Oldenbourg, 2021), 267-296.

“The Pioneering American Jewish Women Directors from Elaine May to Claudia Weill,” Jews and Gender (Studies in Jewish Civilization), ed. Leonard Greenspoon (W. Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press, 2021), 217-243.

A Tale of Two Alpha Dogs

It had been the healthiest of times, but then it became the sickest of times.  One day the rabies vaccine stopped working.  There was a new virulent strain of distemper transmitted by wolves to their domesticated relatives.  Dogs frothed at the mouth and bit humans and other dogs.  Those who became infected suffered terribly and some died.     [Satire by Elona Baron as told to Laurie Baron]

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Lawrence Baron, Trivia, Humor & Satire

Call on Fauci (Melody: That’s Amore)

When you yearn for the facts                                                                                                                            
To know how to react,                                                                                                                               
Call on Fauci! [Satire column by Laurie Baron]

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Lawrence Baron, Trivia, Humor & Satire

Briefing songs for President Trump

Whether Donald Trump holds his daily coronavirus press conferences to calm and inform the public or as a social distance substitute for his campaign rallies, the disinformation he disseminates through them is dangerous.  Since he doesn’t read, I am encouraging his closest advisors to have him listen to these cautionary songs before he utters a word.  [Satire column by Laurie Baron]                

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Lawrence Baron, Music, Dance, and Visual Arts, Trivia, Humor & Satire

When humans shelter in place

As was evident in my last column, I know all about the coronavirus.  Ever since my owners have sequestered themselves in the house, I have observed them exhibiting odd behaviors which I fear are symptoms of the illness.  Their eyes have become glazed from watching too much television.  They even listen for extended periods to what the Golden Retriever is spouting on screen, a clinically proven cause of anxiety and high blood pressure.   They previously turned the television off or switched channels whenever he appeared and spoke.  [Humor by Elona Baron as told to Lawrence Baron]

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Lawrence Baron, Trivia, Humor & Satire

Parent of 3 SDJA students tests positive for coronavirus

A parent of three San Diego Jewish Academy students has tested positive for coronavirus, according to Chaim Heller, the retiring head of the school.  In a letter to other parents sent on Saturday (Shabbat) , he wrote, “The parent was at school during the past week.  Their children, who are in grades, 1, 3, and 6, were in many rooms, including the Ulam (Auditorium), many times during the past week as well.  They were with their friends acting in a regular, non-distance manner during that time.  Effectively, they could have been with anyone from the school, from ECC [Early Childhood Center] to high school.” [Our Shtetl San Diego County column by Donald H. Harrison]

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Donald H. Harrison, Jerry Klinger, Jewish Religion, Lawrence Baron, Science, Medicine, & Education, Trivia, Humor & Satire, USA