Contribute to Jewish history

The Canadian Jewish Life Writing Project is a national annual initiative to collect, archive and digitally exhibit short autobiographical life stories of Canadian Jews from a wide range of ages, regions and social, cultural and religious experience. This year’s theme is “Growing Up Jewish in Canada,” and submissions are being accepted until Oct. 30.

The project invites autobiographical essays that engage with the experience of childhood and young adulthood from a Jewish and Canadian perspective. You may write about this period of your life from beginning to end in chronological fashion; isolate just a few years; or choose to focus on one or more specific moments that capture the experience of coming of age. Your essay might address your Jewish or secular education, summer camp, a Jewish lifecycle event, Jewish holidays, a travel or immigration experience, your relationship with siblings or friends, a first love, and more. There are prompts on the project’s website, intended to spur your thinking.

Regardless of your approach, fill your narrative with detail – names, dates, places, professions, physical features, and so on – while remaining mindful that your work will become part of a publicly accessible archive. The project is designed to empower Jewish Canadians to write their life stories while offering insight into on-the-ground realities of daily life that might otherwise go undocumented. 

This collection of autobiographical writing will be housed in perpetuity at the Alex Dworkin Canadian Jewish Archives in Montreal and exhibited digitally in an online database hosted by the Association for Canadian Jewish Studies. The essays will be of interest to scholars, writers, filmmakers and other creative professionals; museum professionals and archivists, genealogists, educators; and anyone interested in the lived Canadian Jewish experience.

While all submissions will appear in the archive, the top three – as selected by the project’s advisory board – will be published separately on the ACJS website. 

The project’s advisory board – Arielle Berger (Azrieli Foundation’s Holocaust Survivor Memoirs Program), Faye Blum (Ontario Jewish Archives), Jillian Gould (Memorial University), David S. Koffman (York University), Karen Kollins (Shalom Hartman Institute of Canada), Janice Rosen (Alex Dworkin Canadian Jewish Archives) and Alysa Routtenberg (Jewish Museum and Archives of British Columbia) – will review submissions from January through March 2027. Authors will be recognized at a launch event in April.

Writers must be over the age of 13, and submissions must not have been previously published. The project has no residency or citizenship requirements, but the essay must have a clear Canadian setting for at least part of your experience “growing up” to be included in the archive. Each submission will be reviewed for thematic relevance. There is no limit on the number of essays you may submit.

Submissions based on recorded testimony are permitted. For instance, you may submit an essay based on a relative’s life provided you clearly state the relationship between you and your subject.

Other eligibility requirements are listed on the project’s website, as are the details on how to submit your essay(s), which should fall between 4,000 and 6,000 words (roughly 15 to 25 double-spaced pages), though both shorter and longer submissions will be accepted. 

You are encouraged to include images (photos, artwork, etc.) in your essay. Inquiries about submitting additional relevant digital or physical material should be directed to Rosen at jrosen@cjarchives.ca. 

Any questions about the Canadian Jewish Life Writing Project should be directed to Joshua Tapper (jtapper@yorku.ca) or Jesse Toufexis (jtoufexi@uottawa.ca). The project’s website is canadianjewishstudies.ca/lifewriting. 

– Courtesy Canadian Jewish Life Writing Project