Abigail Pogrebin

{{Infobox person

| name = Abigail Pogrebin

| image =

| caption = Abigail Pogrebin

| birth_date = {{birth date and age|mf=yes|1965|5|17}}

| birth_place = New York City, U.S.

| spouse =

| occupation = Writer

| parents = Letty Cottin Pogrebin
Bert Pogrebin

| family = Robin Pogrebin (sister)

}}

Abigail Pogrebin (born May 17, 1965) is an American writer, journalist, podcast host{{Cite web|title=Parsha in Progress on Apple Podcasts|url=https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/parsha-in-progress/id1446518157|access-date=2021-03-01|website=Apple Podcasts|date=21 September 2020 |language=en-us}} for Tablet magazine, and former Director of Jewish Outreach for the Michael Bloomberg 2020 presidential campaign.{{Cite web|url=https://jewishweek.timesofisrael.com/abigail-pogrebin-joining-bloomberg-campaign-as-jewish-liaison/|title=Abigail Pogrebin Joining Bloomberg Campaign As Jewish Liaison|last=Hanau|first=Shira|website=jewishweek.timesofisrael.com|language=en-US|access-date=2020-04-03}}

Family and early life

Pogrebin was born in New York to a Jewish family, the daughter of an author and feminist activist Letty Cottin Pogrebin, the co-founder of Ms. magazine, and Bert Pogrebin, a management-side labor lawyer, and is the identical twin sister of New York Times journalist Robin Pogrebin.{{cn|date=May 2024}} At 16, she was the youngest member of the original Broadway cast of Hal Prince’s production of Stephen Sondheim's musical Merrily We Roll Along, which closed in November 1981 after 44 previews and only 16 performances.{{Cite web|title=Merrily We Roll Along|url=https://www.ibdb.com/broadway-production/merrily-we-roll-along-4144#OpeningNightCast|access-date=2024-04-03|website=Internet Broadway Database|language=en}} She graduated summa cum laude from Yale University.{{Cite web|title=Abigail Pogrebin|url=https://www.muslimjewishadvocacy.org/member/abigail-pogrebin/|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191211205758/https://www.muslimjewishadvocacy.org/member/abigail-pogrebin/|archive-date=2019-12-11|access-date=2021-03-01|website=Muslim-Jewish Advisory Council|language=en-US}}{{Cite web|last=Bolton-Fasman|first=Judy|title=The Spiritual Adventures of Abigail Pogrebin|url=http://www.jewishboston.com/read/the-spiritual-adventures-of-abigail-pogrebin/|access-date=2021-03-01|website=JewishBoston|language=en-US}}

Pogrebin married David Shapiro in 1993, and they have two children.{{Cite news|date=1993-12-12|title=Weddings – Abigail Pogrebin and David Shapiro |language=en-US|work=The New York Times|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1993/12/12/style/weddings-abigail-pogrebin-and-david-shapiro.html|access-date=2021-03-01|issn=0362-4331}}{{Cite web|first=Sandee|last=Brawarsky|title=Discovering A Sense Of Belonging|url=https://jewishweek.timesofisrael.com/discovering-a-sense-of-belonging/|access-date=2021-03-01|website=jewishweek.timesofisrael.com|language=en-US}}

Pogrebin's sister-in-law, Alina Arenal (married to brother David Pogrebin in 1998), also had a career at a Times-related entity, the New York Times Foundation.{{Cite news |date=1998-05-24 |title=WEDDINGS; Alina Arenal and David Pogrebin |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1998/05/24/style/weddings-alina-arenal-and-david-pogrebin.html |access-date=2024-05-16 |work=The New York Times |language=en-US |issn=0362-4331}}

Career

After graduating from Yale in 1987, Pogrebin became a broadcast producer for Mike Wallace, Charlie Rose and associate producer for Ed Bradley at 60 Minutes and Bill Moyers at PBS and before that for The MacNeil/Lehrer Report and Fred W. Friendly.{{Cite web|title=Central Synagogue - Abigail Pogrebin - Honorary President|url=https://www.centralsynagogue.org//about_us/our_trustees/pogrebin|url-status=live|access-date=2021-03-01|website=www.centralsynagogue.org|language=en|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121207191308/http://www.centralsynagogue.org/about_us/our_trustees/pogrebin |archive-date=2012-12-07 }} Afterwards she turned to freelance journalism and published articles in magazines and newspapers like Newsweek, New York Magazine, The Forward, Tablet, and The Daily Beast.{{Cite web|title=Abigail Pogrebin|url=http://www.pearlcoliteraryagency.com/abigail-pogrebin|access-date=2021-03-01|website=PearlCo Literary Agency|language=en-US}}{{Cite web|first=Abigail|last=Pogrebin|date=2015-11-19|title=30 Days, 30 Authors: Abigail Pogrebin|url=https://www.jewishbookcouncil.org/pb-daily/30-days-30-authors-abigail-pogrebin|access-date=2021-03-01|website=www.jewishbookcouncil.org|language=en}}{{Cite web|title=Abigail Pogrebin|url=https://jwa.org/people/pogrebin-abigail|access-date=2021-03-01|website=Jewish Women's Archive|language=en}}

She has moderated conversations for The Jewish Community Center in Manhattan (JCC), the Streicker Center, UJA Federation, and the Shalom Hartman Institute.

Pogrebin is the author of My Jewish Year: 18 Holidays, One Wondering Jew, published in 2017,{{Cite web |last=Gregory |first=David |date=2017-04-07 |title=You Shall Tell Your Child: In Time for Passover, a Journalist Celebrates a Year of Jewish Holidays |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/07/books/review/my-jewish-year-abigail-pogrebin.html |access-date=2024-05-31 |website=The New York Times |language=en-US}}{{Cite web|last=Pogrebin|first=Abigail|title=The Feminist Passover: A (Third) Seder of Her Own|url=https://www.jwi.org/articles/the-feminist-passover-a-third-seder-of-her-own|url-status=live|access-date=2021-03-01|website=JWI|date=7 October 2020 |language=en-US|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210124194808/http://www.jwi.org/articles/the-feminist-passover-a-third-seder-of-her-own |archive-date=2021-01-24 }} which was a finalist for the 2018 National Jewish Book Award, and the 2005 book Stars of David: Prominent Jews Talk About Being Jewish, for which she interviewed 62 famous American Jews, — from Ruth Bader Ginsburg to Steven Spielberg — about their religious identity.{{Cite web |date=December 21, 2005 |title=Excerpt: 'Stars of David : Prominent Jews Talk About Being Jewish' by Abigail Pogrebin |url=https://abcnews.go.com/GMA/Books/story?id=1429337 |access-date=2024-05-31 |website=ABC News |language=en}} Her second book, One and the Same: My Life As an Identical Twin and What I’ve Learned About Everyone’s Struggle to Be Singular,[https://books.google.com/books?id=deJJPgAACAAJ&q=%22Abigail+Pogrebin%22 "One and the Same"], Google Books was published in October 2009. Her 2011 book Showstopper documents her time in the cast of Stephen Sondheim’s musical “Merrily We Roll Along,” and Pogrebin is featured in the 2016 Netflix documentary film by director Lonny Price, Best Worst Thing That Ever Could Have Happened.{{Cite web|last=Eve|first=Best Worst Thing That|title=How Being Part of A Rare Sondheim Flop Taught Me Lessons for Life|url=https://forward.com/culture/354638/how-being-part-of-a-rare-sondheim-flop-taught-me-lessons-for-life/|access-date=2021-03-01|website=The Forward|date=16 November 2016 |language=en-US}}

She served as the president of New York's Central Synagogue from 2015-2018, and in November 2019 she joined former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg’s presidential campaign as the Director of Jewish Outreach.[https://jewishweek.timesofisrael.com/abigail-pogrebin-joining-bloomberg-campaign-as-jewish-liaison/ Abigail Pogrebin Joining Bloomberg Campaign As Jewish Liaison] article in Times of Israel{{Cite web|title=Abigail Pogrebin|url=https://www.algemeiner.com/list/top-100-people-positively-influencing-jewish-life-2017/abigail-pogrebin|access-date=2021-03-01|website=Algemeiner.com|language=en-US}}

Tablet Magazine’s podcast, “Parsha in Progress” features a regular Torah discussion with Pogrebin and Rabbi Dov Linzer, who is the president of Yeshivat Chovevei Torah.{{Cite web|title=Parsha In Progress|url=https://www.tabletmag.com/contributors/parsha-in-progress-|access-date=2021-03-01|website=Tablet Magazine|language=en}} Pogrebin moderated and wrote the Tablet Magazine series, “The Minyan,” which zeroes in on one aspect of Jewish life through the voices of those who live it. She has written about antisemitism in The Atlantic and the Jewish New Year in Vogue.{{Cite web |last=Pogrebin |first=Abigail |date=2020-09-24 |title=The Unexpected Power of a Virtual Jewish New Year |url=https://www.vogue.com/article/the-unexpected-power-of-a-virtual-jewish-new-year |access-date=2024-05-31 |website=Vogue |language=en-US}}{{Cite web |last=Pogrebin |first=Abigail |date=2022-04-12 |title=Why Is This Year Different From All Other Years? |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/04/passover-2022-america-anti-semitism/629535/ |access-date=2024-05-31 |website=The Atlantic |language=en}}

Her most recent opinion piece on Hanukkah appeared inThe New York Times.{{Cite web |last=Pogrebin |first=Abigail |date=2024-12-24 |title=This Hanukkah, Choose Light Over Heat |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/25/opinion/hanukkah-jewish-tradition.html/ |access-date=2024-05-31 |website=The New York Times |language=en}}

Awards

Pogrebin received the “Impact Award”[https://jewishweek.timesofisrael.com/event/jcc-2019-annual-benefit/ JCC 2019 Annual Benefit] JCC Official site from the JCC in Manhattan, and the “Community Leader Award” from The Jewish Week in 2017.[https://jewishweek.timesofisrael.com/photos-jewish-week-gala-2017/ Highlights From The Jewish Week Gala 2017] Photo coverage at Times of Israel Her 2017 book My Jewish Year: 18 Holidays, One Wondering Jew was a finalist for the 2018 National Jewish Book Award.{{cn|date=June 2024}}

She received the second place award for the 2021 Excellence in Enterprise Religion Reporting from The Religion News Association and received an honorable mention in the category of for Excellence in Special Sections or Supplements from The Jewish Press Association’s Rockower Awards in 2021 for her series in The Forward, “Still Small Voice: 18 Questions about God,” which asked 18 clergy and scholars about their own faith.{{Cite web |title=2021 winners |url=https://www.rna.org/page/2021_contest_winners |url-status=dead |archive-url=http://web.archive.org/web/20220302005026/https://www.rna.org/page/2021_contest_winners |archive-date=2022-03-02}}{{Cite web |title=AJPA - 2021 Competition |url=https://www.ajpa.org/2021-Competition-Winners |access-date=2024-05-31 |website=www.ajpa.org}}{{Cite web |title=Still Small Voice Archives |url=https://forward.com/tag/still-small-voice/ |access-date=2024-05-31 |website=The Forward |language=en}}