Upstate NY Christian Village Grapples with Modernity, with Richard Schiffman in Conversation with Judy Langer

Upstate NY Christian Village Grapples with Modernity, with Richard Schiffman in Conversation with Judy Langer
March 28, 2024 @ 2:45-4:00pm

The story of this little-known religious community, the Bruderhof, was prominently featured in the Sunday New York Times recently. Richard, a journalist, spent weeks researching the story and visited two of the group’s bucolic settlements in the Hudson Valley. A pacifist movement, it was founded during the 1920s in Germany and then expelled by the Nazis. They migrated abroad, ultimately settling in 26 communities on five continents. Today, about half of the roughly 3,000 Bruderhof are scattered across the world living in six villages. The Fox Hill community in Walden is just an hour and a half northwest of Manhattan. The group sees their communities as refuges from the materialism and inequities of the modern world, living simply and sharing their wealth. After the pandemic lockdowns, the Bruderhof were forced to revisit their longstanding mistrust of digital devices and online communication – a challenge for its members. The Bruderhof Life: Few Phones, Some Beer has generated both praise and some controversy. In this session, Richard will speak with Judy about how the story idea developed, the reporting and editing process, and how the piece was received by readers. The class will give some insight into how news content is developed and The Times’ editorial process. This will be an open discussion with your questions and comments welcome. Please read the article in advance if possible. Here is a gift link to the article:
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/17/nyregion/hudson-valley-bruderhof-community.html?un;locked_article_code=1.dU0.URCD.ZrWhSn4TrumK&smid=em-share