Writer & Reporter

Emily Tamkin

 
 

Hello! My name, as you can see in the very large block of text above, is Emily Tamkin.

I am a journalist in Washington, DC.

My work has appeared in the Boston Globe, Columbia Journalism Review, the New Republic, Politico, Slate, and the Washington Post, among other publications. Previously, I covered foreign affairs as a staff writer at Foreign Policy and BuzzFeed News and US politics, foreign policy, and society at the New Statesman. I was in New Delhi, India on a Council on Foreign Relations International Affairs Fellowship.

I am the co-host of The Election Tricycle, a new podcast on the elections of 2024 in India, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

I am also the author of The Influence of Soros: Politics, Power, and the Struggle for an Open Society, published by Harper Books, an imprint of Harper Collins, in July 2020, and Bad Jews: A History of American Jewish Politics and Identities, published by Harper Books in October 2022.

If any of that is of interest to you, please do get in touch.

I also have a Substack, which I update more regularly than I do this website.

I speak Russian, German, and some French, Georgian, and Yiddish.

The photo above is by Joy Asico. The dog is named Shiloh. She is a good girl.

 
 

Bad Jews

my new book is available now!

My new book, Bad Jews: A History of American Jewish Politics and Identities, is out now. It is an examination of the last 100 years of American Jewish history and a look at what it means to be Jewish in America. In a starred review, Publishers Weekly wrote, “Heartfelt, nuanced, and empathetic, this revelatory ethnography is a must-read.” Kirkus wrote, “the book ably reflects the author’s experience as a skilled journalist and storyteller” and said “an engaging gathering of voices demonstrate “the one truth of American Jewish identity: it can never be pinned down.” Haaretz said it looks “critically into the past, shattering myths about Jewish life in America and highlighting age-old issues still shaping Jewish identity.” If you’re interested in any of that — or in questions in the expansions and limits of identity more generally — I hope you’ll read it. It is now available wherever you get your books.

The Influence of Soros

x300-2.jpg

My book is available now!

The Influence of Soros: Politics, Power, and the Struggle for an Open Society is now available for purchase from HarperCollins, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books-A-Million, and IndieBound. The book is, as the title suggests, about George Soros and his influence. It assesses what that influence is while disentangling it from rumor and conspiracy theory; examines why those looking for a bogeyman so often turn to Soros; and asks whether a society in which one person can be as influential as Soros can be an open society. Publishers Weekly calls it “an unconventional yet fair-minded biography” that “cuts through the fog of conspiracy theories.” Kirkus says it is “a welcome study of a man whose outsize power in the marketplace and public sphere fascinates.” In Haaretz, it was deemed “an original attempt to try to understand the 21st century phenomenon of the billionaire activist, and the effect capitalist philanthropists have on our age” that “ably demolishes the main conspiracy theories that have been constructed around Soros and his ‘Mephistophelian’ influence.” Hey Alma called it the best Jewish nonfiction book of the year (the year being 5780). You can, if you are so inclined, read an interview I did with JTA about the book here or listen to me talk about it on NPR/WAMU 88.5’s 1A here.



select clips

Boston Globe

The art of not making a deal

On ‘bad Jews’

BuzzFeed News

Israel Will Be the Next Great Foreign Policy Debate Of The Democratic Primary

Hungary’s Decision To Close A Soros-Linked University Shows The Limits Of Trump’s Influence

Trump Wants To Cancel Birthright Citizenship. The US Has Already Helped One Country Do That.

Columbia Journalism Review

Diary of a laid-off reporter

CNN Public Editor: The value for the viewer

Foreign Policy

India Is Stuck in a New World Disorder

Why India and Russia Are Going to Stay Friends

Enemy of the State

Who’s Afraid of George Soros?

The Man Without a State

The Forward

Jews you disagree with are still Jews — even if they feel differently about Israel

My non-Jewish husband doesn’t fast for Yom Kippur. We spend the day in shul together anyway

Haaretz

Vienna’s Jewish Museum Chose a non-Jewish Director. Misunderstandings Ensued

COVID-19 to George Floyd to caravans: Is ‘Soros’ Now the World’s Most Versatile, Dangerous Conspiracy Theory?

Jewish Telegraphic Agency

Vilnius is celebrating its 700th anniversary. Lithuanian Jews are commemorating a darker one.

Los Angeles Review of Books

Work and the New Wave: On My Capricious Summer with Jiří Menzel

The New Republic

Are We Sliding Toward McCarthyism?

Liberal Jewish U.S. Groups Are Walking an Oh-So-Thin Tightrope

Jewish Members of Congress Don’t Want a Cease-Fire. Their Jewish Staffers Are a Different Story.

Why the GOP Fell in Love with Hungary

Can American Jewish Support for Israel Survive This New Government

Criticizing Bloomberg in an Age of Anti-Semitism

J Street Is Minding the Mainstream

The New Statesman

Jhumpa Lahiri: “Who isn’t on the outside?”

The executed innocent

Biden’s burden

Antisemitism in the time of Trump

A joyful shlep: how learning Yiddish helped me through lockdown

The accelerating rise of a dangerous new nationalism in India

The New York Times

How the American Right Learned to Stop Worrying and Learned to Love Russia

Politico

How Jeanne Shaheen Fills a Void in Trump’s Foreign Policy

Slate

What Should American Jews Do With Our Fear?

The Jews Pushing Israel to Stop the War

One of the Most Annoying Modern Debates About Antisemitism

Uh, to Be Clear, Remembering Auschwitz Is Not the Key to a Happy Marriage

Smithsonian

A Cultural History of Barbie

Vulture

Essential Czech Movies From the New Wave and Beyond

The Washington Post

‘Eastern Europe’ doesn’t really exist, but we can still revel in it

A wry look at the absurd origins of Rothschild conspiracy theories


Education

St Antony’s College, University of Oxford

Russian and East European Studies, M.Phil

October 2013 - July 2015

Columbia College, Columbia University

Russian Literature and Culture, BA with honors

September 2008 - May 2012

 

 

Awards & Honors

Council on Foreign relations international affairs fellowship

2019-2020; New Delhi, India

Heinrich Böll Reporting fellowship

2017; Bucharest, Romania and Bratislava, Slovakia

Fulbright research Fellowship

2012-2013; Bremen, Germany

harriman junior fellowship

2012; Moscow, Russia

Contact

Email: emilyctamkin@gmail.com