Blog

Roni Masel pro­pos­es a ​“failed watch­ing” of Net­flix’s new series Unortho­dox that side­steps ques­tions of authen­tic­i­ty in rep­re­sen­ta­tion and instead ​“gen­er­ates what we could call queer plea­sure or OTD pleasure.”

Jun 29, 2020

Faith Hillis reflects on build­ing dig­i­tal Yid­dish com­mu­ni­ty amid the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic and the Black Lives Mat­ter protests.

Jun 22, 2020

Bilin­gual reflec­tions com­piled by Zackary Sholem Berg­er and authored by Berg­er, Sara Feld­man, and Antho­ny Rus­sell, Jew­ish activists who took part in recent Black Lives Mat­ter protests.

Jun 19, 2020

Mey­er Wein­shel and Asya Vais­man Schul­man speak about devel­op­ing Vais­man Schul­man’s new Yid­dish text­book, In eynem, com­ing from the Yid­dish Book Cen­ter this summer.

Jun 16, 2020

Mari­na May­ors­ki talks with Sarah Bunin Benor about her work record­ing, pre­serv­ing, and teach­ing about Jew­ish languages.

Jun 12, 2020

Hes­kes explores the con­tents of a slim, blue-leathered note­book he found in his par­ents’ garage. The note­book belonged to his grandmother’s moth­er, the Yid­dish writer Dora Schulner.

May 28, 2020

Moyshe Klayn­man’s remark­able 1943 man­u­script relates his ten-month impris­on­ment at the Tre­blin­ka II exter­mi­na­tion camp, his escape dur­ing the August 2, 1943 pris­on­er revolt, and much more. There is only one oth­er known sur­vivor source writ­ten so ear­ly, and there are no oth­er known Tre­blin­ka sur­vivor mem­oirs avail­able only in the orig­i­nal Yiddish.

May 22, 2020

We are seek­ing sub­mis­sions for a spe­cial issue on Yid­dish pop­u­lar theater.

May 18, 2020

Yid­dish poet and trans­la­tor Yehoash lived at the famous Hotel Kli­bit­sky in Rehovot for almost four months in 1914; the hotel fea­tured fre­quent­ly in his pub­lished trav­el­ogue. This note in the hotel’s guest­book, now in the city archive, marks his stay.

May 15, 2020

The Jew­ish Labor Bund was a major force in Russ­ian Jew­ish life, expand­ing the polit­i­cal are­na to be more demo­c­ra­t­ic in nature and dri­ving the cre­ation of a new polit­i­cal and eco­nom­ic dis­course in Yid­dish. So I was shocked to learn that in 1910, the Bund had a mere 609 mem­bers — down from approx­i­mate­ly 35,000 five years ear­li­er. The speed with which the Bund and oth­er Jew­ish polit­i­cal par­ties in the Russ­ian Empire could rise, fall, and rise again reflects the pres­sures the com­mu­ni­ty was under, result­ing in both sober cau­tion and dar­ing, des­per­ate dreams.

May 06, 2020