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Past Events

2022

Thursday
Dec 22
7:00pm

A Very Jewish Christmas: Jesus and Shabbtai Zvi, from Heretic to Hero

David Biale examines how modern Jewish culture has remembered Jewish Messiahs such as Jesus and Shabbati Zvi, revealing how Jews in the 19th and 20th centuries thought about heretics in Jewish history and how they transmuted heretics into modern heroes.

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Sunday
Dec 18
3:00pm

Hanukkah Concert

This annual Hanukkah concert showcases songs and stories that charm and delight, both familiar and new.

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Thursday
Dec 15
2:00pm

The North American Premiere of the Opera 'Bas Sheve'

Bas Sheve is one of the only known pre-Holocaust Yiddish operas. Presumed lost, it was discovered in 2017 and made its North American debut in the summer of 2022. This panel will discuss the performance with video examples provided.

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Wednesday
Dec 14
1:00pm

Ukrainian-Jewish Relations on the Eve and during the Holocaust

Hanna Abakunova examines Ukranian-Jewish relations in prewar Soviet Ukraine and how it determined the attitude of the Ukrainian population toward Jews during the Holocaust.

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Tuesday
Dec 13
2:00pm

Yiddish Cultural & Music Festivals

This panel shares information about and highlights from four festivals, workshops, and programs that celebrate klezmer and Yiddish music.

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Sunday
Dec 11
2:00pm

YIVO Yiddish Club: Yiddish in Rio with Sonia Kramer

Yiddish enthusiasts the world over, join the YIVO Yiddish club to celebrate Mame-loshn. This session features Sonia Kramer, Professor at Pontific Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro/PUC-Rio and coordinator of the Núcleo Viver com Yiddish [Lebn far Yiddish Center]: research, courses, and cultural projects.

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Wednesday
Dec 7
7:00pm

Irena Klepfisz: Her Birth and Later Years: New and Collected Poems, 1971-2021

Lesbian poet, child Holocaust survivor, and political activist Irena Klepfisz discusses her newly published book, the first and only complete collection of her work, in conversation with Rabbi Ellen Lippmann.

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Wednesday
Dec 7
1:00pm

Gender in The Shtetl: Have Boys Really Never Spoken with Girls?

Ekaterina Oleshkevich explores the gender boundaries of premodern Jewish society, challenging the notion that the roles and expectations of boys and girls were separate and distinct.

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Tuesday
Dec 6
2:00pm

Continuing Evolution: Yiddish Folksong Today

Mark Kligman (Director of the Lowell Milken Center) interviews Alex Weiser (Director of Public Programs, YIVO) about the YIVO festival, which took place in May 2022.

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Thursday
Dec 1
7:30pm

Break Forth Into Joy - Music in Our Time 2022 - A Choral Festival

Celebrate 400 years of Jewish Music and hear the spectacular voices of the future cantors of the Reform and Conservative movements!

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Wednesday
Nov 30
12:00pm

Yiddish Paris: Staging Nation and Community in Interwar France

Nick Underwood explores how left-wing Yiddish-speaking emigrants from Eastern Europe created a Yiddish diaspora nation in Paris in the 1920s and 1930s.

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Tuesday
Nov 29
7:00pm

I Am Free ... But Who Is Left?

A new documentary created by Joanne Weiner Rudof and Lawrence Langer tells the story of a family that thrived in pre-war Poland and what happened to them when the Nazis invaded.

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Sunday
Nov 20
2:00pm

YIVO Yiddish Club: Yiddish Songwriting Today with Adah Hetko

Yiddish enthusiasts the world over, join the YIVO Yiddish club to celebrate Mame-loshn. This session features Adah Hetko, a Yiddish singer, songwriter, and educator.

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Wednesday
Nov 16
7:00pm

"Ver vet blaybn?" (Who Will Remain?) — A Documentary About Avrom Sutzkever

Join YIVO and the Yiddish Book Center for the New York premiere screening of Ver Vet Blaybn? (Who Will Remain?), an award-winning documentary about the life and survival of Yiddish poet Avrom Sutzkever, featuring his granddaughter, actress Hadas Kalderon. A Q&A with the filmmakers will follow the screening.

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Thursday
Nov 10
6:30pm

Virtual Tenement Talk – Yiddish in Translation: On the Hunt for Novels by Women with YIVO

In this special virtual Tenement Talk, we explore the lives of Jewish women in tenements through women’s novels with Dr. Anita Norich and Dr. Annie Polland.

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Thursday
Nov 10
3:30pm

Dineh: An Autobiographical Novel

Yermiyahu Ahron Taub discusses his English translation of Ida Maze's haunting Yiddish portrait of her rural, village, and small-town life in White Russia at the turn of the 20th century.

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Wednesday
Nov 9
7:30pm

Kristallnacht and Its Aftermath

A fitting tribute to those whose lives forever changed by the events leading up to Kristallnacht, November 9, 1938, “The Night of Broken Glass,” this concert will feature pieces by three composers who were forced to re-start their promising young careers as immigrants in new countries.

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Thursday
Nov 3
1:00pm

The Golden Peacock: The Voice of the Yiddish Writer

Sheva Zucker discusses a special project with bilingual audio recordings and texts of twelve Yiddish writers, including Kadya Molodowsky, Beyle Schaechter-Gottesman, and Elie Wiesel.

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Monday
Oct 31
1:00pm

How To Do Research at YIVO: Accessing Digitized Materials

Join YIVO archivist Hallel Yadin for an overview of how to access YIVO’s digitized holdings. This program will go over the portals that contain digitized archival and library materials, as well as tips for navigating each portal effectively.

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Thursday
Oct 27
7:00pm

Music of Hugo Kauder

This concert explores a selection of Viennese Jewish composer Hugo Kauder's vocal music, piano music, and chamber music, including the newly available Violin Sonata in a minor.

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Tuesday
Oct 25
1:00pm

The Origins of National Culture: Self Translation, Originals and Split Authors

This lecture will look at work by self-translating writers such as Sholem Yankev Abramovitsh, Hersch Dovid Nomberg, and Zalman Shneour to explore the ways authors and critics thought about self-translation, how they pondered and practiced writing the same work time and again.

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Sunday
Oct 23
2:00pm

YIVO Yiddish Club: Contemporary Yiddish Creativity in Israel with Mendy Cahan

Yiddish enthusiasts the world over, join the YIVO Yiddish club to celebrate Mame-loshn. This session features Mendy Cahan, founder of the YUNG YiDiSH Library and Cultural center in Tel Aviv.

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Thursday
Oct 20
1:00pm

Hugo Kauder: Composer, Musical Philosopher, Music Theorist

YIVO's Director of Public Programs Alex Weiser and biographer, scholar and pianist Karin Wagner discuss Viennese Jewish composer Hugo Kauder, his work, and his legacy.

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Class starts Oct 12 5:00pm-6:30pm

[FALL2022] Polish Jewish History After the Holocaust, 1944 - Present

This weekly seminar, conducted in English, examines the evolution of Jewish identity under communism and postcommunism, the development of postwar political antisemitism in Poland, and contemporary dimensions of Polish-Jewish relations. All readings, including testimony, memoir, and secondary historical literature will be read in English or English translation.

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Class starts Oct 12 4:00pm-5:30pm

[FALL2022] Odesa Myth

This weekly seminar, conducted in English, studies the myth of Odesa in Jewish literature written originally in Yiddish and Russian. All readings, including prose, poetry, and press, will be read in English translation.

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Class starts Oct 12 1:00pm-2:30pm

[FALL2022] Between Two Worlds: Women in Yiddish Literature

This weekly seminar, conducted in Yiddish, explores the history of women as readers and writers of Yiddish, and reads poetry, prose, and memoirs by Yiddish women writers. It is for people with at least a high-intermediate-level knowledge of Yiddish.

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Class starts Oct 7 10:00am-11:30am

[FALL2022] Yiddish Reference Works and How to Use Them

This weekly seminar, conducted in Yiddish, investigates Yiddish reference works pivotal for interpreters, readers, researchers, teachers, translators, and writers. It is for people with a high-intermediate-level or advanced-level knowledge of Yiddish.

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Thursday
Sep 29
1:00pm

How To Do Research at YIVO: What is an Archive?

Join YIVO archivist Hallel Yadin for an overview on how to do research at YIVO. The program will cover crucial and fundamental questions as well as the basics of how to search for material at YIVO.

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Class starts Sep 28 10:00am-11:30am

[FALL2022] Yiddish Folktales

This weekly seminar, conducted mainly in Yiddish, glimpses into the fears and fantasies of the past by reading folktales in Yiddish. It is for people with an advanced-beginner-level or intermediate-level knowledge of Yiddish.

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Class starts Sep 23 3:00pm-4:30pm

[FALL2022] Beginner III Yiddish (Friday)

This weekly standard class develops listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring Beginner II students.

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Class starts Sep 22 6:00pm-7:30pm

[FALL2022] Beginner I Yiddish (In-person)

This weekly standard class covers the alef-beys and grammar, vocabulary, and conversational basics. It is for those who are new to the Yiddish language or would like a review.

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Thursday
Sep 22
1:00pm

Hidden Heretics: Jewish Doubt in the Digital Age

Ayala Fader discusses her new book with Professor Josh Lambert, delving into universal quandaries of faith and skepticism, the ways digital media can change us, and family frictions that arise when a person radically transforms who they are and what they believe.

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Class starts Sep 22 12:30pm-2:00pm

[FALL2022] Beginner I Yiddish (Thursday)

This weekly standard class covers the alef-beys and grammar, vocabulary, and conversational basics. It is for those who are new to the Yiddish language or would like a review.

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Wednesday
Sep 21
1:00pm

The Nightmare in Jewish History and Culture

In this talk, Elly Moseson will explore the variety of conceptions and interpretations of the nightmare in Jewish culture and the range of responses that Jews have taken toward this phenomenon in different periods and places, from the Bible through to the twentieth century.

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Class starts Sep 15 6:00pm-7:30pm

[FALL2022] Intensive Beginner I&II Yiddish

This twice-weekly intensive class covers the alef-beys and grammar, vocabulary, and conversational basics. It is for students who are new to the Yiddish language or would like a review.

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Class starts Sep 15 6:00pm-7:30pm

[FALL2022] Intensive Beginner III&IV Yiddish

This twice-weekly intensive class develops listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring Intensive Beginner I&II students.

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Class starts Sep 15 4:00pm-5:30pm

[FALL2022] Beginner IV Yiddish (Thursday)

This weekly standard class develops listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring Beginner III students.

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Class starts Sep 15 12:00pm-1:30pm

[FALL2022] Intensive Intermediate I&II Yiddish

This twice-weekly intensive class enhances listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring Intensive Beginner III&IV students.

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Class starts Sep 15 10:00am-11:30am

[FALL2022] Beginner II Yiddish (Thursday)

This weekly standard class develops listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring Beginner I students.

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Class starts Sep 15 9:00am-10:30am

[FALL2022] Intensive Intermediate III&IV Yiddish

This twice-weekly intensive class enhances listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring Intensive Intermediate I&II students.

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Class starts Sep 14 6:00pm-7:30pm

[FALL2022] Beginner I Yiddish (Wednesday)

This weekly standard class covers the alef-beys and grammar, vocabulary, and conversational basics. It is for those who are new to the Yiddish language or would like a review.

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Class starts Sep 14 3:00pm-4:30pm

[FALL2022] Beginner II Conversational Yiddish for Heritage Learners (Wednesday)

This weekly conversational class introduces new grammatical skills and sets of vocabulary. It is primarily for spring Beginner I Conversational Yiddish for Heritage Learners students.

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Class starts Sep 14 1:00pm-2:30pm

[FALL2022] Beginner I Reading Yiddish

This weekly reading class covers grammar and how to read Yiddish texts with the help of a dictionary. It is for students new to Yiddish, especially those interested in obtaining reading proficiency for academic or archival research.

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Wednesday
Sep 14
1:00pm

The Dancer and the Holocaust: A Biography of Pola Nireńska

In her book Tancerka i Zagłada (The Dancer and the Holocaust), Weronika Kostyrko uncovers the story of dancer Pola Nireńska (1910-1992) whose career was repeatedly interrupted by antisemitism and fascism. Join YIVO for a discussion of this important new biography featuring Kostyrko in conversation with YIVO’s Executive Director Jonathan Brent.

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Class starts Sep 13 6:00pm-7:30pm

[FALL2022] Intermediate IV Yiddish

This weekly standard class enhances listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring Intermediate III students.

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Class starts Sep 13 6:00pm-7:30pm

[FALL2022] Intensive Advanced I&II Yiddish

This twice-weekly intensive class further enhances listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring Intensive Intermediate III&IV students.

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Class starts Sep 13 3:00pm-4:30pm

[FALL2022] Beginner II Yiddish (Tuesday)

This weekly standard class develops listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring Beginner I students.

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Class starts Sep 13 3:00pm-4:30pm

[FALL2022] Intensive Advanced III&IV Yiddish

This twice-weekly intensive class further enhances listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring advanced intensive course students.

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Tuesday
Sep 13
1:00pm

The YIVO Sound Archive at 40: A Celebration

Join YIVO for a discussion exploring the history of the YIVO Sound Archive, important areas of the collection, projects the Sound Archive has facilitated, and other interesting stories from the past 40 years.

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Class starts Sep 12 6:30pm-8:00pm

[FALL2022] Intermediate II Yiddish

This weekly standard class enhances listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring Intermediate I students.

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Class starts Sep 12 6:00pm-7:30pm

[FALL2022] Beginner II Yiddish (Monday II)

This weekly standard class develops listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring Beginner I students.

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Class starts Sep 12 5:00pm-6:30pm

[FALL2022] Beginner II Yiddish (Monday I)

This weekly standard class develops listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring Beginner I students.

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Class starts Sep 12 11:00am-12:30pm

[FALL2022] Beginner IV Yiddish (Monday)

This weekly standard class develops listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring Beginner III students.

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Class starts Sep 12 11:00am-12:30pm

[FALL2022] Intermediate I Yiddish (Monday)

This weekly standard class enhances listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring Beginner IV students.

read more
Class starts Sep 12 10:30am-12:00pm

[FALL2022] Beginner I Yiddish (Monday)

This weekly standard class covers the alef-beys and grammar, vocabulary, and conversational basics. It is for those who are new to the Yiddish language or would like a review.

read more
Class starts Sep 11 6:00pm-7:30pm

[FALL2022] Beginner II Conversational Yiddish for Heritage Learners (Sunday)

This weekly conversational class introduces new grammatical skills and sets of vocabulary. It is primarily for spring Beginner I Conversational Yiddish for Heritage Learners students.

read more
Class starts Sep 11 4:00pm-5:30pm

[FALL2022] Beginner II Yiddish (Sunday)

This weekly standard class develops listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring Beginner I students.

read more
Class starts Sep 11 3:00pm-4:30pm

[FALL2022] Beginner I Yiddish (Sunday Afternoon)

This weekly standard class covers the alef-beys and grammar, vocabulary, and conversational basics. It is for those who are new to the Yiddish language or would like a review.

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Class starts Sep 11 3:00pm-4:30pm

[FALL2022] Beginner IV Yiddish (Sunday)

This weekly standard class develops listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring Beginner III students.

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Class starts Sep 11 2:30pm-4:00pm

[FALL2022] Beginner I Conversational Yiddish for Heritage Learners (Afternoon)

This weekly conversational class covers grammar, vocabulary, and conversational basics. It is for students who are new to the Yiddish language or have some exposure to Yiddish and would like a review.

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Class starts Sep 11 2:00pm-3:30pm

[FALL2022] Intermediate I Yiddish (Sunday)

This weekly standard class enhances listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring Beginner IV students.

read more
Class starts Sep 11 1:30pm-3:00pm

[FALL2022] Intermediate III Yiddish

This weekly standard class enhances listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring Intermediate II students.

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Sunday
Sep 11
1:00pm

Nusakh Vilne Memorial

For 2022’s commemoration of the Jewish community of Vilna, Justin Cammy discusses the poetic legacy of Yung-vilne and Avrom Sutzkever using an archival document. A mini concert featuring musical settings of poetry of Avrom Sutzkever performed by Adrian Rosas and Ya-Jhu Yang will follow Cammy's presentation.

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Class starts Sep 11 12:30pm-2:00pm

[FALL2022] Beginner III Yiddish (Sunday Afternoon)

This weekly standard class develops listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring Beginner II students.

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Class starts Sep 11 12:00pm-1:30pm

[FALL2022] Advanced I Yiddish

This weekly standard class further enhances listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring Intermediate IV students.

read more
Class starts Sep 11 12:00pm-1:30pm

[FALL2022] Intermediate I Conversational Yiddish for Heritage Learners (Afternoon)

This weekly conversational class develops grammatical skills and sets of vocabulary. It is primarily for spring Beginner IV Conversational Yiddish for Heritage Learners students.

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Class starts Sep 11 11:00am-12:30pm

[FALL2022] Beginner I Conversational Yiddish for Heritage Learners (Morning)

This weekly conversational class covers grammar, vocabulary, and conversational basics. It is for students who are new to the Yiddish language or have some exposure to Yiddish and would like a review.

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Class starts Sep 11 10:30am-12:00pm

[FALL2022] Beginner I Yiddish (Sunday Morning)

This weekly standard class covers the alef-beys and grammar, vocabulary, and conversational basics. It is for those who are new to the Yiddish language or would like a review.

read more
Class starts Sep 11 10:00am-11:30am

[FALL2022] Beginner III Yiddish (Sunday Morning)

This weekly standard class develops listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for spring Beginner II students.

read more
Class starts Sep 11 10:00am-11:30am

[FALL2022] Intermediate I Conversational Yiddish for Heritage Learners (Morning)

This weekly conversational class develops grammatical skills and sets of vocabulary. It is primarily for spring Beginner IV Conversational Yiddish for Heritage Learners students.

read more
Thursday
Sep 8
1:00pm

Serenade: A Balanchine Story

Former Balanchine dancer Toni Bentley and YIVO's Executive Director Jonathan Brent discuss how researching her new book, Serenade: A Balanchine Story, brought Bentley to YIVO, even though Balanchine was not Jewish.

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Thursday
Sep 1
1:00pm

Orthodox, Female, Poet: the Litvish Life of Hadasah Hirshovitz Levin, 1912-1946

In this lecture, Tzipora Weinberg will examine Orthodox Jewish poet Hadasah Hirshovitz Levin’s written legacy in the context of lesser-known efforts and publications of her colleagues, to provide a lens into the experiences of an unknown group of traditionalist women in greater Jewish Lithuania.

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Cancelled

2022 Study Tour of St. Petersburg – Moscow – Prague

YIVO is proud to announce a study tour to St. Petersburg, Moscow, and Prague. This tour will explore the history of Russian and Soviet Jewry, as well as visit some of the major attractions of these two Russian capitals. The tour will conclude in Prague, one of Europe’s most beautiful cities and home to one of the oldest Jewish communities in Europe.

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Thursday
Jul 21
2:00pm

Sutzkever's Environmental Poetics

Through a reading of Sutzkever before and beyond the ghetto, Justin Cammy explores the connection between nature, landscape, and the search for a contemporary Yiddish spiritual vocabulary.

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Tuesday
Jul 19
8:00pm

Storytelling with YIVO’s Beba Epstein: The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Girl Exhibition

In this interactive workshop, Teach the Shoah’s professional storytelling director Jennifer Zunikoff and the Chief Curator of the YIVO Online Museum Karolina Ziulkoski will guide you in using storytelling techniques to bring Beba’s story to life.

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Tuesday
Jul 19
2:00pm

Libes briv (18th C.): Isaac Wetzlar’s Call for Reform of Jewish Society and Education

Marion Aptroot explores Isaac Wetzlar's ideas for reforming Jewish education in Ashkenaz in the mid-18th century.

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Thursday
Jul 14
2:00pm

Tea Arciszewska’s 'Miryeml' (1958) and Yiddish Plays by Women

In this talk, Sonia Gollance will discuss her translation-in-progress of Miryeml and selected texts about Tea Arciszewska by contemporaries such as Y. Y. Trunk, Yosef Opatoshu, and Melech Ravitch.

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Tuesday
Jul 12
2:00pm

The Theater of Aaron Zeitlin

Yitskhok Niborski explores the mystical themes of Aaron Zeitlin’s writing through the lens of Jacob Jacobson, a play that depicts an imagined second world war in which the whole world is destroyed.

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Thursday
Jul 7
2:00pm

Women on the Immigrant Yiddish Stage: Paths to Stardom

This lecture will follow the careers of Yiddish actresses to illuminate shifting attitudes within society and the Yiddish theater regarding gender.

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Wednesday
Jul 6
6:00pm

Fear and Other Stories by Chana Blankshteyn, Translated by Anita Norich

Anita Norich and Chana Kronfeld discuss Norich’s new translation of Yiddish writer Chana Blankshteyn’s short stories, which brings this collection to English readers for the first time.

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Tuesday
Jul 5
2:00pm

Kyiv and Kharkiv – Two Centers of Yiddish Culture, 1917-1941

This lecture will discuss the migration of Yiddish culture in post-revolutionary Ukraine from Kyiv to Kharkiv, and the subsequent “division of labor” between the two cities.

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Cancelled

2022 Literary Tour of Jewish Galicia

Due to popular demand and the success of the 2018 tour, YIVO will host its second Literary Tour of Jewish Galicia, where we will read the works of writers such as Peretz, Bruno Schulz, Agnon, Celan, Babel, and many others in the places that they were written, and travel through the historic landscape that shaped them.

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Trip starts July 1

2022 Study Tour of Kraków, Wrocław, and Berlin

Journey with noted historian Dr. Samuel Kassow and acclaimed Australian Jewish author Arnold Zable as we examine the fascinating ways Jewish culture was shaped in these lands.

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Thursday
Jun 30
2:00pm

Displacement & Creative Resilience in the Modern Jewish Age

Barry Trachtenberg introduces the Ashkenazic Jewish experience of exile and displacement that began in the late 19th century and continued through the khurbn years and beyond.

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Tuesday
Jun 28
2:00pm

Did the YIVO Linguists Disregard Hasidic Yiddish?

Leyzer Burko contrasts the separate development of Standard Yiddish and Hasidic Yiddish both in Europe and America.

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Thursday
Jun 23
2:00pm

"The Master's Tools": Jews and Music in Revolutionary Eastern Europe

James Loeffler explores what it means to compose art music in Yiddish and whether Jewish culture can exist without nationalism.

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Cancelled

2022 Study Tour of Lithuania & Poland

Join YIVO for an enlightening journey to Lithuania and Poland. Examine the life that was lived as you reconnect with your own heritage. Discover the remarkable treasures of old Warsaw, Kraków, Vilnius, and the magical Białowieża Forest.

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Thursday
Jun 9
1:00pm

Modernist Form / Modern Hegemony: Reading the Politics of Introspectivist Poetics

Elias Pitegoff investigates the evolving poetic program of Introspectivism, which was established by Yiddish poets in New York with the aim of producing Yiddish literature beyond Jewish interest before shifting to critique Jewish assimilation in America.

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Tuesday
Jun 7
7:00pm

Revivalistics: From the Genesis of Israeli to Language Reclamation in Australia and Beyond

Ghil'ad Zuckermann's new book, Revivalistics: From the Genesis of Israeli to Language Reclamation in Australia and Beyond, tells the story of the Hebrew revival with new insights about modern Israeli Hebrew's connection to the Yiddish language. Join YIVO for a discussion with Zuckermann in conversation with Yiddish poet and linguist Dov-Ber Kerler.

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Wednesday
Jun 1
1:00pm

Are We In The Midst Of A Yiddish Renaissance?

Are we currently experiencing a Yiddish renaissance? YIVO’s own community of Yiddish learners has expanded more than 10-fold in the last two years. Duolingo has added Yiddish as a language. Headline after headline touts Yiddish as unexpectedly alive and well. What does this all mean for Yiddish in the 21st century?

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Thursday
May 26
7:00pm

Continuing Evolution: Yiddish Folksong Today

This concert features music by Frederic Rzweski alongside the premiere of new works by Derek David, Lainie Fefferman, David Ludwig, Daniel Schlosberg, and Dan Shore. Part of YIVO’s May 2022 festival celebrating Yiddish folksong. This event will take place in person at YIVO and via livestream.

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Tuesday
May 24
1:00pm

Yiddish Theatre in South America (1930-1960): Transnational Networks and Artistic Exchange

In this lecture, Dr. Paula Ansaldo will explore the development of the South American Yiddish theatre scene and the connections it established with the main Yiddish cultural centers of the time in the U.S. and Europe and with the larger theatrical ecosystem of South America.

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Monday
May 23
1:00pm

The YIVO Folksong Project

Join YIVO for a discussion of the YIVO Folksong Project including examples of material from the project, and a demonstration of how to access this material. This panel will feature the original project director Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, ethnomusicologist Mark Slobin, singer and composer Joshua Waletzky, and YIVO Sound Archivist Eléonore Biezunski. Part of YIVO’s May 2022 festival celebrating Yiddish folksong.

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Sunday
May 22
4:00pm

Continuing Evolution: Yiddish Folksong Today

This concert features a showcase of contemporary artists engaged with Yiddish folksong performing material collected as a part of YIVO’s 1973-1975 Folksong Project: East European Jewish Folksong in its Social Context. Part of YIVO’s May 2022 festival celebrating Yiddish folksong. This event will take place in person at the Jalopy Theatre and via livestream.

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Wednesday
May 18
7:00pm

Continuing Evolution: Yiddish Folksong Today

This concert features music by Stefan Wolpe, Lazare Saminsky, and Joseph Achron, alongside the premiere of new works by Marti Epstein, Aaron Kernis, Anthony Russell/Uri Schreter, Judith Shatin, and Anat Spiegel. Part of YIVO’s May 2022 festival celebrating Yiddish folksong. This event will take place in person at YIVO and via livestream.

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Wednesday
May 11
1:00pm

Israel's Moment: International Support for and Opposition to Establishing the Jewish State, 1945–1949

Drawing on new research in government, public and private archives, Jeffrey Herf’s Israel's Moment: International Support for and Opposition to Establishing the Jewish State, 1945–1949 explores the political realities that underpinned support for and opposition to Zionist aspirations in Palestine in the wake of the Holocaust and during the onset of the Cold War.

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Monday
May 9
7:00pm

Continuing Evolution: Yiddish Folksong Today

This concert features music by Sergei Prokofiev, Maurice Ravel, Joel Engel, Alexander Veprik, and Aaron Copland, alongside the premiere of new works by Martin Bresnick, Annie Gosfield, Paul Alan Levi, and Alex Weiser. Part of YIVO’s May 2022 festival celebrating Yiddish folksong. This event will take place in person at YIVO and via livestream.

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Thursday
May 5
7:00pm

Am Yisrael High: The Story of Jews and Cannabis

Mentioned in the Bible and discussed in numerous traditional texts, cannabis has long been a part of Jewish life. Join YIVO for the opening of our latest exhibition, including a panel discussion covering the many connections of Jews to cannabis – religious and spiritual, historical, scientific, and more.

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Monday
May 2
1:00pm

“What Does Your Dream Tell You?”: B. Rivkin and Yiddish Occultism in America

The writer B. Rivkin (Borukh Avrom Weinrebe, 1883–1945) is known to scholars today as an important anarchist thinker and Yiddish literary critic. Less known is that Rivkin was also a firm believer in the occult who attended spiritualist séances and speculated about the possibility of telepathic communication.

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Sunday
Apr 24
2:00pm

YIVO Yiddish Club: Zalmen Mlotek and Yiddish Theater Today

Yiddish enthusiasts the world over, join the YIVO Yiddish club to celebrate Mame-loshn. This session features Zalmen Mlotek, conductor, composer, pianist, and the artistic director of the National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene (NYTF), the longest continuously running Yiddish theatre in the world.

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Thursday
Apr 14
1:00pm

Modernism in the Ghetto: Propaganda in the Graphic Design of Documents Produced by the Łódź Judenrat

Unlike most of those who created them, a large number of documents produced by the Łódź Ghetto Judenrat survived the Holocaust. In this lecture, Paweł Michna will uncover the artistic contexts of these unique and little known documents, of which the preeminent specimens are held in the YIVO Archives.

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Wednesday
Apr 13
1:00pm

Free as a Jew: A New Memoir by Ruth Wisse

In her new book, Ruth R. Wisse reflects on her experience fleeing the Holocaust as a child, living through the birth of the State of Israel, and teaching Yiddish literature and Comparative Literature at Harvard University for more than 20 years. A special collaboration with the Yiddish Book Center, this event will feature Wisse in conversation with author and founder of the Yiddish Book Center, Aaron Lansky.

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Thursday
Apr 7
12:00pm

Hope Is Stronger Than Life: The Vilna Ghetto Diary of Zelig Kalmanovich

Zelig Kalmanovich kept a vivid diary during his time in the Vilna Ghetto describing daily life, the hopes and efforts of the people to retain humanity, and his thoughts about the future of the Jewish people and Jewish culture. Join YIVO for a panel discussion celebrating the new English publication of his important testimony.

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Thursday
Mar 31
1:00pm

Hidden Connections, Unintended Consequences: American Jews, Contraband Trades, and Soviet Borders in the 1920s

Drawing on original archival research in Europe and the United States, Andrey Shlyakhter uncovers the role that American Jews played, both wittingly and unwittingly, in the contraband trade that flourished across Soviet borders.

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Sunday
Mar 27
2:00pm

YIVO Yiddish Club: Miglė Anušauskaitė and her Yiddish Cartoons

Yiddish enthusiasts the world over, join the YIVO Yiddish club to celebrate Mame-loshn. This session features Miglė Anušauskaitė, a Judaica researcher and a cartoonist from Lithuania.

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Class starts Mar 24 9:00am-10:30am

[SPR2022] Tales from Early Yiddish Literature

This weekly seminar offers an introduction to Yiddish literature in the Early Modern period. Course materials will be given in Yiddish and English translation, and discussion will be conducted in Yiddish and English. It is primarily for intermediate Yiddish learners.

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Thursday
Mar 17
7:00pm

CHEWDAISM: A Taste of Jewish Montreal

CHEWDAISM: A Taste of Jewish Montreal is an hour-long documentary following Eli Batalion and Jamie Elman of "YidlLife Crisis" fame as they discover the roots of Montreal's Jewish community through a series of classic Jewish eateries. This screening will mark the New York premiere of the film and will be followed by a discussion and Q&A with Batalion and Elman, moderated by Gabriella Gershenson.

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Class starts Mar 17 12:00pm-1:30pm

[SPR2022] Jewish Berlin Then and Now: Culture, Society and the German Capital from the 18th Century Until Today

This weekly seminar, conducted in English, considers memoir, essays, art, architecture, film, and primary sources to examine Jewish Berlin as it was, as it is, and as it is imagined.

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Wednesday
Mar 16
12:00pm

Russia's War on Ukraine: Perspectives from Jewish History

Join four distinguished scholars of Jewish, Russian, and Ukrainian studies in a discussion of how we can understand the war in Ukraine from the perspective of Jewish history and how the region's history may inform the future.

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Class starts Mar 15 6:00pm-7:30pm

[SPR2022] Jews and Jewishness in English Renaissance Literature and Culture

This weekly seminar, conducted in English, reads and discusses canonical and lesser-known English Renaissance texts featuring Jewish characters and Jewish questions.

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Class starts Mar 15 2:30pm-4:00pm

[SPR2022] Avrom Sutzkever After 1945: Between Europe and Israel

This weekly seminar studies Avrom Sutkzever’s literary works in the immediate aftermath of khurbn, along with historical sources. Conducted entirely in Yiddish, it is primarily for advanced Yiddish learners.

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Class starts Mar 14 7:00pm-8:30pm

[SPR2022] Jewish Literature and Film Under Dictatorship in Latin America

This weekly seminar, conducted in English, explores Jewish literary works of fiction and nonfiction written during the various Latin American dictatorships of the 20th century.

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Class starts Mar 14 7:00pm-8:15pm

[SPR2022] לייענקרײַז Yiddish Reading Group: A Bintel Briv (Monday)

This weekly reading circle reads selected letters and responses from advice column A Bintel Briv. With texts in Yiddish and discussion partly in Yiddish, it is for those who can comfortably read Yiddish (aloud) or understand it when read aloud to them.

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Monday
Mar 14
1:00pm

How To Do Research at YIVO: A Practical Introduction

Join YIVO archivist Hallel Yadin for an overview on how to do research at YIVO. All are welcome to attend: scholars, students, amateur researchers, and anyone who has ever been curious about YIVO's vast collections.

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Class starts Mar 13 2:00pm-3:30pm

[SPR2022] Holocaust and the Law

This weekly seminar, conducted in English, scrutinizes attempts to prosecute individuals for crimes—ranging from war crimes and genocide to local collaboration—across the European continent and explores the complicated relationships between justice, politics, and memory.

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Class starts Mar 13 12:00pm-1:30pm

[SPR2022] The Jewish Soldier, 1788-1948

This weekly seminar, conducted in English, studies the Jewish soldiers who fought in many of Europe’s major wars, both domestic and colonial.

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Class starts Mar 13 10:30am-12:00pm

[SPR2022] Di Froyen Velt: Eastern European Textile Heritage within the United States

This weekly seminar, conducted in English, explores handmade textiles as a microcosm of the sociopolitical scene within the Eastern European Jewish immigrant community in the U.S. at the turn of the 20th century.

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Thursday
Mar 10
7:00pm

Song Searcher: The Times and Toils of Moyshe Beregovsky

This documentary film tells the story of musician and scholar Moyshe Beregovsky, who crisscrossed Ukraine with a phonograph in hand during the most dramatic years of Soviet history to record and study the traditional music of Ukrainian Jewry.

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Class starts Mar 9 5:30pm-6:45pm

[SPR2022] לייענקרײַז Yiddish Reading Group: A Bintel Briv (Wednesday)

This weekly reading circle reads selected letters and responses from advice column A Bintel Briv. With texts in Yiddish and discussion partly in Yiddish, it is for those who can comfortably read Yiddish (aloud) or understand it when read aloud to them.

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Sunday
Mar 6
11:00am

2022 Summer Program Information Session - Advanced Levels

Are you thinking of returning to the Summer Program to continue your advanced studies? Join Summer Program faculty and staff for a brief information session about YIVO’s advanced levels.

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Wednesday
Mar 2
1:00pm

An Unchosen People: Jewish Political Reckoning in Interwar Poland

Kenneth B. Moss and Steven Zipperstein discuss Moss's newly published book, which traces the complex and painful story of Polish Jewish reckoning with diasporic vulnerability, nationalism’s terrible potencies, Zionism’s promises, and the necessity of choice.

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Class starts Mar 1 12:30pm-2:00pm

[SPR2022] Beginner I Conversational Yiddish for Heritage Learners (Tuesday)

This weekly conversational class covers grammar, vocabulary, and conversational basics. It is for students who are new to the Yiddish language or have some exposure to Yiddish and would like a review.

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Class starts Feb 27 6:00pm-7:30pm

[SPR2022] Beginner I Conversational Yiddish for Heritage Learners (Sunday)

This weekly conversational class covers grammar, vocabulary, and conversational basics. It is for students who are new to the Yiddish language or have some exposure to Yiddish and would like a review.

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Class starts Feb 27 12:00pm-1:30pm

[SPR2022] Beginner IV Conversational Yiddish for Heritage Learners (Afternoon)

This weekly conversational class develops grammatical skills and sets of vocabulary. It is primarily for fall Beginner III Conversational Yiddish for Heritage Learners students.

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Class starts Feb 27 10:00am-11:30am

[SPR2022] Beginner IV Conversational Yiddish for Heritage Learners (Morning)

This weekly conversational class develops grammatical skills and sets of vocabulary. It is primarily for fall Beginner III Conversational Yiddish for Heritage Learners students.

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Class starts Feb 24 4:00pm-5:30pm

[SPR2022] Beginner II Conversational Yiddish for Heritage Learners

This weekly conversational class introduces new grammatical skills and sets of vocabulary. It is primarily for fall Beginner II Conversational Yiddish for Heritage Learners students.

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Sunday
Feb 20
2:00pm

YIVO Yiddish Club: Yiddish TikTok with Cameron Bernstein

Yiddish enthusiasts the world over, join the YIVO Yiddish club to celebrate Mame-loshn. This session features Cameron Bernstein, an artist and Yiddishist from the Chicagoland Jewish community.

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Class starts Feb 20 10:30am-12:00pm

[SPR2022] Advanced I Yiddish

This weekly standard class further enhances listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for fall Intermediate IV students.

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Class starts Feb 18 3:00pm-4:30pm

[SPR2022] Beginner II Yiddish (Friday)

This weekly standard class develops listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for fall Beginner I students.

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Class starts Feb 18 12:30pm-2:00pm

[SPR2022] Beginner II Reading Yiddish

This weekly reading class is for those with working Yiddish literacy, especially those interested in improving reading proficiency for academic or archival research. It is primarily for fall Beginner I Reading Yiddish students.

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Thursday
Feb 17
7:00pm

An Evening of Yiddish Theater in Translation: Celebrating Nahma Sandrow's 'Yiddish Plays for Reading and Performance'

Join YIVO for scenes of romance, political symbolism, and low comedy in Nahma Sandrow’s translations, performed by Yelena Shmulenson, Allen Lewis Rickman, Shane Baker, and Jakob von Eichel. This event will take place on Zoom and in person. A wine reception will follow for those in-person.

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Class starts Feb 17 4:00pm-5:30pm

[SPR2022] Beginner III Yiddish (Thursday)

This weekly standard class develops listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for fall Beginner II students.

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Class starts Feb 17 1:00pm-2:30pm

[SPR2022] Beginner I Reading Yiddish

This weekly reading class covers grammar and how to read Yiddish texts with the help of a dictionary. It is for students new to Yiddish, especially those interested in obtaining reading proficiency for academic or archival research.

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Class starts Feb 15 6:00pm-7:30pm

[SPR2022] Intermediate III Yiddish

This weekly standard class enhances listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for fall Intermediate II students.

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Class starts Feb 15 6:00pm-7:30pm

[SPR2022] Intensive Advanced I&II Yiddish

This twice-weekly intensive class further enhances listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for fall Intensive Intermediate III&IV students.

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Class starts Feb 15 3:00pm-4:30pm

[SPR2022] Beginner I Yiddish (Tuesday Afternoon)

This weekly standard class covers the alef-beys and grammar, vocabulary, and conversational basics. It is for those who are new to the Yiddish language or would like a review.

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Class starts Feb 15 3:00pm-4:30pm

[SPR2022] Intensive Advanced III&IV Yiddish

This twice-weekly intensive class further enhances listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for fall Intensive Advanced I&II students.

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Tuesday
Feb 15
1:00pm

The Clever Little Tailor

Solomon Simon’s novel The Clever Little Tailor spins tales of a Jewish tailor who impresses kings, judges, thieves, and even giants with his sharp wit. Simon's grandson, David R. Forman, has now translated the novel for the first time into English. Join translator Forman in conversation with literature scholar Miriam Udel, as they discuss Solomon Simon, the newly translated novel, and the future of bilingual English-Yiddish literature.

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Class starts Feb 15 10:00am-11:30am

[SPR2022] Beginner I Yiddish (Tuesday Morning)

This weekly standard class covers the alef-beys and grammar, vocabulary, and conversational basics. It is for those who are new to the Yiddish language or would like a review.

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Class starts Feb 14 6:30pm-8:00pm

[SPR2022] Intermediate I Yiddish

This weekly standard class enhances listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for fall Beginner IV students.

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Class starts Feb 14 6:00pm-7:30pm

[SPR2022] Beginner I Yiddish (Monday II)

This weekly standard class covers the alef-beys and grammar, vocabulary, and conversational basics. It is for those who are new to the Yiddish language or would like a review.

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Class starts Feb 14 6:00pm-7:30pm

[SPR2022] Intensive Beginner I&II Yiddish

This twice-weekly intensive class covers the alef-beys and grammar, vocabulary, and conversational basics. It is for students who are new to the Yiddish language or would like a review.

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Class starts Feb 14 5:30pm-7:00pm

[SPR2022] Yiddish Literature Seminar: Short Stories

This weekly seminar analyzes short stories by classic Yiddish writers and Americans. Conducted mainly in Yiddish, it is primarily for intermediate Yiddish learners.

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Class starts Feb 14 5:00pm-6:30pm

[SPR2022] Beginner I Yiddish (Monday I)

This weekly standard class covers the alef-beys and grammar, vocabulary, and conversational basics. It is for those who are new to the Yiddish language or would like a review.

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Class starts Feb 14 11:00am-12:30pm

[SPR2022] Beginner III Yiddish (Monday)

This weekly standard class develops listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for fall Beginner II students.

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Class starts Feb 14 11:00am-12:30pm

[SPR2022] Beginner IV Yiddish (Monday)

This weekly standard class develops listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for fall Beginner III students.

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Class starts Feb 14 9:00am-10:30am

[SPR2022] Intensive Intermediate I&II Yiddish

This twice-weekly intensive class enhances listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for fall Intensive Beginner III&IV students.

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Class starts Feb 13 6:00pm-7:30pm

[SPR2022] Intensive Intermediate III&IV Yiddish

This twice-weekly intensive class enhances listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for fall Intensive Intermediate I&II students.

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Class starts Feb 13 6:00pm-7:30pm

[SPR2022] Intensive Advanced V&VI Yiddish

This twice-weekly intensive class further enhances listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for fall Intensive Advanced III&IV students.

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Class starts Feb 13 4:00pm-5:30pm

[SPR2022] Beginner I Yiddish (Sunday)

This weekly standard class covers the alef-beys and grammar, vocabulary, and conversational basics. It is for those who are new to the Yiddish language or would like a review.

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Class starts Feb 13 3:00pm-4:30pm

[SPR2022] Beginner III Yiddish (Sunday)

This weekly standard class develops listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for fall Beginner II students.

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Class starts Feb 13 1:30pm-3:00pm

[SPR2022] Intermediate II Yiddish

This weekly standard class enhances listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for fall Intermediate I students.

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Class starts Feb 13 12:30pm-2:00pm

[SPR2022] Beginner II Yiddish (Sunday Afternoon)

This weekly standard class develops listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for fall Beginner I students.

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Class starts Feb 13 12:00pm-1:30pm

[SPR2022] Beginner IV Yiddish (Sunday)

This weekly standard class develops listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for fall Beginner III students.

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Class starts Feb 13 12:00pm-1:30pm

[SPR2022] Intermediate IV Yiddish

This weekly standard class enhances listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for fall Intermediate III students.

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Class starts Feb 13 12:00pm-1:30pm

[SPR2022] Intensive Beginner III&IV Yiddish

This twice-weekly intensive class develops listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for fall Intensive Beginner I&II students.

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Class starts Feb 13 10:00am-11:30am

[SPR2022] Beginner II Yiddish (Sunday Morning)

This weekly standard class develops listening, speaking, writing, and reading skills. It is primarily for fall Beginner I students.

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Friday
Feb 11
9:00am

2022 Summer Program Information Session

Have you always wanted to study Yiddish at YIVO’s Summer Program? Are you wondering what it would be like to take the program online or in person? Join faculty and staff of YIVO's Summer Program for a brief information session.

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Wednesday
Feb 9
1:00pm

Irene Pletka presents: Awful, Offal Dinner

Lung, tongue, liver, and brains were once among the staples of the Eastern European Jewish diet. Join YIVO’s Vice Chair Irene Pletka for her Awful, Offal Dinner, a tour through culinary delicacies the faint of heart will not want to try at home.

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Friday
Feb 4
1:00pm

2022 Summer Program Information Session

Have you always wanted to study Yiddish at YIVO’s Summer Program? Are you wondering what it would be like to take the program online or in person? Join faculty and staff of YIVO's Summer Program for a brief information session.

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Thursday
Feb 3
1:00pm

The Letters Project: A Daughter’s Journey

In 1986, Eleanor Reissa went through all of her mother’s belongings and unearthed fifty-six handwritten letters from her father in 1949, only four years after Auschwitz. Thirty years later, with her father’s letters as her silent guide, Reissa goes on a journey, unearthing the unknowable about her family’s past and her own present.

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Wednesday
Feb 2
6:00pm

2022 Summer Program Information Session

Have you always wanted to study Yiddish at YIVO’s Summer Program? Are you wondering what it would be like to take the program online or in person? Join faculty and staff of YIVO's Summer Program for a brief information session.

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Thursday
Jan 27
1:00pm

From the Vilna Ghetto to Nuremberg: Memoir and Testimony

Join us for a discussion of the renowned Yiddish poet Avrom Sutzkever’s account of the Holocaust, translated into English for the first time by Justin Cammy, in conversation with YIVO’s executive director Jonathan Brent.

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Thursday
Jan 20
6:30pm

Virtual Tenement Talk: New York in Yiddish Song

The Tenement Museum and YIVO are partnering to bring you a night exploring New York City in the Yiddish imagination with musical performances from inside the recreated 1890s parlor of the Levine family, immigrants from Eastern Europe.

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Tuesday
Jan 18
1:00pm

The Shuttering of Memorial, A Russian Human Rights Group

In January 1989 in Moscow an NGO called Memorial was founded to document and publish the crimes of the Soviet regime. In two recent rulings by the Russian Supreme Court and Moscow's City Court, Memorial has been ordered to shut down. Join YIVO for a conversation discussing Memorial, and the meaning of the Russian government's actions.

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Wednesday
Jan 12
1:00pm

The Other Side: Law, Education, Ideology & Normalizing the Criminal

A school board in Texas was recently asked by its executive director to contemplate “opposing views” of the Holocaust. Can such views ever accord with reason, or with social, political and religious values? This lecture by YIVO's executive director Jonathan Brent will explore the other side of “normal.”

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Class starts Jan 11 7:30pm-9:00pm

[WY2022] Yiddish Culture between the Two World Wars: The Case of Leyb Malakh and Mikhl Weichert’s 'Mississippi'

Conducted in English, this course offers a close reading of Mississippi, a Yiddish play about the Scottsboro Boys debuted in 1935 by Warsaw-based experimental Yiddish theater troupe Yung Teater. The class will read a bilingual script of the play as well as primary sources.

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Class starts Jan 11 6:30pm-8:00pm

[WY2022] Yiddish Lullabies

Conducted in English, this course will teach a diverse body of Yiddish lullabies, both folksongs and ones created by beloved poets. Students will have an opportunity to work on proper pronunciation and align the song texts with the rhythm of natural Yiddish speech. Song texts will be provided in Yiddish, transliteration, and English translation.

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Class starts Jan 11 5:30pm-7:00pm

[WY2022] Laughter. Tears. Curtain. A Yiddish Theatrical Salon

Conducted in Yiddish, this course will transform an ordinary Zoom meeting into a theatrical salon as everyone will take turns reading a Yiddish play aloud—no acting experience required. Discussion of the play will be in Yiddish and English.

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Class starts Jan 11 5:30pm-7:00pm

[WY2022] Yiddish Voices from Latin America

Conducted in Yiddish, this course will read Yiddish texts published in Latin America in the first half of the 20th century.

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Class starts Jan 11 3:30pm-5:00pm

[WY2022] Poetic Texts from the Ghettos and Camps: a Neglected Area

Conducted in Yiddish, this course will read Yiddish poetry written by everyday people in the ghettos and camps of World War II in an attempt to understand the multi-faceted character and significance of the poetry within the context of historical testimony.

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Class starts Jan 11 12:30pm-2:00pm

[WY2022] The Yiddish Cinema: A Celebration of Jewish Life

Conducted in English, this course will trace the history of Yiddish cinema from its early years in Eastern Europe, through its Golden Age in both Poland and the United States in the 1930s, into today's renewed interest and possible renaissance. Yiddish films discussed will be subtitled in English.

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Class starts Jan 9 6:30pm-8:00pm

[WY2022] 'Royte pomerantsn': Its Humor, History and Language

Conducted in Yiddish, this course will read and study the history of Royte pomerantsn, the century-old collection of Yiddish jokes compiled by Immanuel Olshvanger. Towards the eternal attempt to characterize Yiddish humor, the course will discuss the motifs that are joked about and Olshvanger's theory of what is essential to the Yiddish joke.

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Class starts Jan 6 9:00am-10:15am

[WP2022] Reviving European-Jewish Thought and Culture after 1945

This course will explore how institutions and individuals, coping with the void left by the Holocaust, established continuity with the past while acknowledging the fundamental rupture that had occurred in Jewish existence.

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Wednesday
Jan 5
1:00pm

How Should We Think About Freedom?

Freedom is the main idea of American political life, but no one knows what it means. What would it take to have a country of free speakers and free people? In this lecture, Timothy Snyder defines freedom as the capacity to choose among values, envision futures, and realize some of them.

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Class starts Jan 5 9:00am-10:15am

[WP2022] Grace Paley and Philip Roth: Writing Jews in America

Grace Paley and Philip Roth pose questions about what it means to be a Jew in America, how Jewish life has changed, and where it might be heading. This course will examine the themes, characters, and narrative devices in their stories.

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Class starts Jan 4 8:00pm-9:15pm

[WP2022] History of the Yiddish Language (Evening)

From the origins of Ashkenazi civilization to twenty-first century Yiddish debates, this course will provide a thorough overview of the Yiddish language through linguistical, sociological, and historical lenses.

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Class starts Jan 4 8:00pm-9:15pm

[WP2022] Jews and Science Fiction

Nurtured by an assortment of visionaries from multiple diasporas, this course explores the way Jews have used science fiction to explore time, space, and themselves.

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Class starts Jan 4 6:00pm-7:15pm

[WP2022] Jews, Anarchism, and the Pursuit of Radical Freedom

This course will focus on the ideas, politics, and culture of Jewish anarchists within the broad context of modern Jewish politics. Topics will include Jewish nationalism, the Russian Revolution, Yiddish literature, morality, violence, and free will.

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Class starts Jan 4 5:30pm-7:00pm

[WY2022] The Underworld in Yiddish Literature

Conducted in Yiddish, this course will examine literary works and folklore collections that explore the social underworld and language of thieves within Yiddish-speaking Jewish life.

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Class starts Jan 4 4:00pm-5:15pm

[WP2022] History of the Yiddish Language (Afternoon)

From the origins of Ashkenazi civilization to twenty-first century Yiddish debates, this course will provide a thorough overview of the Yiddish language through linguistical, sociological, and historical lenses.

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Class starts Jan 4 3:30pm-5:00pm

[WY2022] Cooking from Yiddish Recipe Books

Conducted in Yiddish for advanced beginners, this course will examine the development of the recipe as a Yiddish literary genre. Ingredient lists will be provided before each session so students may cook along in real time if they wish.

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Class starts Jan 4 2:30pm-3:45pm

[WP2022] The Many Realities of Bruno Schulz

Through close reading, this course will explore "the mutterings of mythological delirium" found in the fictional masterpieces and art of Bruno Schulz.

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Class starts Jan 4 1:00pm-2:15pm

[WP2022] The Price of Whiteness: Jews, Race, and American Identity

This course will explore the history of European Jews’ uncertain place in America’s culture of race and difference from the period of mass immigration through the contemporary movement for racial justice.

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Class starts Jan 4 12:30pm-2:00pm

[WY2022] Mendele’s 'Di klyatshe' (The Mare)

Conducted in English, this course will offer a close reading of Sholem-Yankev Abramovitsh's 1873 landmark novel, Di klyatshe (The Mare). While the course will use an English translation of the novel, Yiddish-readers may read the original Yiddish text.

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Class starts Jan 4 10:45am-12:00pm

[WP2022] Conquering the Space: Symbolic Topography of the Former Warsaw Ghetto

The former Warsaw Ghetto site is at once a symbol and a place of history. This course will outline the history of the site, examine narrative patterns imprinted in the ground, and consider twenty-first century politics of Poland.

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Class starts Jan 4 8:30am-10:00am

[WY2022] Topographies of Yiddish Warsaw

Conducted in Yiddish, this course will analyze the topography of pre-WWII Warsaw using texts from literature and the press, archival documents, old and new maps, photographs, and drawings.

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Class starts Jan 4 8:30am-10:00am

[WY2022] Yiddish Folklore: From Life to Literature

Conducted in Yiddish, this course will study original folklore texts as well as their literary metamorphoses in the works of Y. L. Perets and Sh. Ansky. All readings will be in Yiddish.

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