Podcasts about soviet jewish

The Cognitive Crucible is a forum that presents different perspectives and emerging thought leadership related to the information environment. The opinions expressed by guests are their own, and do not necessarily reflect the views of or endorsement by the Information Professionals Association. During this episode, Genia Simkin discusses his firm's Samizdat technology which makes it possible to bypass DNS blockades set up by autocratic regimes. Recording Date: 5 Aug 2024 Research Question: Genia Simkin suggests as interested student examine OSINT practices. For example, would it be possible to get an accurate sense (census, poll, survey, etc.) of how various populations that live in fear of and under the repressive rule of governments like those in Russia, Iran, or China feel about their governments' various policies and other important geopolitical questions so as to better understand what kinds of propaganda that they're subjected to is effective and they're able to see past? Resources: Samizdat Online makes it possible to bypass the DNS blockades set up by autocratic regimes. Through Samizdat Online, you will be able to access censored media from around the globe and share freely, without VPN. Samizdat = the clandestine copying and distribution of literature banned by the state, especially formerly in the communist countries of eastern Europe. Yevgeny Simkin Bulwark site Alfred North Whitehead Quote: “Civilization advances by extending the number of important operations which we can perform without thinking of them.” I, Pencil: My Family Tree by Leonard E. Read Wayback Machine Fact Checks and Context for Wayback Machine Pages by Mark Graham I Love Russia: Reporting from a Lost Country by Elena Kostyuchenko, Bela Shayevich, Ilona Yazhbin Chavasse Putin's People: How the KGB Took Back Russia and Then Took On the West by Catherine Belton Link to full show notes and resources Guest Bio:  Yevgeny (Genia) Simkin is a technologist, analyst, comedian, musician, and entrepreneur who fled with his family to the US from the former Soviet Union in 1978, during the mass Soviet Jewish exodus of the 70s. Over the last 25 years, Simkin has developed a multitude of software products for the likes of CBS News, YouTube, USA Today, and, many other global media and tech companies. Additionally he's a regular contributor to The Bulwark and has intended but failed to find the time to write multiple insightful and arguably books on the ways in which humanity has failed to realize its potential. Last year, after Russia invaded Ukraine, Yevgeny co-founded Samizdat Online, an anti-censorship media platform that uses unique IP to make it possible to bypass Internet blocking commonly practiced by autocratic regimes such as Putin's. About: The Information Professionals Association (IPA) is a non-profit organization dedicated to exploring the role of information activities, such as influence and cognitive security, within the national security sector and helping to bridge the divide between operations and research. Its goal is to increase interdisciplinary collaboration between scholars and practitioners and policymakers with an interest in this domain. For more information, please contact us at communications@information-professionals.org. Or, connect directly with The Cognitive Crucible podcast host, John Bicknell, on LinkedIn. Disclosure: As an Amazon Associate, 1) IPA earns from qualifying purchases, 2) IPA gets commissions for purchases made through links in this post.

In Collectivization and Social Engineering: Soviet Administration and the Jews of Uzbekistan, 1917-1939 (Brill, 2015), Zeev Levin seeks to provide a comprehensive picture of government efforts to socialize the Jewish masses in Uzbekistan, a process in which the central Soviet government took part, together with the local, republican and regional administrations and Soviet Jewish activists. This research presents a chapter in the history of the Jews in Uzbekistan, as well as contributing to the study of the socialization process of the Jewish population in the USSR in general. It also contributes to the study of relations among political and government bodies and decision makers. The study is based on archival documents and provides a unique glance at the implementation of Soviet nationalities policy towards Bukharan Jews while comparing it to other national minority groups in Uzbekistan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

In Collectivization and Social Engineering: Soviet Administration and the Jews of Uzbekistan, 1917-1939 (Brill, 2015), Zeev Levin seeks to provide a comprehensive picture of government efforts to socialize the Jewish masses in Uzbekistan, a process in which the central Soviet government took part, together with the local, republican and regional administrations and Soviet Jewish activists. This research presents a chapter in the history of the Jews in Uzbekistan, as well as contributing to the study of the socialization process of the Jewish population in the USSR in general. It also contributes to the study of relations among political and government bodies and decision makers. The study is based on archival documents and provides a unique glance at the implementation of Soviet nationalities policy towards Bukharan Jews while comparing it to other national minority groups in Uzbekistan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/history

In Collectivization and Social Engineering: Soviet Administration and the Jews of Uzbekistan, 1917-1939 (Brill, 2015), Zeev Levin seeks to provide a comprehensive picture of government efforts to socialize the Jewish masses in Uzbekistan, a process in which the central Soviet government took part, together with the local, republican and regional administrations and Soviet Jewish activists. This research presents a chapter in the history of the Jews in Uzbekistan, as well as contributing to the study of the socialization process of the Jewish population in the USSR in general. It also contributes to the study of relations among political and government bodies and decision makers. The study is based on archival documents and provides a unique glance at the implementation of Soviet nationalities policy towards Bukharan Jews while comparing it to other national minority groups in Uzbekistan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/jewish-studies

In Collectivization and Social Engineering: Soviet Administration and the Jews of Uzbekistan, 1917-1939 (Brill, 2015), Zeev Levin seeks to provide a comprehensive picture of government efforts to socialize the Jewish masses in Uzbekistan, a process in which the central Soviet government took part, together with the local, republican and regional administrations and Soviet Jewish activists. This research presents a chapter in the history of the Jews in Uzbekistan, as well as contributing to the study of the socialization process of the Jewish population in the USSR in general. It also contributes to the study of relations among political and government bodies and decision makers. The study is based on archival documents and provides a unique glance at the implementation of Soviet nationalities policy towards Bukharan Jews while comparing it to other national minority groups in Uzbekistan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/central-asian-studies

In Collectivization and Social Engineering: Soviet Administration and the Jews of Uzbekistan, 1917-1939 (Brill, 2015), Zeev Levin seeks to provide a comprehensive picture of government efforts to socialize the Jewish masses in Uzbekistan, a process in which the central Soviet government took part, together with the local, republican and regional administrations and Soviet Jewish activists. This research presents a chapter in the history of the Jews in Uzbekistan, as well as contributing to the study of the socialization process of the Jewish population in the USSR in general. It also contributes to the study of relations among political and government bodies and decision makers. The study is based on archival documents and provides a unique glance at the implementation of Soviet nationalities policy towards Bukharan Jews while comparing it to other national minority groups in Uzbekistan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/russian-studies

In Collectivization and Social Engineering: Soviet Administration and the Jews of Uzbekistan, 1917-1939 (Brill, 2015), Zeev Levin seeks to provide a comprehensive picture of government efforts to socialize the Jewish masses in Uzbekistan, a process in which the central Soviet government took part, together with the local, republican and regional administrations and Soviet Jewish activists. This research presents a chapter in the history of the Jews in Uzbekistan, as well as contributing to the study of the socialization process of the Jewish population in the USSR in general. It also contributes to the study of relations among political and government bodies and decision makers. The study is based on archival documents and provides a unique glance at the implementation of Soviet nationalities policy towards Bukharan Jews while comparing it to other national minority groups in Uzbekistan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In Collectivization and Social Engineering: Soviet Administration and the Jews of Uzbekistan, 1917-1939 (Brill, 2015), Zeev Levin seeks to provide a comprehensive picture of government efforts to socialize the Jewish masses in Uzbekistan, a process in which the central Soviet government took part, together with the local, republican and regional administrations and Soviet Jewish activists. This research presents a chapter in the history of the Jews in Uzbekistan, as well as contributing to the study of the socialization process of the Jewish population in the USSR in general. It also contributes to the study of relations among political and government bodies and decision makers. The study is based on archival documents and provides a unique glance at the implementation of Soviet nationalities policy towards Bukharan Jews while comparing it to other national minority groups in Uzbekistan.

In this episode of CounterPunch Radio, Rebecca Maria Goldschmidt talks with fellow members of California Jewish Artists for Palestine, Sophia Sobko and Steph Kudisch, about their collective decision to submit and withdraw explicitly anti-Zionist artworks to an open call for Jewish artists at the Contemporary Jewish Museum in San Francisco. They discuss the process of pulling their works out of the exhibition; the importance of the academic and cultural boycott of Israel (PACBI); and what it means to be Jewish artists publicly confronting Jewish arts institutions that receive Zionist funding and are struggling to address the ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people. Steph Kudisch is a trans genderfluid artist whose work uses mutated intertidal aesthetics and personal storytelling to dwell in in-betweens. They work as a teaching artist on Lisjan Ohlone land, also known as the San Francisco Bay Area. Kudisch and their collaborator Kate Laster form Clear as Schmutz Press as well as the collective Hevra Kadisha in which they create site-specific works across the mediums of printmaking, sculpture, performance, and sound. Sophia Sobko (she/they) is an artist, educator & researcher born in Moscow, USSR & based on Lisjan Ohlone Land in Oakland, CA. They are excited about collaborative learning, participatory art, and co-creating a more liberatory world. Sophia is founder/co-steward of two queer post-Soviet Jewish collectives: Kolektiv Goluboy Vagon and Krivoy Kolektiv. Get in touch with CJAFP at cajewishartists4palestine[@]proton.me More The post California Jewish Artists for Palestine: Sophia Sobko and Steph Kudisch appeared first on CounterPunch.org.

In The Soviet Jewish Bookshelf: Jewish Culture and Identity Between the Lines (Brandeis UP, 2023), Marat Grinberg argues that in an environment where Judaism had been all but destroyed, and a public Jewish presence routinely delegitimized, reading uniquely provided many Soviet Jews with an entry to communal memory and identity. The bookshelf was both a depository of selective Jewish knowledge and often the only conspicuously Jewish presence in their homes. The typical Soviet Jewish bookshelf consisted of a few translated works from Hebrew and numerous translations from Yiddish and German as well as Russian books with both noticeable and subterranean Jewish content. Such volumes, officially published, and not intended solely for a Jewish audience, afforded an opportunity for Soviet Jews to indulge insubordinate feelings in a largely safe manner. Grinberg is interested in pinpointing and decoding the complex reading strategies and the specifically Jewish uses to which the books on the Soviet Jewish bookshelf were put. He reveals that not only Jews read them, but Jews read them in a specific way. Amber Nickell is Associate Professor of History at Fort Hays State University, Editor at H-Ukraine, and Host at NBN Jewish Studies, Ukrainian Studies, and Eastern Europe. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

In The Soviet Jewish Bookshelf: Jewish Culture and Identity Between the Lines (Brandeis UP, 2023), Marat Grinberg argues that in an environment where Judaism had been all but destroyed, and a public Jewish presence routinely delegitimized, reading uniquely provided many Soviet Jews with an entry to communal memory and identity. The bookshelf was both a depository of selective Jewish knowledge and often the only conspicuously Jewish presence in their homes. The typical Soviet Jewish bookshelf consisted of a few translated works from Hebrew and numerous translations from Yiddish and German as well as Russian books with both noticeable and subterranean Jewish content. Such volumes, officially published, and not intended solely for a Jewish audience, afforded an opportunity for Soviet Jews to indulge insubordinate feelings in a largely safe manner. Grinberg is interested in pinpointing and decoding the complex reading strategies and the specifically Jewish uses to which the books on the Soviet Jewish bookshelf were put. He reveals that not only Jews read them, but Jews read them in a specific way. Amber Nickell is Associate Professor of History at Fort Hays State University, Editor at H-Ukraine, and Host at NBN Jewish Studies, Ukrainian Studies, and Eastern Europe. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/history

In The Soviet Jewish Bookshelf: Jewish Culture and Identity Between the Lines (Brandeis UP, 2023), Marat Grinberg argues that in an environment where Judaism had been all but destroyed, and a public Jewish presence routinely delegitimized, reading uniquely provided many Soviet Jews with an entry to communal memory and identity. The bookshelf was both a depository of selective Jewish knowledge and often the only conspicuously Jewish presence in their homes. The typical Soviet Jewish bookshelf consisted of a few translated works from Hebrew and numerous translations from Yiddish and German as well as Russian books with both noticeable and subterranean Jewish content. Such volumes, officially published, and not intended solely for a Jewish audience, afforded an opportunity for Soviet Jews to indulge insubordinate feelings in a largely safe manner. Grinberg is interested in pinpointing and decoding the complex reading strategies and the specifically Jewish uses to which the books on the Soviet Jewish bookshelf were put. He reveals that not only Jews read them, but Jews read them in a specific way. Amber Nickell is Associate Professor of History at Fort Hays State University, Editor at H-Ukraine, and Host at NBN Jewish Studies, Ukrainian Studies, and Eastern Europe. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/literary-studies

In The Soviet Jewish Bookshelf: Jewish Culture and Identity Between the Lines (Brandeis UP, 2023), Marat Grinberg argues that in an environment where Judaism had been all but destroyed, and a public Jewish presence routinely delegitimized, reading uniquely provided many Soviet Jews with an entry to communal memory and identity. The bookshelf was both a depository of selective Jewish knowledge and often the only conspicuously Jewish presence in their homes. The typical Soviet Jewish bookshelf consisted of a few translated works from Hebrew and numerous translations from Yiddish and German as well as Russian books with both noticeable and subterranean Jewish content. Such volumes, officially published, and not intended solely for a Jewish audience, afforded an opportunity for Soviet Jews to indulge insubordinate feelings in a largely safe manner. Grinberg is interested in pinpointing and decoding the complex reading strategies and the specifically Jewish uses to which the books on the Soviet Jewish bookshelf were put. He reveals that not only Jews read them, but Jews read them in a specific way. Amber Nickell is Associate Professor of History at Fort Hays State University, Editor at H-Ukraine, and Host at NBN Jewish Studies, Ukrainian Studies, and Eastern Europe. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/jewish-studies

In The Soviet Jewish Bookshelf: Jewish Culture and Identity Between the Lines (Brandeis UP, 2023), Marat Grinberg argues that in an environment where Judaism had been all but destroyed, and a public Jewish presence routinely delegitimized, reading uniquely provided many Soviet Jews with an entry to communal memory and identity. The bookshelf was both a depository of selective Jewish knowledge and often the only conspicuously Jewish presence in their homes. The typical Soviet Jewish bookshelf consisted of a few translated works from Hebrew and numerous translations from Yiddish and German as well as Russian books with both noticeable and subterranean Jewish content. Such volumes, officially published, and not intended solely for a Jewish audience, afforded an opportunity for Soviet Jews to indulge insubordinate feelings in a largely safe manner. Grinberg is interested in pinpointing and decoding the complex reading strategies and the specifically Jewish uses to which the books on the Soviet Jewish bookshelf were put. He reveals that not only Jews read them, but Jews read them in a specific way. Amber Nickell is Associate Professor of History at Fort Hays State University, Editor at H-Ukraine, and Host at NBN Jewish Studies, Ukrainian Studies, and Eastern Europe. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/russian-studies

In The Soviet Jewish Bookshelf: Jewish Culture and Identity Between the Lines (Brandeis UP, 2023), Marat Grinberg argues that in an environment where Judaism had been all but destroyed, and a public Jewish presence routinely delegitimized, reading uniquely provided many Soviet Jews with an entry to communal memory and identity. The bookshelf was both a depository of selective Jewish knowledge and often the only conspicuously Jewish presence in their homes. The typical Soviet Jewish bookshelf consisted of a few translated works from Hebrew and numerous translations from Yiddish and German as well as Russian books with both noticeable and subterranean Jewish content. Such volumes, officially published, and not intended solely for a Jewish audience, afforded an opportunity for Soviet Jews to indulge insubordinate feelings in a largely safe manner. Grinberg is interested in pinpointing and decoding the complex reading strategies and the specifically Jewish uses to which the books on the Soviet Jewish bookshelf were put. He reveals that not only Jews read them, but Jews read them in a specific way. Amber Nickell is Associate Professor of History at Fort Hays State University, Editor at H-Ukraine, and Host at NBN Jewish Studies, Ukrainian Studies, and Eastern Europe. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/eastern-european-studies

In The Soviet Jewish Bookshelf: Jewish Culture and Identity Between the Lines (Brandeis UP, 2023), Marat Grinberg argues that in an environment where Judaism had been all but destroyed, and a public Jewish presence routinely delegitimized, reading uniquely provided many Soviet Jews with an entry to communal memory and identity. The bookshelf was both a depository of selective Jewish knowledge and often the only conspicuously Jewish presence in their homes. The typical Soviet Jewish bookshelf consisted of a few translated works from Hebrew and numerous translations from Yiddish and German as well as Russian books with both noticeable and subterranean Jewish content. Such volumes, officially published, and not intended solely for a Jewish audience, afforded an opportunity for Soviet Jews to indulge insubordinate feelings in a largely safe manner. Grinberg is interested in pinpointing and decoding the complex reading strategies and the specifically Jewish uses to which the books on the Soviet Jewish bookshelf were put. He reveals that not only Jews read them, but Jews read them in a specific way. Amber Nickell is Associate Professor of History at Fort Hays State University, Editor at H-Ukraine, and Host at NBN Jewish Studies, Ukrainian Studies, and Eastern Europe. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/religion

In The Soviet Jewish Bookshelf: Jewish Culture and Identity Between the Lines (Brandeis UP, 2023), Marat Grinberg argues that in an environment where Judaism had been all but destroyed, and a public Jewish presence routinely delegitimized, reading uniquely provided many Soviet Jews with an entry to communal memory and identity. The bookshelf was both a depository of selective Jewish knowledge and often the only conspicuously Jewish presence in their homes. The typical Soviet Jewish bookshelf consisted of a few translated works from Hebrew and numerous translations from Yiddish and German as well as Russian books with both noticeable and subterranean Jewish content. Such volumes, officially published, and not intended solely for a Jewish audience, afforded an opportunity for Soviet Jews to indulge insubordinate feelings in a largely safe manner. Grinberg is interested in pinpointing and decoding the complex reading strategies and the specifically Jewish uses to which the books on the Soviet Jewish bookshelf were put. He reveals that not only Jews read them, but Jews read them in a specific way. Amber Nickell is Associate Professor of History at Fort Hays State University, Editor at H-Ukraine, and Host at NBN Jewish Studies, Ukrainian Studies, and Eastern Europe. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In The Soviet Jewish Bookshelf: Jewish Culture and Identity Between the Lines (Brandeis UP, 2023), Marat Grinberg argues that in an environment where Judaism had been all but destroyed, and a public Jewish presence routinely delegitimized, reading uniquely provided many Soviet Jews with an entry to communal memory and identity. The bookshelf was both a depository of selective Jewish knowledge and often the only conspicuously Jewish presence in their homes. The typical Soviet Jewish bookshelf consisted of a few translated works from Hebrew and numerous translations from Yiddish and German as well as Russian books with both noticeable and subterranean Jewish content. Such volumes, officially published, and not intended solely for a Jewish audience, afforded an opportunity for Soviet Jews to indulge insubordinate feelings in a largely safe manner. Grinberg is interested in pinpointing and decoding the complex reading strategies and the specifically Jewish uses to which the books on the Soviet Jewish bookshelf were put. He reveals that not only Jews read them, but Jews read them in a specific way. Amber Nickell is Associate Professor of History at Fort Hays State University, Editor at H-Ukraine, and Host at NBN Jewish Studies, Ukrainian Studies, and Eastern Europe. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/book-of-the-day

If We Had Wings We Would Fly to You: A Soviet Jewish Family Faces Destruction 1941-42 (Academic Studies Press, 2020) is the first work in any language that offers both an overarching exploration of the flight and evacuation of Soviet Jews viewed at the macro level, and a personal history of one Soviet Jewish family. It is also the first study to examine Jewish life in the Northern Caucasus, a Soviet region that history scholars have rarely addressed. Drawing on a collection of family letters, Kiril Feferman provides a history of the Ginsburgs as they debate whether to evacuate their home of Rostov-on-Don in southern Russia and are eventually swept away by the Soviet-German War, the German invasion of Soviet Russia, and the Holocaust. The book makes a significant contribution to the history of the Holocaust and Second World War in the Soviet Union, presenting one Soviet region as an illustration of wartime social and media politics. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

If We Had Wings We Would Fly to You: A Soviet Jewish Family Faces Destruction 1941-42 (Academic Studies Press, 2020) is the first work in any language that offers both an overarching exploration of the flight and evacuation of Soviet Jews viewed at the macro level, and a personal history of one Soviet Jewish family. It is also the first study to examine Jewish life in the Northern Caucasus, a Soviet region that history scholars have rarely addressed. Drawing on a collection of family letters, Kiril Feferman provides a history of the Ginsburgs as they debate whether to evacuate their home of Rostov-on-Don in southern Russia and are eventually swept away by the Soviet-German War, the German invasion of Soviet Russia, and the Holocaust. The book makes a significant contribution to the history of the Holocaust and Second World War in the Soviet Union, presenting one Soviet region as an illustration of wartime social and media politics. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/history

If We Had Wings We Would Fly to You: A Soviet Jewish Family Faces Destruction 1941-42 (Academic Studies Press, 2020) is the first work in any language that offers both an overarching exploration of the flight and evacuation of Soviet Jews viewed at the macro level, and a personal history of one Soviet Jewish family. It is also the first study to examine Jewish life in the Northern Caucasus, a Soviet region that history scholars have rarely addressed. Drawing on a collection of family letters, Kiril Feferman provides a history of the Ginsburgs as they debate whether to evacuate their home of Rostov-on-Don in southern Russia and are eventually swept away by the Soviet-German War, the German invasion of Soviet Russia, and the Holocaust. The book makes a significant contribution to the history of the Holocaust and Second World War in the Soviet Union, presenting one Soviet region as an illustration of wartime social and media politics. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

If We Had Wings We Would Fly to You: A Soviet Jewish Family Faces Destruction 1941-42 (Academic Studies Press, 2020) is the first work in any language that offers both an overarching exploration of the flight and evacuation of Soviet Jews viewed at the macro level, and a personal history of one Soviet Jewish family. It is also the first study to examine Jewish life in the Northern Caucasus, a Soviet region that history scholars have rarely addressed. Drawing on a collection of family letters, Kiril Feferman provides a history of the Ginsburgs as they debate whether to evacuate their home of Rostov-on-Don in southern Russia and are eventually swept away by the Soviet-German War, the German invasion of Soviet Russia, and the Holocaust. The book makes a significant contribution to the history of the Holocaust and Second World War in the Soviet Union, presenting one Soviet region as an illustration of wartime social and media politics. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/jewish-studies

If We Had Wings We Would Fly to You: A Soviet Jewish Family Faces Destruction 1941-42 (Academic Studies Press, 2020) is the first work in any language that offers both an overarching exploration of the flight and evacuation of Soviet Jews viewed at the macro level, and a personal history of one Soviet Jewish family. It is also the first study to examine Jewish life in the Northern Caucasus, a Soviet region that history scholars have rarely addressed. Drawing on a collection of family letters, Kiril Feferman provides a history of the Ginsburgs as they debate whether to evacuate their home of Rostov-on-Don in southern Russia and are eventually swept away by the Soviet-German War, the German invasion of Soviet Russia, and the Holocaust. The book makes a significant contribution to the history of the Holocaust and Second World War in the Soviet Union, presenting one Soviet region as an illustration of wartime social and media politics. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/genocide-studies

If We Had Wings We Would Fly to You: A Soviet Jewish Family Faces Destruction 1941-42 (Academic Studies Press, 2020) is the first work in any language that offers both an overarching exploration of the flight and evacuation of Soviet Jews viewed at the macro level, and a personal history of one Soviet Jewish family. It is also the first study to examine Jewish life in the Northern Caucasus, a Soviet region that history scholars have rarely addressed. Drawing on a collection of family letters, Kiril Feferman provides a history of the Ginsburgs as they debate whether to evacuate their home of Rostov-on-Don in southern Russia and are eventually swept away by the Soviet-German War, the German invasion of Soviet Russia, and the Holocaust. The book makes a significant contribution to the history of the Holocaust and Second World War in the Soviet Union, presenting one Soviet region as an illustration of wartime social and media politics. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/russian-studies

“When you have an ideology that pretends to know exactly who the oppressors are and who are the oppressed, and you have an ideology that conflates success with oppression … then Jews who do, on average, better than the mean, are going to be viewed as oppressors.”For decades, David Bernstein has served in senior roles at major Jewish organizations. But when he saw the effect that woke ideology was having on these institutions, he decided to tackle the problem head-on and start a new nonprofit demanding a return to classical liberalism.“I want there to be conservatives. As the social psychologist Jonathan Haidt says … a bird needs a left wing and a right wing in order to fly,” says Bernstein.We dive into his book, “Woke Antisemitism: How a Progressive Ideology Harms Jews,” and discuss Kanye West, Elon Musk, and the Soviet-Jewish refusenik Natan Sharansky.“When he hears woke ideology in America and the West, it sounds the same to him as the communist ideology that he grew up with, except that they've replaced class with race,” says Bernstein.

Second interview with Gennady Estraikh discussing the war in Ukraine. (Our first interview aired in March, 2022.) Estraikh, who was born in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine, is a professor at NYU who specializes in Jewish intellectual history, Yiddish language and literature, and Soviet Jewish history. He has written numerous books, academic papers, and journal and newspaper articles in English, Russian, Ukrainian, and Yiddish, notably for the Yiddish Forverts. He served as managing editor of the famed Yiddish literary journal Sovetish Heymland from 1988 to 1991. His books include Yiddish Culture in Ukraine (Kyiv: Dukh i Litera, 2016, in Ukrainian) and Transatlantic Russian Jewishness: Ideological Voyages of the Yiddish Daily Forverts in the First Half of the Twentieth Century (Academic Studies Press, 2020). The interview took place over Zoom on Wednesday, November 23, 2022. In honor of our upcoming Thanksgiving holiday, we present Interview with the Turkey, a radio monologue recorded and first aired in the 1990's, by Boston's late, great Yiddish radio host Ben Gailing. Music: Psoy Korolenko: Yoshke fun Ades Mandy Patinkin: Take Me out to the Ball Game and God Bless America Intro instrumental music: DEM HELFANDS TANTS, an instrumental track from the CD Jeff Warschauer: The Singing Waltz Air date: November 23, 2022

Our second interview with Gennady Estraikh (first interview aired in March, 2022) discussing the war in Ukraine. Estraikh, who was born in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine, is a professor at NYU who specializes in Jewish intellectual history, Yiddish language and literature, and Soviet Jewish history. He has written numerous books, academic papers, and journal and newspaper articles in English, Russian, Ukrainian, and Yiddish, notably for the Yiddish Forverts. He served as managing editor of the famed Yiddish literary journal Sovetish Heymland from 1988 to 1991. His books include Yiddish Culture in Ukraine (Kyiv: Dukh i Litera, 2016, in Ukrainian) and Transatlantic Russian Jewishness: Ideological Voyages of the Yiddish Daily Forverts in the First Half of the Twentieth Century (Academic Studies Press, 2020). The interview took place over Zoom on Wednesday, November 23, 2022. In honor of the Thanksgiving holiday we present Interview with the Turkey, a monologue by Boston's late, great Yiddish radio host Ben Gailing, originally aired on his show Der Freylekher Kabtsen in the 1980's. Thanks to Hankus Netsky, Ben's producer and co-host, for supplying this recording. Music: Loyko: Yoshke fun Ades Mandy Patinkin: Take Me out to the Ball Game and God Bless America Intro instrumental music: DEM HELFANDS TANTS, an instrumental track from the CD Jeff Warschauer: The Singing Waltz Air date: November 23, 2022

Today's show was not only focused on Sukkot and wonderful music from Steve McConnell, Sue Samuel, Ted Pearce, Nancy Santiago, Marty Goetz and Paul Wilbur, but I had a lovely time chatting with Ed and Amanita Marvin!Ed and Amanita Marvin are leaders of Shoresh David Messianic Synagogue in Wesley Chapel, Florida. They have been involved in Jewish ministries for many years. They have eight kids and five grandkids. They have a heart for Jews and non Jews to know the Messiah Yeshua and become His disciples.Ed is a graduate of Columbia Bible College, currently called Columbia International University. He served with Slavic Gospel Association among Soviet Jewish immigrants in Chicago for four years in the 1980's and then bringing the gospel to the former Soviet Union while based in Finland. In Finland he founded Shorashim Fellowship. Amanita is a lawyer and a native of Finland. She was involved with several Israel Friendship organizations in Finland and studied at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Rabbi Ed and Rebbetzin Amanita have been in ministry in Florida since 2013.

History Through Fiction is proud to announce that season 3 of our podcast is kicking off on Monday, September 12! Hosted by founder and editor Colin Mustful, season 3 includes fifteen episodes released weekly. Each episode features a historical novelist who will be talking about the craft of weaving elements of history and fiction to create engaging and enlightening stories. Notable interviews include International Best-Selling author and Emmy Award winning producer Yvette Manessis Corporon, winner of the Montana Prize in Fiction Taylor Brown, and Burruberongal writer from the Darug Aboriginal Nation Julie Janson. The podcast also features an interview with History Through Fiction's own New York Times bestselling author, Alina Adams whose Soviet-Jewish historical novel, My Mother's Secret, comes out November 15.

The Molotov-Von Ribbentrop non-aggression pact ultimately led to the annexation of large swaths of territory into the Soviet Union. The Jews of eastern Poland and the Baltic States now had to acclimate to the realities of Soviet Jewish life. With the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union - Operation Barbarossa - on June 22, 1941, the mass shootings of Soviet Jewry began.  The Holocaust in the Soviet Union was unique in many respects. The Einsatzgruppen SS killing squads, along with local collaborators, murdered the Jews of the Soviet Union through mass shootings outside of the towns. Survival under Nazi occupation was rare, and was only possible by escape to the unoccupied areas of the Soviet Union or by serving in the Red Army. The Soviet government appointed the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee, headed by leading Soviet Jewish writers and intellectuals. They generated publicity regarding the Holocaust, and gathered data which was eventually published as the Black Book.  The postwar Stalinist repression of Jewish life was one of the darkest periods of Jewish history in the Soviet Union. Sustaining Jewish life became nearly impossible, and those who struggled to do so did it heroically and against all odds.  This series on the history of Soviet Jewry is sponsored by Shuvu - Chazon Avraham, a network of schools in Israel whose student body is primarily composed of children of immigrants from the former Soviet Union. Support Shuvu's educational projects here: https://www.shuvuusa.org/donate   For sponsorship opportunities about your favorite topics of Jewish history contact Yehuda at:  yehuda@yehudageberer.com   Subscribe To Our Podcast on:    PodBean: https://jsoundbites.podbean.com/   Follow us on Twitter or Instagram at @Jsoundbites You can email Yehuda at yehuda@yehudageberer.com

Interview with Gennady Estraikh discussing the war in Ukraine. Estraikh, who was born in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine, is a professor at NYU who specializes in Jewish intellectual history, Yiddish language and literature, and Soviet Jewish history. He has written numerous books, academic papers, and journal and newspaper articles in English, Russian, Ukrainian, and Yiddish, notably for the Yiddish Forverts. He served as managing editor of the famed Yiddish literary journal Sovetish Heymland from 1988 to 1991. His books include Yiddish Culture in Ukraine (Kyiv: Dukh i Litera, 2016, in Ukrainian) and Transatlantic Russian Jewishness: Ideological Voyages of the Yiddish Daily Forverts in the First Half of the Twentieth Century (Academic Studies Press, 2020). The interview took place over Zoom on Friday March 4, 2022, and was led by Sholem Beinfeld, regular contributor to The Yiddish Voice, co-Editor in Chief of the Comprehensive Yiddish-English Dictionary, and Professor of History, Emeritus, Washington University in St. Louis. Music: Emil Gorovets: Reyzele Tatiana Vayntraub: Gitara Sidi Tal: Nokhemke Emil Gorovets: Ikh Bin a Yid Intro instrumental music: DEM HELFANDS TANTS, an instrumental track from the CD Jeff Warschauer: The Singing Waltz Air date: March 9, 2022

In this episode, we explore the marvelous and terrifying life of the massively renowned Soviet Yiddish actor Solomon Mikhoels: international star of stage and screen, director of the Moscow State Yiddish Theater, and leader of the Soviet Union's Jewish Antifascist Committee during World War Two… and later, in a rather less desirable role, the leading man in the Soviet Jewish nightmare that came to be known as the “Night of the Murdered Poets,” a group of world-class Jewish artists and leaders executed by Stalin one night in 1952.  Mikhoels wasn't one of those Murdered Poets, but he was intimately connected to all of them-- and the unbelievable story of his valiant attempt to become a savior of the Jewish people came at a horrifying cost. What happens when being a Jewish artist and leader requires erasing yourself? Sneak peeks at Vassili Schedrin's work-in-progress on Mikhoels's life and on Soviet Yiddish theater can be found here, here, here, and here. Justin Cammy's new translation of Sutzkever's work is From the Vilna Ghetto to Nuremberg: Memoir and Testimony by Avrom Sutzkever. More information on the Moscow State Yiddish theater can be found in The Travels of Benjamin Zuskin by Ala Zuskin Perelman and in The Moscow State Yiddish Theater by Jeffrey Veidlinger. The trial records of the Jewish Antifascist Committee can be found in Stalin's Secret Pogrom by Joshua Rubenstein and Vladimir P. Naumov.  More information about Solomon Mikhoels's career-long acting partner and fellow Jewish Antifascist Committee member Benjamin Zuskin can be found in the works above, and also in “Executed Jews” in People Love Dead Jews by Dara Horn.  Adventures with Dead Jews is brought to you by Tablet Studios and Soul Shop. It's created and written by Dara Horn, and produced and edited by Josh Kross and Robert Scaramuccia. The managing producer is Sara Fredman Aeder, and the executive producers are Liel Leibovitz, Stephanie Butnick, Gabi Weinberg and Dan Luxenberg. We hope you'll rate and review it wherever you get your podcasts, so that more people can join us on our adventures.  Dara Horn's new book, People Love Dead Jews, is published by WW Norton and is available wherever books are sold. It's also available as an audio book from Recorded Books. We hope you'll check it out.

This companion podcast to Dara Horn's new book People Love Dead Jews takes listeners beyond the book to some of the strangest corners of Jewish history, exploring how the popular mania for dead Jews warps our understanding of both past and present. In this series, you'll meet flamboyantly gay Civil War Jewish spies, Japanese “Jewish specialists” trying to build their own Jewish state, genius Victorian identical twins and genius Lubavitcher identical twins, American and Soviet Jewish moviemakers hoping to become Hebrew prophets, adorable imaginary Jewish children, and a very righteous Tyrannosaurus Rex.  With these strange, dark, hilarious, and fascinating stories, Dara Horn guides listeners through the outsized role that dead Jews play in other people's imaginations— and sometimes still play in ours. Join us on our Adventures with Dead Jews!

It has often been said that we know more about the surface of the Moon than we do about the world's seas and oceans. Exploring the Bizarre hosts Tim Beckley and Tim Swartz welcome PAUL STONEHILL to the KCOR microphones to discuss the strange phenomena known as USOs that have been reported by people at sea, especially by navies around the globe, but especially in Russia and the former USSR. .Paul Stonehill, a former Soviet Jewish refugee from the USSR (Ukraine), is an American lecturer, author, and researcher of Russian and Eurasian ufology and paranormal phenomena. He has spoken at numerous conferences throughout the U.S. and Europe, and has written many articles in English and Russian on UFOs and USOs, as well as several articles about the history of ancient China and its paranormal aspects. Stonehill is the author of such books as: "The Soviet UFO Files: Paranormal Encounters Behind the Iron Curtain", and along with Philip Mantle, "Mysterious Sky: Soviet UFO Phenomenon", Russia's Roswell Incident: And Other Amazing UFO Cases From the Former Soviet Union", and "Russia's USO Secrets."

This week Eric welcomes to the show author and professor Emil Draitser to discuss his brand new book "In the Jaws of the Crocodile: A Soviet Memoir" and his experiences as a Jewish writer and satirist in the Soviet Union. The conversation touches on everything from a historical and material analysis of Odessa, the center of Jewish culture in the Soviet Union, to the political life of dissidents in Odessa and beyond. This wide-ranging conversation provides insights on the reality of daily life, the nature of cultural production, the role of humor in Soviet Jewish life, and so much more. The conversation also explores the acceptance of right wing political ideology by Jewish emigres from the Soviet Union, the shameful embrace of Trumpism by that community, and the generational divides that exist. Click to register for Emil Draitser's book launch on February 3, 2021 Read an excerpt from Emil Draitser's "In the Jaws of the Crocodile: A Soviet Memoir" More The post Emil Draitser appeared first on CounterPunch.org.

This week Eric welcomes to the show author and professor Emil Draitser to discuss his brand new book "In the Jaws of the Crocodile: A Soviet Memoir" and his experiences as a Jewish writer and satirist in the Soviet Union. The conversation touches on everything from a historical and material analysis of Odessa, the center of Jewish culture in the Soviet Union, to the political life of dissidents in Odessa and beyond. This wide-ranging conversation provides insights on the reality of daily life, the nature of cultural production, the role of humor in Soviet Jewish life, and so much more. The conversation also explores the acceptance of right wing political ideology by Jewish emigres from the Soviet Union, the shameful embrace of Trumpism by that community, and the generational divides that exist. Click to register for Emil Draitser's book launch on February 3, 2021

Sasha Lurje never planned on becoming one of the world's premier Yiddish singers. And her love of Yiddish isn't simply rooted in nostalgia. She likes it; it adds meaning to her everyday life. Come and Learn with Sasha about secular Soviet-Jewish identity, the world of Klezfests, and why the simple joy of jamming together can be the bedrock of community.

Meet KGB archives, exclusive interviews and rare recordings in the second and final part of Mitia Khramtsov's and Ilya Saitanov's story of the Soviet Jewish restaurant musicians ("labukhs). You are advised to start listening from the first part, accompanied by the annotated playlist.Download the episodeDetailed descriptionАрхивы КГБ, эксклюзивные интервью и редкие записи – во второй части подкаста Radio Eshkolot, посвященного советским ресторанным музыкантам-лабухам. Составители и ведущие – Митя Храмцов («Добраночь») и Илья Сайтанов («Лакоча»).Не забудьте послушать первую часть подкаста, а также комментированный плейлист.Скачать эпизодПодробное описание

*This episode features some graphic content. Listener discretion is advised* Music is often the only way to express sorrow, loss, and perhaps leave your story behind. This might be especially true for some Jewish communities, who were rounded up and killed during the Holocaust.  Today, Professor Kevin Lewis O'Neill is joined by Professor Anna Shternshis - Director of the Anne Tanenbaum Centre for Jewish Studies at the University of Toronto In this episode, we will discuss Yiddish Glory - a research project that revives Yiddish songs that were thought lost or destroyed.  The songs feature lyrics and poetry written by jews in concentration camps -- and cover issues like Soviet Jewish wartime service in the Red Army, survival and death in Nazi-occupied Europe. These songs were curated, arranged, and performed throughout Europe. -- later they were recorded into an album.  All the music in this episode was used with permission from Professor Shternshis. The full album can be found at soundcloud.com/yiddishglory To learn more about this project please visit http://www.yiddishglory.com. -- This podcast is sponsored by the Centre for Diaspora and Transnational Studies at the University of Toronto. Our Host is Professor Kevin Lewis O'Neill. Between, Across, & Through is produced, edited, and mixed by Ianeke L Romero

With his new memoir, Savage Feast: Three Generations, Two Continents, and a Dinner Table (a Memoir with Recipes), author Boris Fishman explores his family's Soviet Jewish legacy, his arc as a writer, and the glorious and varied meals that kept his family together from Minsk to Brighton Beach. We get into why creative nonfiction is his first passion (after publishing two novels), how he guaranteed his family's disapproval by writing about them throughout his career, how he couldn't leave Sovietness behind until he moved out of his parents' home at 24 (despite emigrating from the USSR at 9), what he'd do if he quit the writing game, and why the recipes were the toughest part of Savage Feast. We also talk smack about certain books and authors, compare Malamud to Roth and Bellow, discuss the first (very not Jewish/not Russian) writer Boris became friends with, and explore the use of fiction to imagine alternate lives for oneself. Along the way, we make a life-changing pact, decide whether an MFA is worth pursuing, share book tour best practices, and conclude that Soviet Jewish guilt is exponentially more severe than Jewish guilt. It's a whole lot of talk about books, food, and deracinated Jews! • More info at our site • Support The Virtual Memories Show via Patreon or Paypal

Julia Alekseyeva’s graphic novel Soviet Daughter: A Graphic Revolution was published by Microcosm Publishing in 2017. This is the intertwining story of two women: Lola, who was born in a Jewish family in Kiev in 1910, and her great-granddaughter Julia, whose family moved to the United States from Ukraine in the wake of the events at Chernobyl. Lola has gone through the Bolshevik revolution, the Civil War, the Stalinist purges, deportation to Kazakhstan, and the Chernobyl disaster and these are her real-life memoirs that lay the foundation for the novel. The chapters telling Lola’s story are alternated with shorter interludes from the contemporary life of the second protagonist, Julia, a representative of the generation of millennials, who are struggling to come to terms with their idealistic views on life and politics amidst the changing world order. Alekseyeva, who is a PhD student in Comparative Literature at Harvard University, works on avant-garde cinema in the USSR, Japan, and France, and her academic interest in visual narrative techniques has deeply affected her work on the graphic novel. The story-telling in Soviet Daughter is rich and intense, and also full of supplementary comments and explanations of various aspects of Soviet everyday life; however, the novel is very easy to read and grasps the readers attention from the very first pages. To this, the sincerity of Alekseyeva’s intonation contributes greatly. She does not shy away from being very honest about issues such as inter-generational misunderstanding, conflicts within family, and difficulties of the migrant experience yet at the same time she persistently maintains the tactful balance between a personal story-telling and a nearly academic inquiry into the experience of several generations of Soviet Jewish immigrants in America. The precursors of Alekseyeva’s novel are works such as Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis, Art Spiegelman’s Maus, and Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home. Another major influence on Alekseyeva is actually Vladimir Mayakovsky, especially his work in Okna ROSTA. Soviet Daughter does, in fact, open by a quote from Mayakovsky. Julia Alekseyeva’s novel will be of much interest both to the broad readers audience, and also to the scholars of Soviet history, Jewish identity, and immigration. Into all of these themes it provides a fascinating insight. Olga Breininger is a PhD candidate in Slavic and Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard University. Her research interests include post-Soviet culture and geopolitics, with a special focus on Islam, nation-building, and energy politics. Olga is the author of the novel There Was No Adderall in the Soviet Union and columnist at Literratura. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Julia Alekseyeva’s graphic novel Soviet Daughter: A Graphic Revolution was published by Microcosm Publishing in 2017. This is the intertwining story of two women: Lola, who was born in a Jewish family in Kiev in 1910, and her great-granddaughter Julia, whose family moved to the United States from Ukraine in the wake of the events at Chernobyl. Lola has gone through the Bolshevik revolution, the Civil War, the Stalinist purges, deportation to Kazakhstan, and the Chernobyl disaster and these are her real-life memoirs that lay the foundation for the novel. The chapters telling Lola’s story are alternated with shorter interludes from the contemporary life of the second protagonist, Julia, a representative of the generation of millennials, who are struggling to come to terms with their idealistic views on life and politics amidst the changing world order. Alekseyeva, who is a PhD student in Comparative Literature at Harvard University, works on avant-garde cinema in the USSR, Japan, and France, and her academic interest in visual narrative techniques has deeply affected her work on the graphic novel. The story-telling in Soviet Daughter is rich and intense, and also full of supplementary comments and explanations of various aspects of Soviet everyday life; however, the novel is very easy to read and grasps the readers attention from the very first pages. To this, the sincerity of Alekseyeva’s intonation contributes greatly. She does not shy away from being very honest about issues such as inter-generational misunderstanding, conflicts within family, and difficulties of the migrant experience yet at the same time she persistently maintains the tactful balance between a personal story-telling and a nearly academic inquiry into the experience of several generations of Soviet Jewish immigrants in America. The precursors of Alekseyeva’s novel are works such as Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis, Art Spiegelman’s Maus, and Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home. Another major influence on Alekseyeva is actually Vladimir Mayakovsky, especially his work in Okna ROSTA. Soviet Daughter does, in fact, open by a quote from Mayakovsky. Julia Alekseyeva’s novel will be of much interest both to the broad readers audience, and also to the scholars of Soviet history, Jewish identity, and immigration. Into all of these themes it provides a fascinating insight. Olga Breininger is a PhD candidate in Slavic and Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard University. Her research interests include post-Soviet culture and geopolitics, with a special focus on Islam, nation-building, and energy politics. Olga is the author of the novel There Was No Adderall in the Soviet Union and columnist at Literratura. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Julia Alekseyeva’s graphic novel Soviet Daughter: A Graphic Revolution was published by Microcosm Publishing in 2017. This is the intertwining story of two women: Lola, who was born in a Jewish family in Kiev in 1910, and her great-granddaughter Julia, whose family moved to the United States from Ukraine in the wake of the events at Chernobyl. Lola has gone through the Bolshevik revolution, the Civil War, the Stalinist purges, deportation to Kazakhstan, and the Chernobyl disaster and these are her real-life memoirs that lay the foundation for the novel. The chapters telling Lola’s story are alternated with shorter interludes from the contemporary life of the second protagonist, Julia, a representative of the generation of millennials, who are struggling to come to terms with their idealistic views on life and politics amidst the changing world order. Alekseyeva, who is a PhD student in Comparative Literature at Harvard University, works on avant-garde cinema in the USSR, Japan, and France, and her academic interest in visual narrative techniques has deeply affected her work on the graphic novel. The story-telling in Soviet Daughter is rich and intense, and also full of supplementary comments and explanations of various aspects of Soviet everyday life; however, the novel is very easy to read and grasps the readers attention from the very first pages. To this, the sincerity of Alekseyeva’s intonation contributes greatly. She does not shy away from being very honest about issues such as inter-generational misunderstanding, conflicts within family, and difficulties of the migrant experience yet at the same time she persistently maintains the tactful balance between a personal story-telling and a nearly academic inquiry into the experience of several generations of Soviet Jewish immigrants in America. The precursors of Alekseyeva’s novel are works such as Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis, Art Spiegelman’s Maus, and Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home. Another major influence on Alekseyeva is actually Vladimir Mayakovsky, especially his work in Okna ROSTA. Soviet Daughter does, in fact, open by a quote from Mayakovsky. Julia Alekseyeva’s novel will be of much interest both to the broad readers audience, and also to the scholars of Soviet history, Jewish identity, and immigration. Into all of these themes it provides a fascinating insight. Olga Breininger is a PhD candidate in Slavic and Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard University. Her research interests include post-Soviet culture and geopolitics, with a special focus on Islam, nation-building, and energy politics. Olga is the author of the novel There Was No Adderall in the Soviet Union and columnist at Literratura. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Julia Alekseyeva’s graphic novel Soviet Daughter: A Graphic Revolution was published by Microcosm Publishing in 2017. This is the intertwining story of two women: Lola, who was born in a Jewish family in Kiev in 1910, and her great-granddaughter Julia, whose family moved to the United States from Ukraine in the wake of the events at Chernobyl. Lola has gone through the Bolshevik revolution, the Civil War, the Stalinist purges, deportation to Kazakhstan, and the Chernobyl disaster and these are her real-life memoirs that lay the foundation for the novel. The chapters telling Lola’s story are alternated with shorter interludes from the contemporary life of the second protagonist, Julia, a representative of the generation of millennials, who are struggling to come to terms with their idealistic views on life and politics amidst the changing world order. Alekseyeva, who is a PhD student in Comparative Literature at Harvard University, works on avant-garde cinema in the USSR, Japan, and France, and her academic interest in visual narrative techniques has deeply affected her work on the graphic novel. The story-telling in Soviet Daughter is rich and intense, and also full of supplementary comments and explanations of various aspects of Soviet everyday life; however, the novel is very easy to read and grasps the readers attention from the very first pages. To this, the sincerity of Alekseyeva’s intonation contributes greatly. She does not shy away from being very honest about issues such as inter-generational misunderstanding, conflicts within family, and difficulties of the migrant experience yet at the same time she persistently maintains the tactful balance between a personal story-telling and a nearly academic inquiry into the experience of several generations of Soviet Jewish immigrants in America. The precursors of Alekseyeva’s novel are works such as Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis, Art Spiegelman’s Maus, and Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home. Another major influence on Alekseyeva is actually Vladimir Mayakovsky, especially his work in Okna ROSTA. Soviet Daughter does, in fact, open by a quote from Mayakovsky. Julia Alekseyeva’s novel will be of much interest both to the broad readers audience, and also to the scholars of Soviet history, Jewish identity, and immigration. Into all of these themes it provides a fascinating insight. Olga Breininger is a PhD candidate in Slavic and Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard University. Her research interests include post-Soviet culture and geopolitics, with a special focus on Islam, nation-building, and energy politics. Olga is the author of the novel There Was No Adderall in the Soviet Union and columnist at Literratura. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Betrayers (Little Brown and Company) Please welcome back to Skylight Books David Bezmozgis, the award-winning author of Free World and Natasha and Other Stories. His latest, The Betrayers is a compact saga of love, duty, family, and sacrifice from a rising star whose fiction is "self-assured, elegant, perceptive . . . and unflinchingly honest" (New York Times) These incandescent pages give us one fraught, momentous day in the life of Baruch Kotler, a Soviet Jewish dissident who now finds himself a disgraced Israeli politician. When he refuses to back down from a contrary but principled stand regarding the settlements in the West Bank, his political opponents expose his affair with a mistress decades his junior, and the besieged couple escapes to Yalta, the faded Crimean resort of Kotler's youth. There, shockingly, Kotler comes face-to-face with the former friend whose denunciation sent him to the Gulag almost forty years earlier. In a whirling twenty-four hours, Kotler must face the ultimate reckoning, both with those who have betrayed him and with those whom he has betrayed, including a teenage daughter, a son facing his own moral dilemma in the Israeli army, and the wife who once campaigned to secure his freedom and stood by him through so much. Stubborn, wry, and self-knowing, Baruch Kotler is one of the great creations of contemporary fiction. An aging man grasping for a final passion, he is drawn inexorably into a crucible that is both personal and biblical in scope. In prose that is elegant, sly, precise, and devastating in its awareness of the human heart, David Bezmozgis has rendered a story for the ages, an inquest into the nature of fate and consequence, love and forgiveness. The Betrayers" is a high-wire act, a powerful tale of morality and sacrifice that will haunt readers long after they turn the final page.  Praise for The Betrayers“The Betrayers is a moral thriller in the tradition of Bernard Malamud, but the generosity, grace, and wisdom of the writing belong entirely to David Bezmozgis. The magic of fiction is that it makes the reader care deeply about imaginary strangers, and Bezmozgis is a magician.”—Aleksandar Hemon, National Book Award finalist for The Lazarus Project “This outstanding novel definitively establishes David Bezmozgis as one of the foremost writers of his generation.”—Ben Fountain, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk “This unforgettable novel squanders no words in its brilliant, deft depictions of love, of memory, of compassion—and, ultimately, despite its title, of loyalty.”—Edith Pearlman, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award forBinocular Vision  David Bezmozgis moved from Latvia to Canada at the age of six. After studying English literature at McGill University and fine arts at the Southern California School of Cinema-Television, he created his first documentary in 1999, entitled L.A. Mohel, capturing the busy lives of three mohels (Jewish ritual circumcisers) in Los Angeles. His debut short story collection, Natasha and Other Stories, won the Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Best First Book and was nominated for a Governor General's Award. Bezmozgis is currently a fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University.

We should be skeptical of what is sometimes called “Jew counting” and all it implies. Yet it cannot be denied that Jews played a pivotal and (dare we say) disproportionate role in moving the West from a pre-modern to a modern condition. Take the media. Most people know that Jews, though hardly alone, built much of the film industry. Fewer people will know, however, that Jews–again, though hardly alone–were central to the birth of photojournalism. Robert Capa, arguably the most famous photojournalist of the last century, was, for example, born Endre Friedmann. In his fine book Through Soviet Jewish Eyes: Photography, War, and the Holocaust (Rutgers University Press, 2010), historian David Shneer explores the ways in which Jews were instrumental in the creation of Soviet photojournalism and the ways in which their Jewishness–acknowledged or unacknowledged, accepted or completely rejected–affected the way they did their jobs and how they experienced what they saw and shot. The book is about identity as much as it is about photography (though it is about that as well). These pioneers of photojournalism were Jews whether they liked it or not. It said so on their passports. Yet they struggled with what that meant and how it should (or shouldn’t) influence their art. David does an excellent job in explaining how they negotiated Jewishness through revolution, socialism, Stalinism, world war, and the destruction of Eastern European Jewry itself. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We should be skeptical of what is sometimes called “Jew counting” and all it implies. Yet it cannot be denied that Jews played a pivotal and (dare we say) disproportionate role in moving the West from a pre-modern to a modern condition. Take the media. Most people know that Jews, though hardly alone, built much of the film industry. Fewer people will know, however, that Jews–again, though hardly alone–were central to the birth of photojournalism. Robert Capa, arguably the most famous photojournalist of the last century, was, for example, born Endre Friedmann. In his fine book Through Soviet Jewish Eyes: Photography, War, and the Holocaust (Rutgers University Press, 2010), historian David Shneer explores the ways in which Jews were instrumental in the creation of Soviet photojournalism and the ways in which their Jewishness–acknowledged or unacknowledged, accepted or completely rejected–affected the way they did their jobs and how they experienced what they saw and shot. The book is about identity as much as it is about photography (though it is about that as well). These pioneers of photojournalism were Jews whether they liked it or not. It said so on their passports. Yet they struggled with what that meant and how it should (or shouldn’t) influence their art. David does an excellent job in explaining how they negotiated Jewishness through revolution, socialism, Stalinism, world war, and the destruction of Eastern European Jewry itself. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We should be skeptical of what is sometimes called “Jew counting” and all it implies. Yet it cannot be denied that Jews played a pivotal and (dare we say) disproportionate role in moving the West from a pre-modern to a modern condition. Take the media. Most people know that Jews, though hardly alone, built much of the film industry. Fewer people will know, however, that Jews–again, though hardly alone–were central to the birth of photojournalism. Robert Capa, arguably the most famous photojournalist of the last century, was, for example, born Endre Friedmann. In his fine book Through Soviet Jewish Eyes: Photography, War, and the Holocaust (Rutgers University Press, 2010), historian David Shneer explores the ways in which Jews were instrumental in the creation of Soviet photojournalism and the ways in which their Jewishness–acknowledged or unacknowledged, accepted or completely rejected–affected the way they did their jobs and how they experienced what they saw and shot. The book is about identity as much as it is about photography (though it is about that as well). These pioneers of photojournalism were Jews whether they liked it or not. It said so on their passports. Yet they struggled with what that meant and how it should (or shouldn’t) influence their art. David does an excellent job in explaining how they negotiated Jewishness through revolution, socialism, Stalinism, world war, and the destruction of Eastern European Jewry itself. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We should be skeptical of what is sometimes called “Jew counting” and all it implies. Yet it cannot be denied that Jews played a pivotal and (dare we say) disproportionate role in moving the West from a pre-modern to a modern condition. Take the media. Most people know that Jews, though hardly alone, built much of the film industry. Fewer people will know, however, that Jews–again, though hardly alone–were central to the birth of photojournalism. Robert Capa, arguably the most famous photojournalist of the last century, was, for example, born Endre Friedmann. In his fine book Through Soviet Jewish Eyes: Photography, War, and the Holocaust (Rutgers University Press, 2010), historian David Shneer explores the ways in which Jews were instrumental in the creation of Soviet photojournalism and the ways in which their Jewishness–acknowledged or unacknowledged, accepted or completely rejected–affected the way they did their jobs and how they experienced what they saw and shot. The book is about identity as much as it is about photography (though it is about that as well). These pioneers of photojournalism were Jews whether they liked it or not. It said so on their passports. Yet they struggled with what that meant and how it should (or shouldn’t) influence their art. David does an excellent job in explaining how they negotiated Jewishness through revolution, socialism, Stalinism, world war, and the destruction of Eastern European Jewry itself. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We should be skeptical of what is sometimes called “Jew counting” and all it implies. Yet it cannot be denied that Jews played a pivotal and (dare we say) disproportionate role in moving the West from a pre-modern to a modern condition. Take the media. Most people know that Jews, though hardly alone, built much of the film industry. Fewer people will know, however, that Jews–again, though hardly alone–were central to the birth of photojournalism. Robert Capa, arguably the most famous photojournalist of the last century, was, for example, born Endre Friedmann. In his fine book Through Soviet Jewish Eyes: Photography, War, and the Holocaust (Rutgers University Press, 2010), historian David Shneer explores the ways in which Jews were instrumental in the creation of Soviet photojournalism and the ways in which their Jewishness–acknowledged or unacknowledged, accepted or completely rejected–affected the way they did their jobs and how they experienced what they saw and shot. The book is about identity as much as it is about photography (though it is about that as well). These pioneers of photojournalism were Jews whether they liked it or not. It said so on their passports. Yet they struggled with what that meant and how it should (or shouldn’t) influence their art. David does an excellent job in explaining how they negotiated Jewishness through revolution, socialism, Stalinism, world war, and the destruction of Eastern European Jewry itself. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We should be skeptical of what is sometimes called “Jew counting” and all it implies. Yet it cannot be denied that Jews played a pivotal and (dare we say) disproportionate role in moving the West from a pre-modern to a modern condition. Take the media. Most people know that Jews, though hardly alone, built much of the film industry. Fewer people will know, however, that Jews–again, though hardly alone–were central to the birth of photojournalism. Robert Capa, arguably the most famous photojournalist of the last century, was, for example, born Endre Friedmann. In his fine book Through Soviet Jewish Eyes: Photography, War, and the Holocaust (Rutgers University Press, 2010), historian David Shneer explores the ways in which Jews were instrumental in the creation of Soviet photojournalism and the ways in which their Jewishness–acknowledged or unacknowledged, accepted or completely rejected–affected the way they did their jobs and how they experienced what they saw and shot. The book is about identity as much as it is about photography (though it is about that as well). These pioneers of photojournalism were Jews whether they liked it or not. It said so on their passports. Yet they struggled with what that meant and how it should (or shouldn’t) influence their art. David does an excellent job in explaining how they negotiated Jewishness through revolution, socialism, Stalinism, world war, and the destruction of Eastern European Jewry itself. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

By Brandon Springer IN SEPTEMBER OF 1946, Soviet Jewish mathematician Naum Meiman was parted from his family. His daughter, Olga Plam; her husband, Misha; and their son were leaving the Soviet Union for the United States after spending a year as refuseniks, Soviet Jews who had applied for exit visas from the state and were […]