Podcasts about Yiddish Book Center

The Chabad-Lubavitch movement, one of the world's best-known Hasidic groups, is driven by the belief that we are on the verge of the messianic age. The man most recognized for the movement's success is the seventh and last Lubavitcher rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson (1902–1994), believed by many of his followers to be the Messiah. While hope of redemption has sustained the Jewish people through exile and persecution, it has also upended Jewish society with its apocalyptic and anarchic tendencies. So it is not surprising that Schneerson's messianic fervor made him one of the most controversial rabbinic leaders of the twentieth century. How did he go from being an ordinary rabbi's son in the Russian Empire to achieving status as a mystical sage? How did he revitalize a centuries-old Hasidic movement, construct an outreach empire of unprecedented scope, and earn the admiration and condemnation of political, communal, and religious leaders in America and abroad? In Menachem Mendel Schneerson: Becoming the Messiah (Yale University Press, 2024), Glinter presents a thoughtful biography of the spiritual leader that inspired the Lubavitch Hasidic community and its global outreach activities. Interviewee: Ezra Glinter is a writer, editor, translator, and biographer. For five years he worked as the deputy culture editor of the Forward newspaper, where he edited Have I Got a Story for You, an anthology of Yiddish fiction in translation. He is currently the senior staff writer and editor at the Yiddish Book Center. Host: Schneur Zalman Newfield is an Associate Professor of Sociology and Jewish Studies at Hunter College, City University of New York, and the author of Degrees of Separation: Identity Formation While Leaving Ultra-Orthodox Judaism (Temple University Press). Visit him online at ZalmanNewfield.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/jewish-studies

Former “Los Angeles Times” Film Critic Kenneth Turan will be at Yiddish Book Center in Amherst, MA to discuss his new book “Louis B. Mayer and Irving Thalberg: The Whole Equation.” The event is on Sunday, May 11th at 2:00 pm.

When Albert Chasan (1930–2024) retired from the marketing communications firm he founded, “It hit me: I had to do something with the stories my parents told.” He took up painting and commemorated the formative years of his parents' lives through a series of expressionistic, boldly hued acrylics. A selection of color prints of many of these historically poignant works are on exhibit at the Yiddish Book Center. On the occasion of the exhibit opening, before a live audience at the Yiddish Book Center, Albert's daughter Betty and his son Robert sat down with "The Shmooze" to talk about their father's work as a painter and stories behind his narrative painting. Episode 391 May 5, 2025 Amherst, MA

Deb Kirvoy, director of the annual Pioneer Valley Jewish Film Festival, joined "The Shmooze" to talk about this year's lineup. Now in its nineteenth year, the Pioneer Valley Jewish Film Festival continues its tradition of showcasing award-winning films from around the globe. This year's festival kicks off at the Yiddish Book Center on April 3 with the screening of "Midas Man." Episode 388 March 26, 2025 Amherst, MA

“Yiddish: A Global Culture” is an acclaimed and original permanent exhibition at The Yiddish Book Center in Amherst, Massachusetts. It opened in Fall of 2023. The exhibition features hundreds of rare objects, family heirlooms, photographs, music, and videos that illuminate the expansive story of modern Yiddish cultural reach.Lisa Newman is director of publishing and public programs at The Yiddish Book Center. David Mazower is the center's research bibliographer and editorial director - and is the chief curator and writer of “Yiddish: A Global Culture.”

In a live conversation at the Yiddish Book Center, award-winning photographer, filmmaker, and author Harvey Wang visits with "The Shmooze" to talk about his work and his recently opened exhibit, "Harvey Wang's New York."In the early years of his career, in the 1980s, Harvey's photographic beat was the New York City nightlife scene. Yet a very different facet of the downtown landscape fascinated him. Cycling through the Lower East Side, he'd notice old businesses clearly not long for this world—venerable holdouts from when the neighborhood was an epicenter of Jewish immigration. Episode 381 October 9, 2024 Amherst, MA"

David Mazower, chief-curator and writer of "Yiddish: A Global Culture," and Caleb Sher, the Yiddish Book Center's Richard S. Herman Endowed Senior Fellow, join "The Shmooze" to share the news that the Center's groundbreaking exhibition, "Yiddish: A Global Culture," is now live on the Bloomberg Connects app. The free, downloadable app allows users to explore expert-curated guides from some 550 selected cultural institutions across the globe in the palm of their hand. David and Caleb share some of what can be found on the app—from featured artifacts, videos, and audio to how to plan your visit or learn about related exhibits and public programs. Episode 380 September 26, 2024 Amherst, MA

Rokhl Kafrissen—journalist, teacher, playwright, and 2022 winner of the prestigious Adrienne Cooper Dreaming in Yiddish prize—sits down with "The Shmooze" this week to talk about her upcoming Yiddish Book Center online course “Sacred Time and Liminal Space: Ashkenazi Folk Magic at the Threshold.” Rokhl talks about the unique Eastern European women's folk magic ritual known as "feldmestn:" measuring a cemetery (and its graves) to make special holiday candles. In conversation she shares other traditions and tells how the course will also place a special emphasis on learning about these customs through short stories, particularly the work of Sarah Hamer Jacklyn. Episode 377 August 14, 2024 Amherst, MA

Welcome to Episode 214! This episode contains a lot of biblio adventuring. Emily is in Traverse City, Michigan, helping her daughter, getting to know her new granddaughter, and discovering the many excellent Little Free Libraries in the area. She also shopped at Horizon Books and has been spending time at the Traverse City Library. Meanwhile, back in New England, Chris and “Colleen from Chicago” hit the road for a four-day Biblio Adventure Extravaganza that included Melville's Arrowhead, Wharton's The Mount, Emily Dickinson's family homes, The Homestead and The Evergreens, Amherst Books, and The Yiddish Book Center. The former bookstore coworkers capped it off with the annual Moby Dick marathon aboard the Charles W. Morgan at Mystic Seaport Museum. Oh, and she forgot to mention that they also went to the Odyssey Bookstore at Mount Holyoke. Phew, what a blast! We managed to finish a few books, too: Emily loved THE SNOW CHILD by Eowyn Ivey and appreciated its cold Alaska setting while reading in the heat of Michigan's summer. She listened to the audiobook version of Ann Napolitano's first novel, WITHIN ARM'S REACH, which features six narrators, and then two Audible Original short stories by Alice Hoffman, "The Bookstore Sisters" and "The Bookstore Wedding.” Chris read MOBY DICK by Herman Melville (that's twice this year) and a novelization about his relationship with Nathaniel Hawthorne, THE WHALE: A Love Story by Mark Beauregard. She also read her first book club selection from Book Browse, THE ROSE ARBOR, by Rhys Bowen. Happy Listening!

Translator and adapter Weaver sits down with "The Shmooze" to talk about the drama group Theater Between Addresses and its upcoming immersive, staged reading of Sholem Asch's "Shabbtai Tsvi," which Weaver translated and adapted. Never before performed in its entirety, the play shows the meteoric rise and tragic fall of Shabbtai Tsvi, the 17th-century Ottoman Jewish mystic whose messianic aspirations attracted a following of thousands of Jews from every corner of the earth. The reading will take place outdoors on the grounds of the Yiddish Book Center. Episode 376 August 7, 2024 Amherst, MA

Avia Moore and Sebastian Schulman join "The Shmooze" for a lively conversation about all things Klezakanda. As Avia shares, KlezKanada “fosters a community where the vibrant living tradition of Yiddish culture and Jewish music continues to thrive.” This year's lineup includes workshops on Yiddish song, dance, and language learning as well as a translation workshop, a cabaret, and a three-part talk on Quebec in Yiddish and Yiddish in Quebec. The Yiddish Book Center is a co-sponsor of KlezKanada 2024. Episode 374 July 25, 2024 Amherst, MA

Yidstock: The Festival of New Yiddish Music is back. Now in its twelfth year, Yidstock brings the best in klezmer and new Yiddish music to the Yiddish Book Center in Amherst, Massachusetts.

"The Shmooze" visits with Sebastian Schulman for a chat about Yiddish culture in America as we celebrate American Jewish Heritage Month. In conversation he shares some of what he's found on the Yiddish Book Center's website related to the Jewish American experience—Yiddish writers in America, Jewish food, Yiddish film, immigration, activism, and more. Episode 369 April 28, 2024 Amherst, MA

Sonia Bloom and Judith Liskin-Gasparro speak to "The Shmooze" about Yiddish-language learning, their work in the field, and their participation at the Yiddish Book Center's upcoming Bossie Dubowick YiddishSchool. Episode 367 March 11, 2024 Amherst, MA

In this episode, Sawad Hussain spoke about bringing Arabic Literature into English, developmental editing, her passion for mentoring and her new book ‘Djinn's Apple'.Sawad Hussain is a translator from Arabic whose work in 2023 was shortlisted for The Warwick Prize for Women in Translation and the Saif Ghobash Banipal Prize for Arabic Literary Translation and longlisted for The Moore Prize for Human Rights Writing.She is a judge for the Palestine Book Awards and the Armory Square Prize for South Asian Literature in Translation. She has run translation workshops under the auspices of Shadow Heroes, Africa Writes, the Yiddish Book Center, the British Library, and the National Centre for Writing. Her most recent translations include Edo's Souls by Stella Gaitano and Djinn's Apple by Djamila Morani. Her works-in-progress include Woman of the Rivers by Ishraga Mustafa and Behind the Sun by Bushra Al-Maqtari. More about her on - https://sawadhussain.comTo buy her translated work - https://amzn.to/3Tobe3u* For your Valuable feedback on this Episode - Please click the link given below.https://harshaneeyam.captivate.fm/feedbackHarshaneeyam on Spotify App –https://harshaneeyam.captivate.fm/onspotHarshaneeyam on Apple App – https://harshaneeyam.captivate.fm/onapple*Contact us - harshaneeyam@gmail.com ***Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by Interviewees in interviews conducted by Harshaneeyam Podcast are those of the Interviewees and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of Harshaneeyam Podcast. Any content provided by Interviewees is of their opinion and is not intended to malign any religion, ethnic group, club, organization, company, individual, or anyone or anything.This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: Podtrac - https://analytics.podtrac.com/privacy-policy-gdrpChartable - https://chartable.com/privacy

Marvin Zuckerman and Ruby Elliot Zuckerman join "The Shmooze" to talk about their family's story, which is featured in the Yiddish Book Center's new core exhibition, "Yiddish: A Global Culture." As Marvin shares, “In our one-bedroom apartment in the Bronx we had world literature—Georg Brandes, Maupassant, Marx, Darwin, Jack London, Tolstoy—all in Yiddish.” Marvin and his granddaughter Ruby share the experience of traveling together from the West Coast to be part of the exhibition's opening and to see their family's “Worker's Library” on view. Episode 364 January 22, 2023 Amherst, MA

David Mazower, chief curator of the Yiddish Book Center's core exhibition, "Yiddish: A Global Culture," and Caraid O'Brien, co-curator of the exhibition's theater section, chat with "The Shmooze" about all things Yiddish theater. You'll hear how they gathered rare artifacts and stories about the actors, the audiences, and the contemporary Yiddish theater scene. Episode 363 January 14, 2023 Amherst, MA

On "The Shmooze," Kristen Morgenstern, a senior studying history and theater at Middlebury College, tells the story behind her zine "Irena Klepfisz: The Life of the Fighter." The zine was selected for inclusion in the Yiddish Book Center's core exhibition, "Yiddish: A Global Culture." Episode 358 November 21, 2023 Amherst, MA

Sebastian Schulman is a writer, editor, and literary translator from Yiddish, Esperanto, and other languages. His translations and original work have appeared in over a dozen literary journals, including Two Lines, Words Without Borders, and ANMLY. His translation of Spomenka Stimec's Esperanto-language novel Croatian War Nocturnal was published by Phoneme Media/Deep Vellum in 2017. After several years as the executive director of the leading Yiddish arts and culture organization KlezKanada, Sebastian now serves as the director of special projects and partnerships at the Yiddish Book Center. He lives in Montréal, Québec.In this episode, he talked about the Language Esperanto, its genesis, Esperanto literature and his translation of Sponeka Stimec's Croatian War Nocturnal from Esperanto into English. Croatian War Nocturnal is a fictionalized memoir of the wars in former Yugoslavia in the early 1990s, told from the perspective of a Croatian Esperanto activist and teacher. The book consists of short, interconnected episodes describing the daily traumas of war and genocide and their effect on life and family, memory and language. It's an emotional account of a woman trying to make sense of the seeming collapse of the two utopian projects that have framed her life—Yugoslavia and Esperanto.You can buy the book using the link given in the show notes.Please share your feedback on this episode either on the Spotify app or through the link provided in the show notes. You can Follow the Harshaneeyam podcast on Spotify, Apple, Deezer or any of your favourite podcasting apps. To Buy 'Croatian War Nocturnal' - https://bit.ly/46IIBC6* For your Valuable feedback on this Episode - Please click the below linkhttps://bit.ly/epfedbckHarshaneeyam on Spotify App –http://bit.ly/harshaneeyam Harshaneeyam on Apple App –http://apple.co/3qmhis5 *Contact us - harshaneeyam@gmail.com ***Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by Interviewees in interviews conducted by Harshaneeyam Podcast are those of the Interviewees and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of Harshaneeyam Podcast. Any content provided by Interviewees is of their opinion and is not intended to malign any religion, ethnic group, club, organization, company, individual, or anyone or anything.This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: Podtrac - https://analytics.podtrac.com/privacy-policy-gdrpChartable - https://chartable.com/privacy

"The Shmooze" sat down with chief curator and writer David Mazower for the first in a series of conversations about the Yiddish Book Center's landmark permanent exhibition, which opens on October 15, 2023. In describing what visitors will encounter when they view this massive exhibition, David notes, “We've created a bright, colorful space full of powerful stories and wonderful objects that make you think but also touch the heart and soul; I want people to see this exhibition and feel inspired, surprised, moved, informed, and entertained.” Episode 356 September 21, 2023 Amherst, MA

Now in its eleventh year, Yidstock brings the best in klezmer and new Yiddish music to the Yiddish Book Center in Amherst, Massachusetts.From July 13 to 16, this four-day festival will include musicians and performers at the forefront of the Yiddish music scene. In addition to seven concerts, the lineup also includes four workshops, eleven talks, and one special film screening, all in celebration of Yiddish music, language, and culture.

"The Shmooze" sits down with Seth Rogovoy to talk about what's in store for the Yiddish Book Center's 11th annual Yidstock: The Festival of New Yiddish Music (July 13–16). Once again curated by Yidstock artistic director Seth Rogovoy, this year's festival will bring some audience favorites, including Merlin Shepherd, Nigunim Trio, and Lorin Sklamberg, along with rising stars making their Yidstock debuts, among them Forshpil, Midwood, and Sam Sadigursky—and that's just some of what we learned about in conversation with Seth. Episode 351 May 7, 2023 Amherst, MA

Caraid O'Brien, one of the foremost contemporary interpreters and translators of Sholem Asch's work, talks with "The Shmooze" about the Theater J class she's teaching—Prostitutes, Criminals, and the Walking Dead: Sholem Asch's Underworld Trilogy in Translation. The class is based on her translations of three of Asch's seminal works, "God of Vengeance," "Motke Thief," and "The Dead Man" (forthcoming from White Goat Press, the Yiddish Book Center's imprint). Episode 348 March 19, 2023 Amherst, MA

Schlep, klutz, shvigger... Yiddish is more than a few kitschy words. The language embodies and celebrates Jewish culture and daily life that is often lost to a younger generation, and can be used as a tool to get learners excited about connecting to Jewish life.This week on Adapting, David Bryfman speaks with Susan Bronson, Executive Director of the Yiddish Book Center in Amherst, MA, who advocates for studying Yiddish as a way to create a generation of Jewishly literate youths. With themes of activism, persecution, and modernity, reading seemingly "dying" Jewish languages like Yiddish and Ladino is, in fact, critical for engaging others while bridging communities across the Jewish spectrum.This episode was produced by Dina Nusnbaum and Miranda Lapides.The show's executive producers are David Bryfman, Karen Cummins, and Nessa Liben. This episode was engineered and edited by Nathan J. Vaughan of NJV Media.If you enjoyed the show, please leave us a 5-star rating and review, or even better, share it with a friend. Be sure to subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts and be the first to know when new episodes are released. To learn more about The Jewish Education Project visit jewishedproject.org where you can find links to our Jewish Educator Portal and learn more about our mission, history, and staff. We are a proud partner of UJA-Federation of New York.

As a preservationist, I have always believed that if you knew about the history of a place, it would make you care more about it. And if you uncovered the history, you'd feel inspired by the stories of the people who came before you. This episode reveals the importance of “citizen historians” - people who are dedicated to saving a historic place's story as well as preserving the site for future generations.   Masses of Eastern European Jews began immigrating to the United States in the 1880s. Between 1881 and 1924, more than two and a half million Jews arrived in America. Many settled in large cities such as New York. But some were aided in becoming farmers and land- owners by the philanthropy of the Baron de Hirsch, a wealthy German Jew who amassed a fortune in building railroads. Funded by de Hirsch, the American Jewish Agricultural Society helped Jews to buy farmland, provided money for synagogues, published a Yiddish farm magazine and had Jewish farm agents. In Connecticut, an early Jewish farm community was established in Chesterfield in the town of Montville northwest of New London. In this episode, we hear more about how this early Jewish community's history was saved by a group of descendants and how the site of the group's first synagogue and creamery was preserved as an archeological site.       Author and historian Mary Donohue interviews Nancy Savin, the 2022 winner of Preservation Connecticut's Harlan H. Griswold Award presented by Preservation Connecticut and the Connecticut State Historic Preservation Office. Harlan Griswold once said, “To me, preservation is more about my grandchildren than about my grandparents.” Her award citation reads “Through her selfless preservation efforts, both small and large, Nancy Savin is helping to build a better future for our children and grandchildren.”   A college graduate in voice and music history, Nancy spent 17 years at Connecticut Public as award-wining producer/host of arts and culture programming. But she is also the great-great granddaughter of Hirsch Kaplan, an Eastern European immigrant who arrived in New York City in 1887. So how did he end up in tiny Chesterfield as a Jewish farmer? And what was the New England Hebrew Farmers of the Emanuel Society?  We'll find in this episode.   Visit the website of the New England Hebrew Farmers of the Emanual Society here: https://www.newenglandhebrewfarmers.org/   Read more about the New England Hebrew Farmers in Nancy's article in Connecticut Explored's Winter 2022 issue here: https://www.ctexplored.org/the-new-england-hebrew-farmers-of-the-emanuel-society/   And Jewish farmers here- https://www.ctexplored.org/hebrew-tillers-of-the-soil/ https://www.ctexplored.org/the-connecticut-catskills/ https://www.ctexplored.org/the-new-england-hebrew-farmers-of-the-emanuel-society/   Listen to our Grating the Nutmeg podcast on Jewish farmers here: https://gratingthenutmeg.libsyn.com/94-connecticuts-jewish-farmers You can buy the book A Life of the Land: Connecticut's Jewish Farmers by Mary M. Donohue and Briann G. Greenfield from the Jewish Historical Society of Greater Hartford here: https://jhsgh.org/product/a-life-of-the-land-connecticuts-jewish-farmers/   Order Micki Savin's book, I Remember Chesterfield on Amazon in hardcover, softcover or Kindle versions. Read the minutes book of the NEHFES at the Yiddish Book Center here: https://www.yiddishbookcenter.org/collections/yiddish-books/spb-nybc217886/leberstein-miriam-the-minutes-and-ledger-book-1892-1933-of-the-new-england-hebrew Fresh episodes of Grating the Nutmeg are brought to you every two weeks with support from our listeners. You can help us continue to produce the podcast by donating directly to Grating the Nutmeg on the Connecticut Explored website at ctexplored.org   Click the donate button at the top and then look for the Grating the Nutmeg donation link at the bottom. Donations in any amount are greatly appreciated-we thank you!   This episode of Grating the Nutmeg was produced by Mary Donohue and engineered by Patrick O'Sullivan at highwattagemedia.com. Donohue may be reached at marydonohue@comcast.net

This week on "The Shmooze," two of New York's finest vocalists, Eleanor Reissa and Cilla Owens, chat about their upcoming performance alongside the Paul Shapiro Quartet. Eleanor and Cilla have interpreted music for decades as soloists and bring their experiences and talents together for a foot-tapping, heart-grabbing concert. The upcoming concert salutes the rich contribution of Jewish women in Yiddish and English music. The program, co-sponsored by the Yiddish Book Center and the Museum of Jewish Heritage, is part of the 2023 Carnegie Hall Festival salute to women and music. The program will take place on March 5, 2023, in New York at the Museum of Jewish Heritage. Episode 347 February 22, 2023 Amherst, MA

"The Shmooze" caught up with Max Weinreich to talk about his interest in and work with the Great Jewish Books Club. Max, a postdoctoral researcher in mathematics at Harvard University, comes to Yiddish through his family ties to the language. His great-grandfather, also named Max Weinreich, founded the field of Yiddish sociolinguistics and was one of the three co-founders of YIVO. His grandfather, Uriel Weinreich, was a renowned Yiddish linguist in his own right. Drawn to Yiddish by a budding curiosity about this family history, he's an alum of the Yiddish Book Center's Steiner Summer Yiddish Program in 2016, where he worked on indexing poetry recordings, and has gone on to be the moderator for the Yiddish Book Center's Great Jewish Books Club since its inception. As a book club steward, he leads discussion and conversation about both classic Jewish books and new translations. Episode 345 January 17, 2023 Amherst, MA

Debra Olin's "Every Protection: Folk Culture and Motherhood in the Jewish Pale of Settlement" is currently on exhibit at the Yiddish Book Center's Brechner Gallery. Debra sat-down with "The Shmooze" to talk about her intricate mixed-media collages created around An-sky's probing, evocative questions on superstitions and religious rituals. Episode 338 November 2, 2022 Amherst, MA

This week on "The Shmooze," Ellen Cassedy, author of "Working 9 to 5: A Women's Movement, a Labor Union, and the Iconic Movie," newly published by Chicago Review Press with a foreword by Jane Fonda. Ellen was a founder of the 9 to 5 movement in the early 1970s. In conversation we talk about how the Yiddish-speaking women activists of a hundred years ago inspired the women of the 9 to 5 movement. And we learn about Ellen's work as a Yiddish translator and an alum of the Yiddish Book Center's Translation Fellowship. Episode 336 October 4, 2022 Amherst, MA

This week on The Shmooze, we talk to Asaf Galay, award-winning director of films that examine modern Jewish culture and creativity. He has explored the magical literature and complex life of Isaac Bashevis Singer, celebrated ultra-Orthodox and queer Swedish pop music, and traced the development of comics and cartoons in the United States and Israel. His documentary "The Adventures of Saul Bellow" will be screened at the Yiddish Book Center and as part of the PBS American Masters series in December 2022. In conversation we talk about how Asaf's documentary brings the viewer into the world that informed Bellow, the writer and the person. Episode 332 August 8, 2022 Amherst, MA

Yidstock: The Festival of New Yiddish Music is back in person this summer, bringing the best in klezmer and new Yiddish music to the stage at the Yiddish Book Center in Amherst, Massachusetts.Yidstock features concerts, discussions, and readings and takes place at the Yiddish Book Center from July 7–10, 2022. Yidstock Artistic Director Seth Rogovoy, author of "The Essential Klezmer: A Music Lover's Guide to Jewish Roots and Soul Music" is here to tell us more along with Lisa Newman – Yiddish Book Center's Director of Publishing and Public Programs.

The Yiddish Book Center was founded in 1980 by Aaron Lansky, a 24-year-old graduate student of Yiddish literature. He realized that many Yiddish books were being lost and he organized a campaign to save as many as possible. The Center, located in Amherst, Massachusetts, grew out of that campaign. Our guest is David Mazower, who is the Research Bibliographer and Editorial Director at the Yiddish Book Center. We learn about the books that arrive in boxes each day and how they are made available to readers of Yiddish.

"In conversation with Chuck Fishman we learn about his 45-year career as a freelance photographer whose work focuses on social and political issues with a strong humanistic concern. In 1975 he traveled to Poland to photograph the “dwindling remnant of a once-vibrant Jewish community on the brink of extinction,” and he has returned several times, most recently to photograph the Jewish community's response to the Ukrainian refugee crisis occurring there now. Chuck Fishman's visiting exhibit "Roots, Resilience and Renewal—A Portrait of Polish Jews, 1975–2016" is on view at the Yiddish Book Center through fall 2022. Episode 329 June 13, 2022 Amherst, MA

In 1972, Richard Nixon made a historic visit to China. The trip broke 25 years of silence between the U.S. and China, paving the way for the establishment of full diplomatic relations later in the decade. Around the same time, second-generation Chinese American Gish Jen started writing; she first visited China with her family in 1979, the experience undoubtedly shaping her identity as both a Chinese American and a writer. Jen's latest book, Thank You, Mr. Nixon, collected 11 stories spanning 50 years since Nixon's landmark visit and meeting with Chairman Mao. Beginning with a cheery letter penned by a Chinese girl in heaven to “poor Mr. Nixon” in hell, Jen embarked on a witty (and at times heartbreaking) journey through U.S.-China relations, capturing the excitement of a world on the brink of change. The stories paint vignettes of the lives of ordinary people after China's reopening: a reunion of Chinese sisters after forty years; a cosmopolitan's musings on why Americans “like to walk around in the woods with the mosquitoes”; and Hong Kong parents who go to extremes to reconnect with their “number-one daughter” in New York. Together with writer Daniel Tam-Claiborne, Gish Jen discussed stories of culture and humanity sparked by a pivotal era in U.S.-Chinese history. Gish Jen has published short work in The New Yorker, The Atlantic, and dozens of other periodicals, anthologies and textbooks. Her work has appeared in The Best American Short Stories four times, including The Best American Short Stories of the Century, edited by John Updike. Nominated for a National Book Critics' Circle Award, her work was featured in a PBS American Masters' special on the American novel and is widely taught. Jen is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She has been awarded a Lannan Literary Award for Fiction, a Guggenheim fellowship, a Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study fellowship, and a Mildred and Harold Strauss Living; she has also delivered the William E. Massey, Sr. Lectures in the History of American Civilization at Harvard University. She is currently a Visiting Professor at Harvard. Daniel Tam-Claiborne is a multiracial essayist and author of the short story collection What Never Leaves. His writing has appeared in Literary Hub, The Rumpus, SupChina, The Huffington Post, The Shanghai Literary Review, and elsewhere. A 2022 National Endowment for the Arts Literature Fellow, he has also received fellowships and awards from the U.S. Fulbright Program, the New York State Summer Writers Institute, Kundiman, the Jack Straw Writers Program, and the Yiddish Book Center. Daniel serves as Director of Community Partnerships & Programs at Hugo House in Seattle and is currently completing a novel set against the backdrop of contemporary U.S.-China relations. Buy the Book: Thank You, Mr. Nixon  Presented by Town Hall Seattle. To become a member or make a donation click here. 

 This interview really had to be a longer one because Josh just does so much creatively, and I had so much I wanted to ask him about! We start with his remix of Curried Soul for CBC radio's daily show As It Happens, and circle around to topics (timestamped below) including:  sampling, Yiddish culture, changes in the industry from when he got his start selling CDs mail-order to touring internationally and collaborating with many musicians, including the funk legend Fred Wesley, David Krakauer, Kiran Ahulwalia, Itzhak Perlman, Theodore Bikel, writing musical theatre, puppets, art...here's a chance for all of us to get to know the creative force known as Josh "Socalled" Dolgin. (if you're wondering about his stage name, you should watch the NFB movie https://www.nfb.ca/film/socalled_movie/ ) J https://www.socalledmusic.com/To watch the Seasons puppet musicals (mentioned in the conversation): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uOjCTYWNwa4  All of these episodes are available in video format as well: https://www.leahroseman.com/episodes/e6-s2-josh-socalled-dolgin Help me with a tip? https://ko-fi.com/leahroseman Thanks! (00:00) Intro (1:16) Curried Soul remix and Moe Koffman  (5:44) Sampling,  hip hop  (13:37) The Socalled Seder album and changes in the industry   (17:46) Di Frosh show Yiddish songs with string quartet  (19:45) Kurt Weill  (21:26) old Yiddish song archives, Yiddish Book Center  (32:55) Tales from Odessa   (43:29) The Seasons Puppet musicals  (46:38) Learning Music  (51:13) Fred Wesley  (1:01)  Perspectives on his career  (1:06) Yiddish Culture Cruise and Yiddish Revival  (1:17:20) Josh's amazing drawings   (1:23) Itzhak Perlman  (1:26:40) Theodore Bikel --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/leah-roseman/message

Yiddish Book Center bibliography and collections manager Rachelle Grossman sits down with "The Shmooze" to share news of the digitization and addition of the 100-volume "Musterverk fun der yidisher literatur" to the Yiddish Book Center's Steven Spielberg Digital Yiddish Library. The addition of the Musterverk series to the Center's Digital Yiddish Library was made possible in partnership with La Fundación IWO Instituto Judío de Investigación in Buenos Aires. Published between 1957 and 1984, the series demonstrates the impressive breadth of Yiddish letters. Episode 321 February 10,2022 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, MA

This week we visit with Dr. Sheva Zucker to talk about her latest book. "The Golden Peacock" is a bilingual edition that includes the work of Yiddish writers Yankev Glatshteyn, Celia Dropkin, H. Leivick, Aron Glanz-Leyeles, Yente Mash, Kadya Molodowsky, Beyle Schaechter-Gottesman, Sholem Aleichem, Yekhiel Shraibman, and Avrom Sutzkever. The print edition includes companion digital recordings of the writers reading from their poetry and prose. Presented as part of the Yiddish Book Center's 2022 Decade of Discovery: Women in Yiddish. Episode 320 February 3, 2022 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, MA

Nina Pick, poet and oral historian with the Yiddish Book Center, speaks about her experience as a grandchild and interviewer of Auschwitz survivors. She reflects on themes of ancestral trauma, intergenerational healing, and the importance of ecological mourning.

Melissa Weisz, Malky Goldman, and Rachel Botchan join us on "The Shmooze" to talk about their upcoming performance of "Di Froyen (The Women)," based on the play "Women's Minyan" by Naomi Ragen, adapted for the New Yiddish Rep by Weisz and Goldman, and directed by Botchan. The play is a one-act drama of an abused Orthodox Jewish wife who is being kept from her children. In conversation the women talk about the role of Yiddish in their work and the universality of the story. Our conversation touches on their work as actors, co-writers, and director of the one-act drama and the role of Yiddish in their work. Presented as part of the Yiddish Book Center's 2022 Decade of Discovery Women in Yiddish. Episode 316 January 6, 2021 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, MA

Chloe spoke with us on how a summer at the Yiddish Book Center opened their eyes to the beauty of Jewish and queer intersectionality, and the importance of finding true community.

In episode 4 we give back to our Jewish podcast community by reviewing five Jewish podcasts. First, we catch up after Yom Kippur and then we get meta by diving into some JEWCY podcasts on our Jewish podcast! We talk about Tablet Magazines Unorthodox, Unpacking Israeli History from Unpacked, Behind the Bima,18Forty, and The Yiddish Book Center's The Shmooze.This episode is brought to you by TheraBreath https://www.therabreath.com, the biggest privately held oral care manufacturer in America. Thank you to our sponsor and to all our loyal listeners!

The Shmooze caught up with Rachelle Grossman, the Yiddish Book Center's Bibliography and Collections Manager, to speak about her new role at the Center. Rachelle is a specialist in Yiddish print culture and is completing a doctorate in comparative literature at Harvard University. Prior to joining the Center, she lived in Warsaw, where she researched postwar Yiddish publishing. Rachelle shared some stories about the Center's rare books and new discoveries, and she spoke about her interest in Yiddish print culture and publishing as it relates to her work. Episode 306 September 15, 2021 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

On this episode of "Come Pray with Me" I interview Rabbi Bernstein of the Seaside Jewish Community. He will be sharing how different sects of Judaism coexist with each other, as well as the significance of the Yiddish language to Jewish people.   If you would like to learn more about the Seaside Jewish Community and attend online courses, visit http://www.seasidejewishcommunity.com/. The Yiddish Book Center provides educational programs as well as events dedicated to the education and preservation of the Yiddish language, and can be found here https://www.yiddishbookcenter.org/. 

This year's virtual Yidstock: The Festival of New Yiddish Music features a dozen artists from around the globe performing Yiddish songs of social justice. The 75-minute event will stream on Sunday, July 11, at 4 p.m. and the ticketed link will be good for 72 hours. Yidstock Artistic Director Seth Rogovoy, author of "The Essential Klezmer: A Music Lover's Guide to Jewish Roots and Soul Music" is here to tell us more along with Lisa Newman – Director of Communications at the Yiddish Book Center. This year's Yidstock performances, exclusively recorded the event, feature a diverse roster of artists from Berlin, the Netherlands, the UK, and US: Sarah Gordon and Michael Winograd, Niki Jacobs, Daniel Kahn, Sveta Kundish and Patrick Farrell, Frank London, Sarah Myerson and Ilya Shneyveys, Cilla Owens, Eleanor Reissa, Polina and Merlin Shepherd, Lorin Sklamberg, Tatiana Wechsler, and Eleonore Weill and Zoë Aqua. They perform a broad and eclectic repertoire of social justice songs, including

From his Lower East Side studio, artist Steve Marcus joins The Shmooze to talk about his early work as an Underground cartoonist - and his latest work which is currently on exhibit at the Yiddish Book Center. Through the Hat, weaves together Steve's childhood memories of bagels and bialys, pickles and green tomatoes from the barrel, and paper-wrapped whitefish chubs with his personal journey and passion for his own roots and culture. Tales from the Golden Medina is a series of work that expands on the Through the Hat exhibit, inspired by underground comics and Jewish wisdom from the shtetl.

In the season finale of the Bainbridge Pod Accomplice, we'll hear from Sara Brickman, Artist in Residence at The Bloedel Reserve, in conversation with Holly Hughes. They'll perform a reading of poems from their manuscript Little Houdini, and share poems from Field Guide – a series of poems that look at the body as a landscape, and discuss Sara's relationship with The Bloedel Reserve. ABOUT SARA Sara Brickman is a writer, performer, and community organizer from Ann Arbor, MI. The winner of the 2015 Split This Rock Poetry Prize, and a five-time member of Seattle slam teams, Sara has received grants and scholarships from the Lambda Literary Foundation, the Yiddish Book Center, 4Culture, and more. A BOAAT Writers Fellow and a Ken Warfel Fellow for Poetry in Community, Sara's poems and prose appear in Narrative, Adriot, BOAAT, The Indiana Review, Muzzle, and the anthologies Ghosts of Seattle Past, The Dead Animal Handbook and Courage: Daring Poems for Gutsy Girls. Sara holds an MFA from the University of Virginia and lives in Seattle, where she teaches writing to youth and adults, and parents a cat named Latke. “My first collection, Little Houdini, catalogs my own experiences of abuse to turn a lens on gendered violence and the lasting impacts of trauma. These poems use the archetype of escape artists to challenge the victim narrative I was expected to claim as a survivor of sexual violence, and explore escape and the body: whether that be a rebellion against binary gender or the numbness and self-distancing that PTSD forges. We often speak of nature as a form of escape: we talk of “unplugging,” “leaving the world behind” or conversely, of the natural world being the “real” world. But who and what gets to be “real,” and who is able to escape to another world, has deep political implications for those already othered by society. Even access to the outdoors is a fraught question if you do not fall cleanly on one side of the gender-binary: for us, entering nature carries as many fears for our own safety as life in the city. The plants and animals may be the only ones who do not question our validity as ourselves, yet even alone with them, we carry that weight. ABOUT HOLLY HUGHES Holly J. Hughes is the author of Hold Fast, Sailing by Ravens, coauthor of The Pen and The Bell: Mindful Writing in a Busy World, and editor of the award-winning anthology, Beyond Forgetting: Poetry and Prose about Alzheimer's Disease. Her fine art chapbook Passings received an American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation in 2017. She's a graduate of Pacific Lutheran University's low-residency MFA program, where she served on the staff for 13 years, in addition to teaching writing at community colleges for several decades. She currently leads writing and mindfulness workshops in Alaska and the northwest and consults as a writing coach. 

Welcome to The Academic Life. You are smart and capable, but you aren't an island, and neither are we. So we reached across our mentor network to bring you podcasts on everything from how to finish that project, to how to take care of your beautiful mind. Wish we'd bring in an expert about something? Email us at cgessler05@gmail.com or dr.danamalone@gmail.com. Find us on Twitter: The Academic Life @AcademicLifeNBN. In this episode you'll hear about: how Jessica first began to learn Yiddish, what drew her to translation work, the importance of finding encouraging mentors and creating peer supports, what it means to be “contingent” faculty, and a discussion of her new book Diary of A Lonely Girl. Our guest is: Dr. Jessica Kirzane, who teaches Yiddish language as well as courses in Yiddish literature and culture. She received her PhD in Yiddish Studies from Columbia University in 2017. Dr. Kirzane is the Editor-in-Chief of In geveb: A Journal of Yiddish Studies. In addition, she has held several positions at the Yiddish Book Center: Translation Fellow in 2017-18, Pedagogy Fellow in 2018-19, and as an editor and contributor to the Teach Great Jewish Books site of the Yiddish Book Center. Her research interests include race, sex, gender, and regionalism in American Jewish and Yiddish literature and has published articles on the idea of rural America in Yiddish literature, interethnic romance in Yiddish periodicals, and lynching in American Yiddish literature. Most recently she has published a translation of Miriam Karpilove's The Diary of a Lonely Girl, or the Battle Against Free Love (Syracuse UP, 2020). Our host is: Dr. Christina Gessler, a historian of women and gender.  Listeners to this episode might be interested in: The Yiddish Book Center “New York's First-Time Women Voters” in Jewish Currents “Freydl” in Columbia Journal The Abandoned Book: A New Collection of Yiddish Translations. To Tread on New Ground: Selected Hebrew Writings of Hava Shapiro. Ed. Carole Balin and Wendy Zierler (Wayne State University Press, 2014) Have I Got a Story For You: More than a Century of Yiddish Fiction from the Forward. (Norton, 2016) Diary of A Lonely Girl, or the Battle Against Free Love by Miriam Karpilove In geveb: A Journal of Yiddish Studies. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/academic-life

Welcome to The Academic Life. You are smart and capable, but you aren't an island, and neither are we. So we reached across our mentor network to bring you podcasts on everything from how to finish that project, to how to take care of your beautiful mind. Wish we'd bring in an expert about something? Email us at cgessler05@gmail.com or dr.danamalone@gmail.com. Find us on Twitter: The Academic Life @AcademicLifeNBN. In this episode you'll hear about: how Jessica first began to learn Yiddish, what drew her to translation work, the importance of finding encouraging mentors and creating peer supports, what it means to be “contingent” faculty, and a discussion of her new book Diary of A Lonely Girl. Our guest is: Dr. Jessica Kirzane, who teaches Yiddish language as well as courses in Yiddish literature and culture. She received her PhD in Yiddish Studies from Columbia University in 2017. Dr. Kirzane is the Editor-in-Chief of In geveb: A Journal of Yiddish Studies. In addition, she has held several positions at the Yiddish Book Center: Translation Fellow in 2017-18, Pedagogy Fellow in 2018-19, and as an editor and contributor to the Teach Great Jewish Books site of the Yiddish Book Center. Her research interests include race, sex, gender, and regionalism in American Jewish and Yiddish literature and has published articles on the idea of rural America in Yiddish literature, interethnic romance in Yiddish periodicals, and lynching in American Yiddish literature. Most recently she has published a translation of Miriam Karpilove's The Diary of a Lonely Girl, or the Battle Against Free Love (Syracuse UP, 2020). Our host is: Dr. Christina Gessler, a historian of women and gender.  Listeners to this episode might be interested in: The Yiddish Book Center “New York's First-Time Women Voters” in Jewish Currents “Freydl” in Columbia Journal The Abandoned Book: A New Collection of Yiddish Translations. To Tread on New Ground: Selected Hebrew Writings of Hava Shapiro. Ed. Carole Balin and Wendy Zierler (Wayne State University Press, 2014) Have I Got a Story For You: More than a Century of Yiddish Fiction from the Forward. (Norton, 2016) Diary of A Lonely Girl, or the Battle Against Free Love by Miriam Karpilove In geveb: A Journal of Yiddish Studies. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/religion

Episode three, presented in collaboration with the Yiddish Book Center, investigates "The Death of My Aunt," a short story written in Yiddish by Blume Lempel and published in 1975. The story moves through time and space as a woman whose aunt has died deals with mourning the loss of this figure whose past came to life as her present grew dim.Ellen Cassedy and Yermiyahu Ahron Taub, whose book Oedipus in Brooklyn and Other Stories includes their English translations of this and many other of Lempel's stories, reveal the intricacies contained within the narrative and discuss the ways in which it touches on immigrant experiences, emotional dislocation, and familial connection.

Interviews with Lisa Newman, Communications Director, and Christa Whitney, director of the Wexler Oral History Project, both at the Yiddish Book Center in Amherst, MA.