This has been a busy weekend, but I did want to at least start working down the collected articles. This post can be filed under the category of “Proud Father”, as it all has to do with Yiddish — my daughter’s speciality.
- Pop Up Exhibition. I would be remiss if I didn’t start with the news that the Magnes Library in Berkeley is doing a pop-up exhibition of my daughter’s research on Weds, December 2, from 12p to 1p. As the Magnes wrote: “ Through her knowledge of Yiddish she helped to create a flagship Digital Humanities project focusing on Yiddish books printed in California, held at The Magnes . Erin catalogued almost 100 volumes, and digitized title pages. By using the online platform, Findery as part of the Digital Programs of The Magnes, she subsequently created a literary map of Yiddish Los Angeles, which allows scholars to see that city’s hidden Yiddish heritage in a new light.” If you would like to see her Findery work, click here.
- Wearing It On Your Tush. Would you like to wear Yiddish. The Forward had a neat article on the rise of cheeky Yiddish wear. Quoting the Forward: “As a recent profile in The Guardian explains, the Unkosher Market line is perfect for that “self-deprecating Jewish hipster of mid-level means” in your life.” My daughter, I’m sure, wouldn’t like it — first, because I’m not sure she likes hipsters :-), and more importantly, she really thinks Yiddish is too beautiful and too significant a language to be reduced to the words we make fun of.
- So How Do I Learn Yiddish. Long ago, I promised my daughter I wouldn’t link to her tumblr. But recently she got that question — what are good Yiddish resources — so I’m going to cut and paste her response:
ay i don’t want to overwhelm you with things so here just a few things to get you started with…
1. yiddishpop is a great online language learning program and a very good starting place
2. once you get comfortable reading yiddish, reading the yiddish daily forward online is a great way to practice reading. if you dont know a word, click on it twice and a definition will pop up.
3. the world of yiddish online dictionaries. the best place to go is verterbukh which is a searchable online version of the beinfeld bochner dictionary, which is the most comprehensive. it’s not free, unless you can get it through a library which you’re a member of. or you can pay. another good place to look is this dictionary
4. here’s a useful link dump of yiddish resources from the university of kentucky
zol zayn mit mazel un zayt gezunt khevre!
Yiddish-English Dictionary:
Learning Yiddish:
Yiddish Books as PDF:
- http://sammlungen.ub.uni-frankfurt.de/jd/nav/index/all
- https://sites.google.com/site/mendeledervaylik/library
- https://archive.org/details/nationalyiddishbookcenter
- https://sites.google.com/site/onlineyiddishresources/
Yiddish Newspapers:
- http://yiddish.forward.com
- yiddish-periodicals.huji.ac.il
Yiddish Poetry:
- http://www.yiddishpoetry.org
- http://yiddish.haifa.ac.il/Stories.html (as PDF and MP3)
Miscellaneous:
