Welcome to the Forward’s coverage of the Yiddish language historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews in Europe and still spoken by many Hasidic Jews today.
For more stories on Yiddishkeit, see Forverts in English, and for stories written in…
Yiddish
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Culture Speaking Yiddish in Gaza
The last time I was in Israel was at the time of one more war in Gaza. People looked anxiously at the sky, scared of the falling debris of Hamas’s mortars. Those who lived closer to the border with Gaza took their deck chairs out to the hills and rooftops every evening. While drinking beer…
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The Schmooze Remembering the Night of the Murdered Soviet Yiddish Poets
What made this year’s Remembrance of the “August 12, 1952 Night of the Murdered Poets” Memorial held at the Center for Jewish History unique, was the presence of Ala Zuskin Perelman, daughter of murdered Yiddish actor Benjamin Zuskin. Following greetings by event host *Shane Baker, Director, Congress for Jewish Culture, YIVO Executive Director Jonathan Brent…
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Opinion I’m Here To Perform Yiddish Music — Not Cater to Your Idea of Blackness
In case I’ve ever given you occasion to think otherwise, I’m black. My parents are black, and their parents (may they live to 120 years) are black as well, though they were not always so; they were previously “colored.” My three brothers happen to be black, as is basically mayn gantse mishpokhe, my whole family….
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Culture 6 Artists You Didn’t Know Used Yiddish, From Elvis to Public Enemy
It’s astounding how much Yiddish has infiltrated today’s popular culture. From classic musicals like “Fiddler on the Roof” to sitcoms like Seinfeld, some words and phrases of Ashkenazi Jews’ native tongue have become Americanized, naturalized, and sometimes clichéd. So, when Public Enemy released its latest album, “Man Plans, God Laughs,” emblazoned with , we decided…
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Culture Why Are These Secular Kids Learning Yiddish?
If you visit Brooklyn’s Middle School 88 late on a Wednesday afternoon, you’ll witness something pretty unusual. The building sits on the southern edge of Park Slope, down the block from Green-Wood Cemetery and next to the noisy Prospect Expressway. Huddling around a table in a science classroom a handful of kids are studying Yiddish….
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The Schmooze ‘2 By Wolf’ — A Yiddish-Gaelic Theatre Delight
On my way to see The New Yiddish Rep’s production of “Two By Wolf” which includes Wolf Mankowitz’s play “The Bespoke Overcoat,” I flashed back to 1956, when in the darkness of the Thalia Theatre on Upper Broadway, I saw the British film “The Bespoke Overcoat” based on Mankowitz’s play about a Jewish tailor and…
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The Schmooze Hasidic Stars Bring Yiddish Soul to Central Park
It’s as if the rain knew to stop precisely at 6 o’clock. After one of the wettest days of the month, the sky turned from gray to blue, the clouds parted for the last hour of Tuesday sun, and Yiddish Soul took the stage at Central Park’s Rumsey Playfield. The concert, a showcase of cantorial…
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Opinion What Flag Should Yiddish Fly?
In mid-2012, I received a friend request from “Yiddish Flag,” a fictional image that purported to be the flag of Yiddish language and culture. Not in the habit of accepting requests from anonymous non-humans, I clicked “reject” without a second thought. Yet the flag, a black-and-white banner featuring a menorah on a stylized tallis (prayer…
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