A growing collection of in-depth interviews with people of all ages and backgrounds, whose stories about the legacy and changing nature of Yiddish language and culture offer a rich and complex chronicle of Jewish identity.
Creation of KlezKamp
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Adrienne Cooper z"l discusses the roots of KlezKamp and how the idea for it came directly out of the YIVO intensive Yiddish summer program. Instead of a summer language program with some cultural activities, she wished to found a week long cultural program with some language components.
This is an excerpt from an oral history with Adrienne Cooper.
This excerpt is in English.
Adrienne Cooper was born in Oakland, California in 1946. Adrienne, z"l, died in 2011.
This interview is part of the Yiddish and the Arts: musicians, actors, and artists series.
Other video highlights from this oral history

Creation of KlezKamp
3 minutes 34 seconds
Adrienne Cooper Finds a Mentor
1 minute 29 seconds
"A Thin Thread": Song-Teaching Project in Former Soviet Union
6 minutes 27 seconds
Adrienne Cooper's Advice to Future Generations
4 minutes 43 seconds
Her Daughter at Weinreich's Desk
2 minutes 19 seconds
Generations of Yiddish Song
3 minutes 26 seconds
Growing up in the Oakland Jewish Community
1 minute 30 seconds
Studying Yiddish
2 minutes 45 seconds
"I Sunk into the YIVO"
2 minutes 17 seconds
Teaching the Klezmatics
1 minute 48 seconds
"It was really the source of my Jewish literacy." (Religious Education)
1 minute 32 seconds
KlezKamp provides model of "living Jewish Culture"
3 minutes 21 secondsMore information about this oral history excerpt
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About the Wexler Oral History Project

Since 2010, the Yiddish Book Center’s Wexler Oral History Project has recorded more than 500 in-depth video interviews that provide a deeper understanding of the Jewish experience and the legacy and changing nature of Yiddish language and culture.
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