The Yiddish Book Center's

Wexler Oral History Project

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.

Growing Up in America as a Native Speaker of Yiddish

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Anna Sheldon, born to survivors of a prominent Warsaw Jewish family, describes speaking Yiddish as her first language and her gradual transition to English as a result of having trouble making friends.

This is an excerpt from an oral history with Anna Sheldon.

This excerpt is in English.

Anna Sheldon was born in Warsaw, Poland in 1935.

Other video highlights from this oral history

Table for 59: Peysekh (Passover) Traditions

1 min 39 sec

My Mother Was A Quintessentially Jewish Cook

1 min 28 sec

"Even in Those Little Towns, We Have To Be Jewish": Transmitting Jewish Culture Down the Generations

3 min 1 sec

"I Never Let Them Get Away With It. Ever.:" Encountering Antisemitism

2 min 26 sec

Giving Jewishly: Charity and Jewish Identity

1 min 51 sec

"Shlof Shlof, Mayn Kind": The Importance of (Jewish) Mothers

4 min 31 sec

Labor Zionism and Progressive Politics

1 min 48 sec

Transmitting Values Within My Jewish Family

2 min 12 sec

More information about this oral history excerpt

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