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.

"Assimilated Enough to Not Be Threatened" by Fiddler on the Roof

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Ken Frieden, B.G. Rudolph Professor of Judaic Studies at Syracuse University, speaks about the absence of Yiddish in 1960s Larchmont, New York, and how his family felt a sense of nostalgia from Fiddler On the Roof that was only made possible because "that wasn't us."

This is an excerpt from an oral history with Ken Frieden.

This excerpt is in English.

Ken Frieden was born in New Rochelle, New York in 1955.

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This interview is part of the Yiddish in the Academy: scholars, language instructors, and students series.

Other video highlights from this oral history

"Trying to Eat a Steak With a Butterknife": A Criticism of Analyzing Yiddish Literature with Theory

1 min 1 sec

Menachem Mendel Lefin, a Yiddishist Maskil in Ukraine

2 min 15 sec

"The only person who will listen to me in Yiddish is my dog"

1 min 3 sec

"Maybe the best place in the world" for a Yiddish Program: Melbourne, Australia

1 min 34 sec

My Neighbor was the Grandson of the Great Yiddish Actor Jacob Adler

1 min 58 sec

Were Jewish Roots "Camouflaged" in My Father's Name?

1 min 3 sec

Coming to Yiddish Through Its Opposite: Germany

5 min 7 sec

More information about this oral history excerpt

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