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.

Finding Yiddish through Women Writers

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Zohar Weiman-Kelman--scholar of Queer Studies, Yiddish Studies, and Jewish literature--describes their journey to Yiddish. They explain their "crush" on Glückel of Hameln (a medieval woman diarist who wrote in Western Yiddish) which led to a Yiddish language class with Hanan Bordin, and finally finding Yiddish women's poetry.

This is an excerpt from an oral history with Zohar Weiman-Kelman.

This excerpt is in English.

Zohar Weiman-Kelman was born in Jerusalem, Israel in 1982.

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

Other video highlights from this oral history

Speaking Directly to the Bubbies: Transmission Between Jewish Lesbian Writers and Yiddish Poetesses

2 min 32 sec

"Making Babies in Other Ways": Beyond Heteronormativity, Essentialism, Survival in Transmission

3 min

Inside or Outside: Closed Circles in the Yiddish World

2 min 30 sec

Who is Irena Klepfisz?: Mentor, Lesbian Yiddish Poetess

2 min 19 sec

Yiddish Rebelliousness, Pleasure, Corporeality of the Past

2 min 22 sec

"Look Through Yiddish at the World": Advice for Those Interested in Yiddish

1 min 13 sec

More information about this oral history excerpt

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