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.

English to Yiddish to English: Learning to Communicate in America

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Arje Shaw, z"l, playwright, remembers his struggle to communicate in English after arriving in America and how reading novels and listening to the radio helped him to learn the language of his new country.

This is an excerpt from an oral history with Arje Shaw.

This excerpt is in Yiddish.

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This interview is part of the Yiddish and the Arts: musicians, actors, and artists series.

Other video highlights from this oral history

A Jewish Refugee's Journey From Tashkent to New York City

2 min 37 sec

Jewish Refugees Finding a Home on the Lower East Side

2 min 43 sec

Reflecting Yiddish Culture In Song: Arje Shaw Reflects on His Childhood

3 min 7 sec

"Ver Bin Ikh (Who Am I)?": Arje Shaw on Feeling Like an Outsider in America

2 min 2 sec

I Knew I Was Not American: Reflecting on a Lifetime of Yiddish

1 min 58 sec

Memories of the Second Avenue Yiddish Theater

1 min 29 sec

"The Gathering" on Broadway: Arje Shaw's Theatrical Journey

3 min 55 sec

"Yiddish iz a Fargnign (Yiddish is a Pleasure)": Arje Shaw Reflects on 21st Century Yiddish Culture

2 min 43 sec

Surviving Starvation in Tashkent During World War II

1 min 35 sec

Forgetting Russian En Route to a New Beginning

1 min 45 sec

More information about this oral history excerpt

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