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.

She Believed in God Because of Destiny: On My Mother's Religious Practice and My Bar Mitzvah

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Micha Brym, engineer and Yiddish enthusiast who was born in Russia and grew up in France, describes the complexities of his religious life as a child growing up in France, with a mother whose belief was based in her survival.

This is an excerpt from an oral history with Micha Brym.

This excerpt is in English.

Micha Brym was born in 1942.

Other video highlights from this oral history

Daily Life for My Parents in Pre-War Poland

3 min 16 sec

An Extraordinary Partisan Song

1 min 40 sec

Convenient Uses for Yiddish

2 min 37 sec

This Magic and Reality of Jewish Storytelling: Interviewing My Mother About Her Life

3 min 42 sec

Thinking of Yiddish While Teaching in Venezuela

7 min 35 sec

The Magical House Mother Named Her Son After Me: Fond Memories of Living in a Children's Home in Nice, France

4 min 14 sec

My Earliest Memories of the Soviet Union during World War Two

2 min 35 sec

Appearance as a Child in Maître après Dieu: Louis Daquin's Film about Illegal Immigration of Jewish Refugees to the US

3 min 10 sec

My Family and Other Villagers' Experience During World War Two

4 min 23 sec

More information about this oral history excerpt

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