This is the Forward’s coverage of the Yiddish language historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews in Europe and still spoken by many Hasidic Jews today.
For more stories on Yiddishkeit, see Forverts in English, and for stories written in…
Yiddish
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News Echoes of Jewish Back-to-Land Movement Under Utah’s Big Sky
On a sunny Saturday in September, Lillian Brown Vogel rolled her wheelchair to the brink of a small gravesite just outside the city of Gunnison, in central Utah. She squinted at the two headstones before her, slabs of gray and brown rock etched with Hebrew letters. Each one was surrounded by a small pen of…
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Culture Looking Back: September 23
100 Years Ago in the Forward A large group of Jews wearing tallitot and holding prayer books and synagogue tickets showed up at a small Manhattan theater on Clinton Street for the High Holy Days. The problem was, the place was locked. Very upset, the crowd started banging on the doors. Eventually the boss showed…
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The Schmooze Monday Music: Where Klezmer Ends and Jazz Begins
Tzadik Records’ Radical Jewish Culture releases often split the difference between jazz and klezmer. Both genres drag long canonical histories behind them like the train on a wedding dress. Both are easily innovated upon, prone to flights of improvisation, and adept at locating individual musicians in the midst of a vast history. Joel Rubin and…
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News Bird-Shaped Challah Holds Special Meaning for Rosh Hashanah
I don’t remember most of what my family ate on Rosh Hashanah when I was growing up. We likely had a platter of brisket and maybe a steaming tureen of tzimmes. There was probably a bottle of Martinelli’s sparkling apple cider on the table to be festive — but honestly, the details are fuzzy. What…
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Culture September 16, 2011
100 Years Ago in the Forward The most popular swindle currently in practice on the Lower East Side, according to an assistant district attorney, is known as the “Doctor Swindle.” What happens is that a well-dressed man knocks on people’s doors and informs them that he is a doctor from the board of health and…
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News Holocaust Survivors Angry About YIVO’s Invitation to Lithuanian Official
It was supposed to be an evening of celebration and remembrance of the Jews of the Vilna Ghetto. But by hosting the Lithuanian foreign minister as “guest of honor” at a concert of Yiddish songs, the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research has instead angered some Holocaust survivors and their advocates. Audronius Ažubalis, the foreign minister,…
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Culture Unpacking ‘Umgepotch’ A Word for Sloppy
Menorah Rotenberg of Teaneck, New Jersey writes: “The other day, I was telling someone about a recipe that I no longer make because it is too much of a ‘potchkie’ — that is, it has too many ingredients and is too time-consuming. “I then thought of ‘umgepotch,’ too much or over the top, as in…
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Culture September 9, 2011
100 Years Ago in the Forward Rising star Rudolf Shildkraut is in awe over Yiddish theater superstar Eugene Mogulesco. Shildkraut first saw Mogulescu perform in Romania, when Shildkraut was a child. During a visit to the offices of the Forverts for a discussion about theater, Shildkraut called Mogulesco “a genius.” He said that he has…
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Yiddish די ווערק פֿון ישׂשׂכר בער ריבאַק מערקן אָפּ, און מאַכן איבער אַ צעשטערטע וועלטThese works by Issachar Ber Ryback commemorate, and transform, a devastated world
אין די אילוסטראַציעס האָט ער אױסגעדריקט זײַן צער נאָך די מוראדיקע פּאָגראָמען פֿון דער רוסישער בירגער־מלחמה.
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