PAST EVENTS
4/26-4/27 - Yiddishkayt at Festival of Books
on the UCLA Campus
Free Admission, $8 Parking
Saturday, April 26, 10 am to 6 pm, and
Sunday, April 27, 10 am to 5 pm
Yiddishkayt L.A. is excited to return for our second year at the Festival of Books. Join us in celebrating the Yiddish word at the country's largest celebration of the written word.
Visit our booth, #603, for an amazing assortment of books covering the rich world of Yiddish. We're bringing books in Yiddish, books about Yiddish, and books for kinderlekh, for kids. Fill your shelves at home with plays, novels, history and humor from the best Yiddish book store in L.A. (well, at least in April)!
The Festival of Books is a huge enterprise for us, and we could never pull it off without the the help of our volunteers. If you're interested in volunteering for an hour or two please let us know at events@yiddishkaytla.org or call us at (213) 389-8880.
4/28 - A Fire in Their Hearts
Conversation, Reception & Booksigning with Historian Tony Michels
Monday, April 28
Begins at 7:00 pm
at Highways Performance Space
1651 18th Street
Santa Monica, CA 90404
Please RSVP to (213) 389-8880
Suggested contribution of $5
Yiddishkayt is delighted to host a conversation with Tony Michels, of the University of Wisconsin, Madison. Professor Michels' recent book, A Fire in Their Hearts: Yiddish Socialists in New York, is an acclaimed and groundbreaking study of the defining role of the Yiddish socialist movement in the American Jewish experience, bringing to vivid life this formative and crucial period for American Jews and the American left.
Professor Michels' talk will examine the interrelated birth of Yiddish secular culture and Jewish left wing/Progressive activism arising from social conditions on the Lower East Side at the turn of the last century, how this grew into a transnational movement, and its enduring influence on Jewish communities across the United States well into the twentieth century.
Come join us as we share these fascinating insights into the immigrant cauldron in New York, the early decades of the Jewish left, and the flowering of secular Yiddish culture in America. Reception and booksigning to follow.
This event is co-sponsored by Yiddishkayt Los Angeles, Reboot, and the UCLA Center for Jewish Studies.
2/15-2/18 - Yiddishkayt at Limmud LA
On President's Day weekend, Yiddishkayt Los Angeles participated in the inaugural LimmudLA, helping to bring Yiddish culture to a conference devoted to all aspects of Jewish life.
LimmudLA was a whirlwind of a Jewish experience, a grassroots exploration of Jewish life in LA and the world. The weekend was packed with 262 study sessions, 21 films, concerts, comedy and even some live theater. For a more thorough description, read the Jewish Journal's review of LimmudLA here.
Yiddishkayt LA sponsored three presentations, discussing Yiddish film, theater, and poetry in the context of the American - and Los Angeles - Jewish experience.
Caraid O'Brien, meyven of the Yiddish Theater, animated its vibrant history with the help of photos, rare sound clips, and even a performance of a monologue from Sholem Asch's God of Vengeance in both English and Yiddish. Caraid also introduced our screening of Uncle Moses, the captivating Yiddish film starring Maurice Schwartz as a wealthy Jewish sweatshop owner on the Lower East Side during the early 20th Century.
And Bradley Bernstein, graduate student at UCLA, presented the experience of Yiddish immigrants to Los Angeles through poetry. This fascinating session discussed some of the forces behind Jewish immigration to Los Angeles at the beginning of the 20th Century and explored reactions to this new home in Southern California.
Below is Bradley's translation of a poem entitled "Boyle Heights" by Kh. Goldovsky, published in Pasifik in March 1929 (Ed. H Rosenblatt).
A wind that whistles around your street corners, whispering
"Let me turn the basket over!" - "No, I'll turn it over!"
Brings the guest who spreads before me
A mixture of oranges, cinnamon and herring.
To hear a Yiddish word or joke does my heart good
Making it jealous of my ears for being the first to hear them.
From each window a fiddle or piano plays for me
In a mix of oranges, cinnamon and herring.
Here I am - and I am here - bombarded in all directions
The longing for "basar, kosher" signs and a familiar "sholem-aleykhem"
Boyle Heights in distant west-land, in the city of the "angels."
A mixture of oranges, cinnamon and herring.
The participants in our "Yiddish LA" session found this poem fascinating for the way its imagery mixes the traditional (herring) with the fruits of the poet's new home (oranges). What do you think? Let us know!
10/20 - Una Noche Idishe: an Argentine Yiddish Experience
Evening of dance, music, comedy, and film
Saturday October 20th, 8:30 pm
At the REDCAT
The rich Jewish/Yiddish culture of Argentina is celebrated in a boisterous trilingual evening of dance, film, Yiddish tangos, klezmer music, theater and comedy. The performance features artists that embrace both their Eastern European Jewish and Argentine identities...
Click here to read more!
View pictures and video from the event here.
Click here to see the winners of the Una Noche Idishe Raffle.
5/31 - Why Study Yiddish?
Celebration & Discussion
Thursday May 31st, 8:00 pm
at the Workmen's Circle
1525 S. Robertson Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90035
(Just south of Pico Blvd. Street Parking available.)
$5 suggested contribution.
For reservations, call us at (213) 389-8880 or E-mail us.
Yiddishkayt Los Angeles presents an evening of celebration, retrospection, and discussion.
Two years ago we embarked on a landmark project to reintroduce Yiddish language instruction in Jewish day schools. Hundreds of lessons, tests and grades later, we celebrate the achievements of our students and our Educator, Hannah Pollin. As we plan the next few years of our project, we reflect on our experiences and discuss the future of Yiddish education. Join us as we examine the question: Why Study Yiddish?
How do we make Yiddish relevant today? What is the place of Yiddish in Jewish Education? Why is it important for teenagers to learn Yiddish?
These questions and more will be explored in discussion with our panel of meyvens. Panel to include David Ackerman, Director of Educational Services at the Bureau of Jewish Education; Beba Leventhal, graduate of original Yiddish school in Vilna, Lithuania; Lilke Majzner, Yiddish Educator and President of the L.A. Yiddish Culture Club; and Hannah Pollin. Followed by reception with live music.
4/28 & 29 - L.A. Times Festival of Books
Yiddishkayt Los Angeles and
the National Yiddish Book Center
April 28th and 29th
UCLA
We are very excited to announce that Yiddishkayt Los Angeles has teamed up with the National Yiddish Book Center (of Amherst, Massachusetts) to bring Yiddish bikher to the L.A. Times Festival of Books!
Visit our joint booth (#704) on Saturday at 1:00 pm for a book signing with Alana Newhouse, editor of "The Living Lens: Photographs of Jewish Life from the Pages of the Forward" and on Sunday at 10:00 am for a book signing with Ellis Weiner and Barbara Davilman, authors of "Yiddish with Dick and Jane" and "Yiddish with George and Laura." And visit our booth anytime to learn about the National Yiddish Book Center, red a bisl Yidish, and peruse our selection of books and CDs for sale.
Help us bring Yiddish to the Festival of Books! We need volunteers to make it happen. Contact us at events@yiddishkaytla.org for more information.
4/23 - The World Was Ours
Film Screening
Monday April 23, 7:30 pm
University of Judaism
Featuring panel discussion with filmmaker and experts. Part of the Los Angeles Jewish Film Festival. Tickets are $10 (General Admission) and $8 (Students/Seniors/JCC Members).
Join us as we present The World Was Ours, a remarkable documentary film focusing on the history of the vibrant Jewish community of Vilna, 'the Jerusalem of Lithuania.' The film depicts the hopes, dreams and remarkable achievements of inter-war life in Vilna (then Poland, now Vilnius, Lithuania), exploring the cultural atmosphere that produced such illustrious figures as Chaim Soutine, Jacques Lipchitz, Jascha Heifetz, Avram Sutzkever, Chaim Grade, Joseph Buloff, and The Vilna Troupe, to name a few. The community's dedication to culture and education was so strong that, during the Holocaust, its people risked their lives to save precious books and documents from destruction. "It's important for the world to know how we lived," says one survivor, "not only how we died." This film tells their story. Narrated by Mandy Patinkin.
Discussion to follow with a panel including the filmmaker, Mira Jedwabnik Van Doren; Vilna Ghetto survivor, Beba Leventhal; and Fulbright Fellow in Lithuania in 2003, Hannah Pollin. Moderated by Adam Rubin, Assistant Professor of Jewish History at Hebrew Union College, who specializes in the history of Jewish culture and politics in Eastern Europe.
Click here to purchase tickets in advance. Check out the full schedule of screenings at the L.A. Jewish Film Festival.
4/21 - East and West
Film Screening
Saturday April 21, 9:00 pm
Billy Wilder Theater,
UCLA Hammer Museum
Advanced Seating Sold Out! Standby seating available (in first-come, first-served fashion) immediately before event.
Presented by Nextbook in partnership with UCLA Film and Television Archive and Yiddishkayt LA.
Film critic Kenneth Turan hosts an evening of Jewish silent films accompanied by live music. Films to be screened are D.W. Griffith's short A Child of the Ghetto, and East and West, starring Molly Picon.
Part of Nextbook's Los Angeles Festival of Ideas, "Acting Jewish: Film, TV, Comedy, Music" occuring on Sunday, April 22nd at UCLA. For more info and to purchase tickets to the many lectures and discussions on Sunday, visit Nextbook's festival website.
2/15 - Exploring the Riches of Yiddish Music, Past and Present
Red Yiddish Event
Thursday February 15th, 8:00 pm
at LACE (Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions)
An exclusive Red Yiddish event
with Lorin Sklamberg of The Klezmatics
Join Lorin Sklamberg for an audio tour of the YIVO archives, a discussion of the impact of the archives on the remarkable Klezmer renaissance, and a performance of contemporary Klezmatics songs influenced by rare holdings in the archive. Followed by a reception mit a gleyzele vayn.Watch clips of the event on our youTube channel:
For more information on past events and festivals produced by Yiddishkayt LA, please e-mail us or call (213) 389-8880.
