Planning for the Jewish Future: Standards for Yiddish in the 20th and 21st Centuries

Watch the video

How does standardizing Yiddish relate to planning a healthy Jewish future? In this lecture, Dr. Rakhmiel Peltz leads us on a panoramic trip through the struggle for standards in society and Jewish culture. Featuring some of the strongest architects of the Jewish future—Birnbaum, Borokhov, Uriel Weinreich, and Schaechter—Peltz demonstrates how the concern for Yiddish spelling is not only synonymous with creating a future for Yiddish, but with a roadmap for Jewish continuity. Yiddish scholar Dr. Adina Cimet, Dr. Ronnie Perelis (Assistant Professor of Sephardic Studies, Yeshiva University), and Dr. Eddy Portnoy (YIVO; Rutgers) join Dr. Peltz for a discussion about the role of language in the Jewish future after Dr. Peltz's talk.

Supported by the Atran Foundation.

About the Speaker

Rakhmiel Peltz, a specialist in the social history of Yiddish language and culture, is the Founding Director of the Judaic Studies Program and Professor of Sociolinguistics at Drexel University. His numerous articles and publications include “From Immigrant to Ethnic Culture: American Yiddish Culture in South Philadelphia” (Stanford University Press, 1997). Dr. Peltz has been a fellow at the Center for Judaic Studies of the University of Pennsylvania, the Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, and the Patt and Choseed Fellowships at YIVO. He is currently working on a book on Uriel Weinreich’s research oeuvre, as well as a book on the future of the Yiddish language.