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Tue, Mar 19
01:00PM ET
Tue, Mar 19
01:00PM ET

discussion

Reimagining the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict - Live on Zoom

As the war in Gaza continues, a debate is unfolding over the future governance and status of Gaza. Join YIVO for a discussion with Marwan Muasher, Vice President for Studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and former Jordanian foreign minister and deputy prime minister, about Muasher's views on “the day after” in Gaza. In this conversation, led by former US Ambassador to Israel Daniel C. Kurtzer, Muasher will lay out his perspective on past failed peace processes, his own recently proposed framework for a peace process going forward, and his assessment of the likely alternatives to a durable peace.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council.

Ticket Info: Free; registration is required.


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discussion

Tue, Mar 19
06:30PM ET
Tue, Mar 19
06:30PM ET

book talk

Postwar Stories  How Books Made Judaism American - In-person Event

Postwar Stories: How Books Made Judaism American - In-person Event

Join author Rachel Gordan for an in-person discussion of her new book Postwar Stories: How Books Made Judaism American with moderator Dara Horn.

Drawing on several archives, magazine articles, and nearly-forgotten bestsellers, Postwar Stories examines how Jewish middlebrow literature helped to shape post-Holocaust American Jewish identity. For both Jews and non-Jews accustomed to anti-Semitic tropes and images, positive depictions of Jews had a normalizing effect. Maybe Jews were just like other Americans, after all.

At the same time, anti-antisemitism novels and “Introduction to Judaism” literature helped to popularize the idea of Judaism as an American religion. In the process, these two genres contributed to a new form of Judaism–one that fit within the emerging myth of America as a Judeo-Christian nation, and yet displayed new confidence in revealing Judaism’s divergences from Christianity.

Ticket Info: $10 General Admission, $30 Admission + copy of the book ($5 discount)


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book talk

Wed, Mar 20
07:30PM ET
Wed, Mar 20
07:30PM ET

concert

An Original Purimspiel - In-person Event

In partnership with the American Society of Jewish Music and the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, this event will include musicians from the Mannes School of Music and the School of Jazz and Contemporary Music and performers from The School of Drama. The “Purim Spiel" — a dramatic and festive telling of the story of Esther, Mordechai, Haman, and King Ahasuerus will be punctuated by thrilling performances of klezmer music. Costumes are not required but are certainly welcome!

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council.

Ticket Info: $18; YIVO members, ASJM members, CJH members: $12; Seniors & students: $9


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concert

Thu, Mar 21
12:30PM ET
Thu, Mar 21
12:30PM ET

conversation

At Lunch with Sally Fischer     Live on Zoom

At Lunch with Sally Fischer – Live on Zoom

Julie Salamon (New York Times best-selling author) sits down with Sally Fischer, Founder and President of Sally Fischer Public Relations based in New York City. Sally was born and raised in New York City, and as a teenager Fischer moved to Florence, Italy where she completed High School and University studies, living in Italy for ten years. Upon moving back to the United States Fischer knew that staying connected to Italy was her life-long goal and has dedicated her career to promoting the Best of Italy: the finest films, the food and wine, the regions, and cities, even the Winter Olympics of 2006 based in Torino. Fischer’s goal has been to create a cultural bridge between Italy and the United States and to promote all that Italy has to offer. In 2018, Sally Fischer was awarded the distinguished Italian decoration: Cavaliere dell’Ordine della Stella d’Italia by the President of the Republic of Italy, the Honorable Sergio Mattarella. Fischer resides in Manhattan with her husband and son.

Ticket Info: Free; register at ajhs.org/events/at-lunch-with-sally-fischer/ for a Zoom link


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conversation

Thu, Mar 21
07:00PM ET
Thu, Mar 21
07:00PM ET

celebration

Is Anything Okay? The History of Jews and Comedy in America - In-person and Live on Zoom

Celebrate the launch of Is Anything Okay? The History of Jews and Comedy in America, our newest online course about Jewish comedy, which delves into the history of Jewish comedy and its development in the United States. Join us for a panel discussion with lead scholar Eddy Portnoy and special guests Judy Gold and Alan Zweibel as they consider the diverse world of Jewish comedy past, present, and future.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council.

Ticket Info: Free, registration is required.


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celebration

Mon, Mar 25
01:00PM ET
Mon, Mar 25
01:00PM ET

discussion

Colonialism, Racism, and the Arab Israeli War of 1948 - Live on Zoom

In 1947, a two-thirds majority of the members of the United Nations, an organization which took its name from the term for the Allies fighting against Nazi Germany, voted to establish an Arab, and a Jewish state on what had been British Mandate Palestine. Supporters of the Jewish state, and the Zionists themselves, viewed that project as an anti-colonial, anti-racist, and as a continuation of the anti-fascist passions of World War II. The Arab opponents, at the time and since, denounced the establishment of Israel as precisely the opposite, that is, an example of colonialism, racism, and in Soviet era propaganda even a form of Nazism. Historian Benny Morris has written extensively about the causes and nature of the war of 1948, and the controversies that have surrounded it ever since. Historian Jeffrey Herf has examined the international politics surrounding Israel’s establishment. In conversation, Morris and Herf will explore these issues and the way they influence contemporary discussions.

Buy the books from this series.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council.

Ticket Info: Free; registration is required.


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discussion

Wed, Mar 27
01:00PM ET
Wed, Mar 27
01:00PM ET

lecture

Yiddish and Hebrew Little Magazines in the Weimar Republic - Live on Zoom

In this talk, Barbara Mann will discuss the "little magazine," a staple of modernist Jewish culture which flourished in the Weimar Republic. The little magazine is a distinctively portable and collaborative genre, an appropriate venue for the migrant, cosmopolitan mix of Berlin’s interwar Jewish population. Each issue blended poetry, manifestos and visual arts to create a unique form of cultural expression. Mann will explore the publishing history of Yiddish and Hebrew little magazines, their content, physical features, and readership.

About the Speaker
Barbara E. Mann is the inaugural holder of the Stephen H. Hoffman Professorship in Modern Hebrew Language and Literature at Case Western Reserve University. She is the author of A Place in History: Modernism, Tel Aviv and the Creation of Jewish Urban Space (Stanford, 2006) and Space and Place in Jewish Studies (Rutgers, 2012).

Ticket Info: Free; registration is required.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council.


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lecture

Wed, Mar 27
06:30PM ET
Wed, Mar 27
06:30PM ET

book talk

The Money Kings  The Epic Story of the Jewish Immigrants Who Transformed Wall Street and Shaped Modern America - In-person Event

The Money Kings: The Epic Story of the Jewish Immigrants Who Transformed Wall Street and Shaped Modern America - In-person Event

Join AJHS and LBI for a discussion with The Money Kings author Daniel Schulman and  Susie J. Pak author of Gentlemen Bankers.

The Money Kings is the incredible saga of the German-Jewish immigrants—with now familiar names like Goldman and Sachs, Kuhn and Loeb, Warburg and Schiff, Lehman and Seligman—who profoundly influenced the rise of modern finance (and so much more), from the New York Times best-selling author of Sons of Wichita.

Joseph Seligman arrived in the United States in 1837, with the equivalent of $100 sewn into the lining of his pants. Then came the Lehman brothers, who would open a general store in Montgomery, Alabama. Not far behind were Solomon Loeb and Marcus Goldman, among the “Forty-Eighters” fleeing a Germany that had relegated Jews to an underclass.  These industrious immigrants would soon go from peddling trinkets and buying up shopkeepers’ IOUs to forming what would become some of the largest investment banks in the world—Goldman Sachs, Kuhn Loeb, Lehman Brothers, J. & W. Seligman & Co. They would clash and collaborate with J. P. Morgan, E. H. Harriman, Jay Gould, and other famed tycoons of the era. And their firms would help to transform the United States from a debtor nation into a financial superpower, capitalizing American industry and underwriting some of the twentieth century’s quintessential companies, like General Motors, Macy’s, and Sears. Along the way, they would shape the destiny not just of American finance but of the millions of Eastern European Jews who spilled off steamships in New York Harbor in the early 1900s, including Daniel Schulman’s paternal grandparents.

Ticket Info: $10 General Admission or $40 Admission + Copy of The Money Kings ($5 discount)


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book talk

Thu, Mar 28
07:00PM ET
Thu, Mar 28
07:00PM ET

concert

In a Dark Blue Night - In-person Event

Celebrate the release of in a dark blue night, the follow-up to Alex Weiser’s Pulitzer Prize nominated debut album and all the days were purple.

A love letter to New York City, in a dark blue nightfeatures acclaimed singer Annie Rosen with a seven-piece chamber ensemble and comprises two song cycles that explore Jewish immigrant New York City. The first cycle, in a dark blue night, features five settings of Yiddish poetry written by newly arrived immigrants in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Coney Island Days follows and sets to music words from an oral history interview with Weiser’s grandmother about childhood in the bilingual immigrant world of Coney Island in the 1930s and ‘40s.

Join YIVO to celebrate the release of this album with performances, discussion, and a post-concert reception. The album, which will be released by Cantaloupe Music on Friday, March 29, 2024, will be available for pre-release purchase and signing after the concert.

The Sidney Krum Young Artists Concert Series is made possible by a generous gift from the Estate of Sidney Krum.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council. 

Ticket Info: Free; registration is required


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concert

Sun, Mar 31
01:00PM ET
Sun, Mar 31
01:00PM ET

symposium

Moses Mendelssohn Returns to Jerusalem - In-person Event

Moses Mendelssohn Returns to Jerusalem - In-person Event

This symposium marks the first Hebrew translation of Moses Mendelssohn's Jerusalem in seventy-five years.

Moses Mendelssohn (1729–1786) wrote Jerusalem with his back to the wall. His Jewish identity and liberal outlook were challenged in the public sphere of the German Enlightenment, and this was his last opportunity to write a book that would perpetuate the essence of his faith and his values as the first modern Jewish humanist. The work, which moves between apologetics for his faith and political and religious philosophy was primarily a daring essay that categorically denied the rule of religion and advocated tolerance and freedom of thought. Neither the state nor the church had the right to govern a person’s conscience; and, no less far-reaching and pioneering: these values are consistent with Judaism. In the summer of 1783, seven years after the resounding voice of protest against tyranny and in favor of liberty and equality was heard in the American Declaration of Independence, less than six years before the French Revolution, but only two years and two months before his death, the man who was called the “German Socrates,” a highly prominent figure in the Enlightenment, published one of the fundamental documents in Jewish modernity.

Featuring a Talk By:
Dr. Shmuel Feiner, Professor Emeritus of Modern Jewish History, Bar-Ilan University; Editor of the new translation of Jerusalem.

Moderated By:
Professor Michah GottliebNYU

With Responses By:
Professor Shira BilletJewish Theological Seminary
Professor Leah HochmanHebrew Union College
Jonathan GreenNYU

With Concluding Reflections By:
Professor Jacob J. SchacterYeshiva University

Organized by Skirball Department of Hebrew and Judaic Studies, New York University and LBI, co-sponsored by Bernard Revel Graduate School of Jewish Studies, Center for Jewish History, Hebrew Union College – Jewish Institute of Religion, and JTS Hendel Center for Ethics and Justice.

Ticket Info: Free; reservations required


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symposium

Sun, Mar 31
03:00PM ET
Sun, Mar 31
03:00PM ET

discussion

Why Spinoza Matters Now: Truth and Freedom in America Today - In-person Event

Join us for a lively and timely discussion celebrating the launch of Ian Buruma’s new book, Spinoza: Freedom’s Messiah. Buruma will be joined on the panel by Steven Nadler, Rebecca Newberger Goldstein, & Clémence Boulouque

350 years after his death, the philosophy of Baruch Spinoza remains vitally relevant — especially in this period of deep political division and with the threat to liberal democracy not only in Europe and elsewhere, but right here at home. Spinoza was the most open and important proponent of democracy, toleration, politics free from religious sectarian interference, and freedom of expression in the early modern period. He was also “cancelled” (Herem) by Amsterdam’s Jewish community.

See this New Yorker review, “Baruch Spinoza and the Art of Thinking in Dangerous Times,” as well as Buruma’s latest, “The 17th-Century Heretic We Could Really Use Now,” in The New York Times.

Ticket Info: $15-$500


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discussion

Mon, Apr 01
07:00PM ET
Mon, Apr 01
07:00PM ET

film screening and discussion

Drew Friedman: Vermeer of the Borscht Belt - In-person Event

For years, artist Drew Friedman has chronicled a strange, alternate universe populated by forgotten Hollywood stars, old Jewish comedians and liver-spotted elevator operators. Drew Friedman: Vermeer of the Borscht Belt is an in-depth documentary tracing artist Friedman's evolution from underground comics to the cover of The New Yorker. The film, directed by Kevin Dougherty, features interviews with Friedman's friends and colleagues, including Gilbert Gottfried, Patton Oswalt, Richard Kind, Mike Judge, Merrill Markoe and many others.

Join YIVO for a screening of this new documentary followed by a panel discussion with Friedman, his wife Kathy Bidus, Dougherty, David Letterman band leader Paul Shaffer, actors Craig Bierko and Richard Kind, filmmaker Owen Kline, and comedy writers Tom Leopold and Frank Santopadre, led by YIVO Senior Academic Advisor & Director of Exhibitions Eddy Portnoy.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council.

Ticket Info: $10; YIVO members: $8


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film screening and discussion

Tue, Apr 02
06:30PM ET
Tue, Apr 02
06:30PM ET

lecture

Stolpertexte in Translation - In-person Event

Stolpertexte in Translation - In-person Event

The LBI Archives hold tens of thousands of family collections that include diaries, memoirs, letters, and photographs that document the everyday lives of German-speaking Jews. In LBI's newest project, German-language writers have been invited to engage with these collections and the people described in them in short literary texts called Stolpertexte. Like their namesake brass memorial plaques, these texts interrupt our daily routines and remind us in the here and now on the lives and hopes of people from whom Nazi terror took everything away.

In addition to some of Germany's leading authors, a new generation of literary talent is also engaged in the project. LBI invites you to meet students from the German Literature Institute in Leipzig, Germany’s premiere creative-writing program, who will read from their own Stolpertexte and a short documentary theater piece. German writer Max Czollek, who holds the Spring 2024 DAAD Chair in Contemporary Poetics at NYU, will discuss literary memory culture in Germany and engage in a discussion with the students. Featuring Nadja EtinskiAmalie Mbianda NjikiTara MeisterKonstantin SchmidtbauerMücahit TürkJonë ZhitiaHannah Beckmann.

Cosponsored by Deutsches Haus at NYU.

Ticket Info: Free; reservations required


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lecture

Thu, Apr 04
01:00PM ET
Thu, Apr 04
01:00PM ET

lecture

The Lodz Ghetto and the Kriminalpolizei: Jews, Neighbors, and Perpetrators in the Holocaust - Live on Zoom

The German criminal police (Kriminalpolizei, or Kripo) maintained a permanent station in the Lodz ghetto, which over the four years of its existence imprisoned some 200,000 Jews. Responsible for stopping smuggling networks and for gathering information about hidden possessions inside and outside the ghetto, the Kripo relied heavily on local ethnic Germans, the so-called Volksdeutsche. These policemen exploited their prewar social networks in their investigations and carried out violent acts against Jews familiar to them. They deployed their Polish and Yiddish language skills in interrogations of suspects, and they used their knowledge of Jewish religious practices and local customs to spy on the Jews and later to evaluate their confiscated property.

In this talk, Winson Chu focuses on how police records in Poland and survivor sources at YIVO enable a better understanding of such prewar connections with wartime perpetrators. By providing additional detail and context to existing accounts of ghetto experiences, this approach re-embeds Jews into interethnic relations in prewar Lodz and Nazi-occupied Poland and questions the common perception of the Lodz ghetto as “hermetically sealed.”

Ticket Info: Free; registration is required.


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lecture

Thu, Apr 04
07:30PM ET
Thu, Apr 04
07:30PM ET

lecture

“Juden, Baptized and Unbaptized”: Jewishness and Ferdinand Hiller’s 'Israel’s Siegesgesang' - Live on Zoom

German composer Ferdinand Hiller (1811-85) lived and worked throughout a period of tumultuous change, marked by unprecedented movement (both geographic and socio-economic), active assimilation, and formalized emancipation for the Jews of German-speaking Europe. A piano prodigy and student of Hummel, he was a direct contemporary of Felix Mendelssohn, with whom he was personally and professionally close. Hiller, who was baptized at the age of 29, had a complex engagement with Jewishness and Judaism, which has thus been variously essentialized as a pervasive part of his identity to mere circumstance of birth, ignored and forgotten. Of several compositions explicitly engaging with Jewish texts, his 1840 oratorio, Die Zerstörung Jerusalems, was a widely acclaimed success throughout Germany and beyond, whereas Hiller’s eight-movement choral work, Israel’s Siegesgesang, op. 151 (1871) had a more modest initial reception.

This presentation shows how Hiller, by this point a well-established teacher and musical authority on the classical and early romantic traditions, used Psalm and other texts from the Hebrew Bible in Israel’s Siegesgesang to reflect current political sentiment following the Battle of Sedan, which ended the Franco-Prussian war of 1870. Amanda Ruppenthal-Stein will trace this work’s appearance from German-speaking Europe to English audiences in London, Cincinnati, Boston, and San Francisco, and finally in the 1897 edition of the Union Hymnal, showing how not only did Hiller clearly recognize his Jewish heritage and engage with it in varied ways throughout his life, but also the recognition of him as member of the broader Jewish community, regardless of his baptismal status.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council. 

Ticket Info: Free; registration is required.


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lecture

Sun, Apr 07
10:00AM ET
Sun, Apr 07
10:00AM ET

symposium

Reconsidering Jewish Migration to the United States  A Century of Controversy     In-person   live on Zoom

Reconsidering Jewish Migration to the United States: A Century of Controversy – In-person & live on Zoom

Reconsidering Jewish Migration to the United States: A Century of Controversy marks the 100th anniversary of the pivotal Johnson-Reed Immigration Act of 1924 by exploring a century of Jewish engagement with immigration at the national and international level. The symposium brings together nationally renowned scholars and experts to examine how the 1924 act restricted immigration from the interwar period to the 1960s, how Jews and other groups were affected, and how the liberalization of immigration law after the 1960s produced major demographic changes in the United States and set the stage for contemporary political controversies over the role of immigration in American life. 

Click here for a list of panels and speakers.

Speakers will be selling and signing books throughout the day. At the conclusion of the symposium, please join us for a wine and cheese reception to celebrate the opening of a related exhibition, Crossing the Ocean. Three Waves of German Jewish Immigration to the United States, presented by the Leo Baeck Institute.

The symposium is generously sponsored by the Selz Foundation, the David Berg Foundation, and supplemented by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council.

Photo Credit: Coming to America, 1952, Louis Stettner, © Louis Stettner Estate 2024

Ticket Info:
In-person tickets: $36 general; $28 members
Zoom: Pay what you wish
Click here to register

Tickets include lunch and a wine and cheese reception after the program.


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symposium

Sun, Apr 07
05:30PM ET
Sun, Apr 07
05:30PM ET

exhibit opening

Crossing the Ocean Exhibit Opening - In-person Event

Crossing the Ocean Exhibit Opening - In-person Event

Based on personal accounts from the LBI Archives, this exhibition explores how the experience of German-speaking Jews coming to America changed between the 1840s and 1950s. It emphasizes the often-marginalized aspect of the migration history, the decision-making, and crossing the ocean in the search for a better life. While showing various aspects of the immigration process and practicalities, the exhibition focuses on the role of transnational contacts between past and prospective immigrants. The strength of one's contacts in the United States could make or break an immigration attempt. The story encompasses three waves of immigration: the 19th century, 1933–1941, and post-World War II. In the year of the 100th Anniversary of the Immigration Act of 1924, which virtually stopped mass immigration to the United States for two generations, immigration, particularly refugees, is still an acute problem of world affairs.

The exhibit will officially open during the symposium Reconsidering Jewish Migration to the United States: A Century of Controversy, organized by the Center for Jewish History on April 7, 2024. 

Ticket Info: Free; reservations required


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exhibit opening

Wed, Apr 10
07:00PM ET
Wed, Apr 10
07:00PM ET

lecture

"The Protocols of the Elders of Zion" in Court: The Bern Trial (1933-1935) and the "Antisemitic International" - In-person Event & Live on Zoom

Between 1933 and 1935, a trial was held in Bern against members of the Swiss extreme right-wing National Front who had distributed “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion,” a widely disseminated antisemitic publication that spread lies about Jews. The real target of the Jewish organization’s fascist movements.

During the course of the trial, both sides received ample support in the form of material assistance and propaganda. The defendants and their supporters in Nazi Germany were able to rely on an extensive network that had been established in the early 1920s to combat “Judaeo-Bolshevism.” This conspiratorial “Antisemitic International” united German völkisch circles, Italian fascists, Russian monarchists, and French conspiracy theorists. On the other side, the plaintiffs, who actively sought to expose the “Protocols” as a forgery in the hope that this would counteract their impact.

In this lecture, Michael Hagemeister will use the Bern trial as a case study of Jewish legal self-defense in order to shed light on both the “Protocols of the Elders of Zion” and the concerted efforts against the “Antisemitic International” in the 1930s, which have received little attention from historians.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council. 

Ticket Info: Free; registration is required.


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lecture

Thu, Apr 11
11:00AM ET
Thu, Apr 11
11:00AM ET

lecture

Family History Today  Belarus Archive Searches     Live on Zoom

Family History Today: Belarus Archive Searches – Live on Zoom

Many people seeking information about their Jewish ancestors in Belarus are quickly deterred because there are so few relevant records online. Until those records go online, genealogy research requires traveling to the Belarus Archives, mainly in Minsk and Grodno, and navigating large registers and document collections handwritten in Russian, which isn’t feasible for most Jews with Belarussian roots today. The London-based non-profit, The Together Plan (TTP), employs a team of Belarussian archivists who will search the Archives for records of your family for a reasonable fee, a portion of which supports TTP’s numerous on-the-ground efforts to revitalize Jewish communities in Belarus today. In this presentation, Carl Kaplan and Vasily Zaitsau, TTP’s Archive Services Caseworker in Boston and Archive Services Coordinator in Minsk, will explain how to initiate a genealogy research request with TTP, what their research process entails, and what kinds of results you may expect to receive from them, with examples of discoveries made for previous clients.

Ticket Info: Pay what you wish; register here


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lecture

Fri, Apr 12
01:00PM ET
Fri, Apr 12
01:00PM ET

class

All in the Mishpocheh  Part II  Jewish Genealogy Beyond the Basics  - Online Course

All in the Mishpocheh, Part II: Jewish Genealogy Beyond the Basics - Online Course

10-session online course (via Zoom)
Fridays, 1:00-2:15 PM ET
April 12 – June 14, 2024

Join the librarians of the Center for Jewish History’s Ackman & Ziff Family Genealogy Institute for this 10-week intermediate-level online course, designed for those who are familiar with the major online databases like Ancestry and JewishGen, as well as basic search strategies for Jewish names and ancestral towns, and at least a few relevant offline resources, such as reference books or archival records. NOTE: You don’t need to complete our beginner-level online course (Intro to Jewish Genealogy at CJH) to join this one. That said, we certainly welcome and encourage all our former students to continue their research journey with us. Topics will include strategies for getting past your “brick walls,” Jewish immigration after the Great Wave, tools for analyzing your DNA matches, tracking down lesser-known record types, digital preservation, artificial intelligence, and more. By the end of this course, you will have compiled the first portion of your family history narrative and will be equipped with the tools to complete it on your own!

Students are encouraged to participate live but are welcome to watch or review class recordings as needed.

FAQ

Can I contact the instructor outside of class time?
Absolutely! One unique aspect of this course is that our instructors not only permit, but encourage, their students to reach out to them beyond the class time – via email, video chat, or in-person visits. Former students say this one-on-one availability was instrumental in their personal research progress, providing the tailored guidance they needed to chart their research path.

Will I get personal feedback?
Yes. Your instructor will give you feedback on your assignments and your personal research questions either during or between classes. Your fellow students may also offer their advice during class.

Registration Info: $295 general; $255 CJH members (members are those who have donated $50 or more to the Center in the past year); click here to register


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class

Fri, Apr 12
01:00PM ET
Fri, Apr 12
01:00PM ET

lecture

Restitution  Mourning  and Memory in the Early Federal Republic     Live on Zoom

Restitution, Mourning, and Memory in the Early Federal Republic – Live on Zoom

In this lecture, CJH NEH Scholar in Residence Helmut Walser Smith (Vanderbilt University) follows the postwar story of a group of Holocaust survivors from the small Swabian town of Haigerloch and argues that their restitution claims, while hedged in by legal categories, constituted an early form of truth telling. Focusing especially on the Buttenhausen Memorial erected in 1961, the presentation then shifts to public claims for truth about the Holocaust in the form of early commemoration. Although located in a village, this monument was essentially put up by Jews in New York and was less an act of memory than it was a form of mourning. The chapter concludes by asking when, where, and how the transition occurred to the first memorials erected by non-Jewish Germans. The presentation draws from the third chapter of the author's book-in-progress, tentatively entitled "Local Truth: How Jews and Germans made the Memory Culture of the Federal Republic."

About the Speakers
Helmut Walser Smith is the Martha Rivers Ingram Professor of History at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee, and currently NEH Scholar in Residence at the Center for Jewish History in New York. His books have appeared in six languages and include German Nationalism and Religious Conflict: Culture, Ideology, Politics, 1870-1914 (Princeton, 1995), The Butcher’s Tale: Murder and Antisemitism in a German Town (W.W. Norton, 2002), The Continuities of German History (Cambridge University Press, 2008), and Germany: A Nation in its Time: Before, During, and After Nationalism (W.W. Norton/Liveright, 2020). He is also the editor of The Oxford Handbook of Modern German History (Oxford University Press, 2011) and a number of other edited volumes. Over the years, his research has been supported by the NEH, the German Academic Exchange, the Volkswagen Foundation, the Humboldt Foundation, and the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. He is currently working on a book with the tentative title "Local Truth: How Jews and Germans made the Memory Culture of the Federal Republic."

Michael Brenner (respondent) holds the chair of Jewish History and Culture at Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich. He is also Distinguished Professor of History and Seymour and Lillian Abensohn Chair in Israel Studies at American University and serves as International President of the Leo Baeck Institute for the Study of German-Jewish History. In 2021 he was the first recipient of the Baron Award for Scholarly Excellence in Research of the Jewish Experience. He is the author of ten books, translated into over a dozen languages. His latest books are In Hitler’s Munich: Jews, the Revolution, and the Rise of Nazism(Princeton University Press, 2022) and In Search of Israel: The History of an Idea (Princeton University Press, 2018).

Ticket Info: Pay what you wish; register here for a zoom link


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lecture

Mon, Apr 15
07:30PM ET
Mon, Apr 15
07:30PM ET

film screening

String Trio  Los Angeles 1946 - In-person Event

String Trio, Los Angeles 1946 - In-person Event

Join us for a 150-year celebration of Arnold Schoenberg (1874-1951), one of the 20th century’s most important and influential composers.

The event will feature the New York City premiere of a film by David Starobin, “String Trio, Los Angeles 1946" a documentary about Schoenberg. In August of 1946, Schoenberg's heart stopped beating. He composed "String Trio” immediately after his recuperation to try and describe his brush with death.

The documentary looks back at Schoenberg's 1933 departure from Nazi Germany, his career, and the composer's years in Los Angeles. In the film Gertrud and Arnold Schoenberg's three children, Nuria, Ronald, and Lawrence comment about their memories of their father, and well-known director Peter Sellars and violist Kim Kashkashian speak about the "String Trio."

After the film, there will be a panel discussion.

Ticket Info: Free; registration is required.


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film screening

Tue, Apr 16
01:00PM ET
Tue, Apr 16
01:00PM ET

panel discussion

Responses to October 7th - Live on Zoom

Historian Jeffrey Herf will lead a panel exploring responses to Hamas’ October 7th massacres and to the state of Israel’s subsequent military response. Meir Litvak will discuss his scholarship on the Islamization of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; Norman Goda will examine rules of war, civilian casualties, and accusations of genocide; Karin Stögner will discuss theories of race and intersectionality and anti-Zionism, and the gendered aspects of the violence of October 7; and David Hirsh will examine the nature of leftist anti-Zionism that achieved predominance for some years in the British Labor Party.

Buy the books from this series.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council.

Ticket Info: Free; registration is required.


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panel discussion

Wed, Apr 17
07:30PM ET
Wed, Apr 17
07:30PM ET

concert

Opera and Democracy  Songs from Exile - In-person Event

Opera and Democracy: Songs from Exile - In-person Event

The concert introduces two German-Jewish composers in American exile: Paul Aron and Rosy Geiger-Kullmann. Aron, a protagonist of the German interwar avant-garde, founded an opera company in New York in the 1950s to popularize the works of émigrés such as Darius Milhaud, Kurt Weill, Tadeusz Kassern, and Ernst Toch through piano arrangements and English translations. One of these - his English version of Toch’s short opera Egon & Emilie - will be presented alongside exile songs by Aron. Geiger-Kullmann, a successful opera composer of the Weimar Republic, was born in Frankfurt and fled from the Nazis to New York and later to Monterey. Excerpts from her opera Columbus, written after her arrival in New York, and two stage works from her years in Germany have been reconstructed and will be performed in excerpts – a world premiere.

Opera and Democracy: Listening to Exile is a series of concerts and discussions co-hosted by 1014 – space for ideas, the Austrian Cultural Forum New York, the Goethe-Institut, the Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin, and American Society for Jewish Music. It is initiated by Thomas Mann House and curated by Thomas Mann Fellow Kai Hinrich Müller.

Ticket Info: Free; registration is required.


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concert

Thu, Apr 18
07:00PM ET
Thu, Apr 18
07:00PM ET

performance

Miryeml - In-person Event & Live on Zoom

Tea Arciszewska's Miryeml was heralded as a powerful memorial to the million children murdered in the Holocaust. This nearly-forgotten modernist masterpiece is now available in English translation for the first time.

Arciszewska was a dazzling figure in the prewar Warsaw Yiddish culture scene – an actress, dramaturge, salon hostess, and muse to the renowned Yiddish writer I. L. Peretz. In the 1920s, she began writing a play about the experiences of children during the pogroms that followed World War I. She worked on it for decades, first publishing Miryeml in 1958. Yiddish critics praised the play, seeing it as a powerful response to the Holocaust. They recognized the character Miryeml as an extraordinary figure in Yiddish drama. The play received an Alexander Shapiro Prize from the Congress for Jewish Culture for Best Yiddish Drama.

Miryeml is a modernist work that deftly integrates twentieth-century history and Jewish folklore into a narrative about children’s response to trauma, challenging our expectations of Yiddish theatre.

Directed by Allen Lewis Rickman, this “rehearsed reading” will be performed in Sonia Gollance’s new English translation.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council.

Ticket Info: In-person admission is $15, and $10 for YIVO members and students. The Zoom livestream is free. Register at https://yivo.org/Miryeml for tickets.


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performance

Thu, May 02
01:00PM ET
Thu, May 02
01:00PM ET

workshop

How to Do Research at YIVO: Reading a Finding Aid - Live on Zoom

The Archives and Library at the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research represent the single largest and most comprehensive collection of materials on Eastern European Jewish civilization in the world. With 24 million unique items in the YIVO Archives and nearly 400,000 volumes in all European languages in YIVO's Library, the possibilities for research are endless.

Join YIVO’s Reference and Outreach Archivist Ruby Landau-Pincus for a workshop on reading YIVO finding aids. A finding aid is a document that covers the background of an archival collection as well as a description of the materials within the collection and how they are arranged. This workshop will cover what information researchers can expect to discover in a finding aid and will provide an overview of a range of finding aid formats, from digital finding aids to legacy finding aids and other resources available for navigating collections in the YIVO Archives.

This event is open to anyone interested in doing research at YIVO or learning more about YIVO’s vast collections.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council. 

Ticket Info: Free; registration is required.


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workshop

Tue, May 07
07:00PM ET
Tue, May 07
07:00PM ET

concert

Yiddish and Hebrew Song in the Weimar Republic

The Weimar Republic era contained a hotbed of Jewish musical activity. Following World War I, there was a spike of curiosity about Eastern European Jewry and Yiddish, which inspired many German-Jewish composers—from Cantor Leon Kornitzer to avant garde composer Stefan Wolpe—to explore Yiddish folksong in their music. At the same time, Berlin and Vienna acted as important publishing centers for the Jibneh Edition. In addition to featuring music of some German-Jewish composers such as Aron M. Rothmüller and Israel Brandmann, Jibneh Edition disseminated music of composers born in the Russian Empire associated with the Society for Jewish Folk Music such as Joel Engel, Joseph Achron, Michael Gnessin, and Alexander Krein, as well as the great Yiddish song composer Lazar Weiner writing in America. This rich musical activity bridged communities active in the East and West and reflected the linguistically and ideologically diverse aspirations of Jewish composers of its time. Join YIVO for a concert exploring Yiddish and Hebrew songs of the Weimar Republic.

Ticket Info: In-person admission is $15, and $10 for YIVO members and students. The Zoom livestream is free. Register at https://yivo.org/Weimar-Song for tickets.


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concert

Wed, May 08
07:30PM ET
Wed, May 08
07:30PM ET

concert

Will There Still Be Singing  A Hanns Eisler Cabaret - In-person Event

Will There Still Be Singing? A Hanns Eisler Cabaret - In-person Event

The Leo Baeck Institute and the American Society for Jewish Music invite you for a night of live music.

Soprano Karyn Levitt performs Eric Bentley’s English versions of the songs of Hanns Eisler and Bertolt Brecht, one of the 20th century’s great songwriting teams. Levitt’s close working relationship with Bentley, the foremost translator of Brecht’s lyrics and plays, gave her the opportunity of a lifetime to consult with the source of these acclaimed translations.

Karyn Levitt, Soprano<
The Hanns Eisler Trio
Eric Ostling, Musical Director and Piano
Michael Unger, Director

Ticket Info: Free; registration required


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concert

Tue, May 14
01:00PM ET
Tue, May 14
01:00PM ET

concert

Jewish Songs and Dances for Piano: Jacob Weinberg’s "Ten Jewish Songs" (1933) - Live on YouTube

Join us for a performance of Jacob Weinberg’s Ten Jewish Songs (1933): a collection of Jewish folksongs, holiday songs, dances, and Hasidic nigunim in piano arrangements. Published by the Bloch Publishing Company, these arrangements were meant for use in homes and schools. Born in Odessa and educated at the Moscow Conservatory of Music, Weinberg was one of the composers of the Society for Jewish Folk Music who pioneered Jewish classical music. Famous for writing the first Hebrew language opera, The Pioneers (Hechalutz), Weinberg was a prolific composer with many songs, choral works, chamber compositions, and oratorios to his name.

This collection of ten pieces will be performed by pianist Thomas Kotcheff.

The Sidney Krum Young Artists Concert Series is made possible by a generous gift from the Estate of Sidney Krum. 

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council.

Ticket Info: Free; registration is required


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concert

Wed, May 15
07:30PM ET
Wed, May 15
07:30PM ET

concert

On Hollywood and Weimar  Songs of European Composers from the Golden Age of Film - In-person Event

On Hollywood and Weimar: Songs of European Composers from the Golden Age of Film - In-person Event

The Leo Baeck Institute and the American Society for Jewish Music invite you for a night of live music with Karyn Levitt, Soprano and Jed Distler, Piano.

Many of Hollywood’s greatest film scores were written by émigré and exiled composers who fled Nazi Europe for Southern California. From dusty westerns and sweeping romances to the thrillers of Alfred Hitchcock, this program celebrates the blending of the old world and the new to produce the uniquely hybrid sound of Hollywood’s Golden Age.

Ticket Info: Free; registration required


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concert

Wed, May 22
07:00PM ET
Wed, May 22
07:00PM ET

concert

Gebirtig's Notebooks - In-person Event & Live on Zoom

Join YIVO Sound Archivist and the Klezmatics’ lead singer Lorin Sklamberg for his first-ever concert of the ballads of the beloved legendary Yiddish bard of Krakow, Mordkhe Gebirtig (1877-1842). The program will focus on the lyrics contained in the precious set of Gebirtig’s hand-written notebooks acquired by the YIVO Archives in 1976. Sklamberg will accompany himself on accordion, piano and guitar in a repertoire including original, contemporary and new musical settings created for this performance. The songs will be presented as written in Gebirtig’s Krakow Yiddish dialect with projected English supertitles.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council.

Ticket Info: $15 YIVO members & students: $10; Live stream: free - registration is required


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concert

Tue, May 28
07:00PM ET
Tue, May 28
07:00PM ET

film screening and discussion

Joseph Brodsky: Epitaph for a Centaur, Six Years Later - In-person Event

Join YIVO and Poetry in America for a panel discussion and screening of a short film examining the life of Joseph Brodsky, the celebrated Russian-Jewish American writer and Nobel Laureate.

Through analyses of two of Brodsky's evocative poems, “Epitaph for a Centaur” and “Six Years Later,” this 25-minute film encapsulates Brodsky's exploration of identity, belonging, and the passage of time. The film examines the paradoxical relationship between the U.S. and Russia during the Cold War, intricately portrayed through the symbolic figure of the centaur—a representation of Brodsky’s own multi-faceted existence as Russian, American, and Jewish. By delving into the intricate language of Brodsky’s poetry, this short film explores Brodsky’s Jewish identity, his legacy, and the political undertones of his writing.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council. 

Ticket Info: Free; registration is required


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film screening and discussion

Thu, May 30
01:00PM ET
Thu, May 30
01:00PM ET

book talk

Neo-Nazi Terrorism and Countercultural Fascism - Live on Zoom

A new wave of aspiring neo-Nazi terrorists has arisen—including the infamous Atomwaffen Division, and they have a bible: James Mason’s Siege, which praises terrorism, serial killers, and Charles Manson. Neo-Nazi Terrorism and Countercultural Fascism: The Origins and Afterlife of James Mason's Siege documents the origins of Siege and shows how Mason’s vision emerged during debates in the 1970s after the splintering of the American Nazi Party/NSWPP. The second part of the book unveils for the first time how four 1980s musicians and publishers—Boyd Rice, Michael Moynihan, Adam Parfrey, and Nikolas Schreck—discovered and promoted the terrorist ideologue.

Join YIVO for a discussion of this book with author Spencer Sunshine.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council. 

Ticket Info: Free; registration is required.


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book talk

Thu, Jun 06
01:00PM ET
Thu, Jun 06
01:00PM ET

book talk

Psychoanalysis and Jewish Languages - Live on Zoom

There is an academic interest in the "Jewish Freud," aiming to detect Jewish influences on Freud, his own feelings about being Jewish, and suppressed traces of Jewishness in his thought. This book takes a different approach, turning its gaze not on Freud but rather on those who seek out his concealed Jewishness. What is it that propels the scholarly aim to show Freud in a Jewish light? Naomi Seidman explores attempts to "touch" Freud (and other famous Jews) through Jewish languages, seeking out his Hebrew name or evidence that he knew some Yiddish. Tracing a history of this drive to bring Freud into Jewish range, Seidman also charts Freud's responses to (and jokes about) this desire. More specifically, she reads the reception and translation of Freud in Hebrew and Yiddish as instances of the desire to touch, feel, "rescue," and connect with the famous professor from Vienna.

Join YIVO for a discussion with Seidman about this newly published book, led by scholar Ken Frieden.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council.

Ticket Info: Free; registration is required.


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book talk

Mon, Jun 24
01:00PM ET
Mon, Jun 24
01:00PM ET

book talk

Homes of the Past - Live on Zoom

In 1940s New York, immigrant Jewish scholars sought to build a museum to commemorate their lost worlds and people. Among the Jews who arrived in the United States in the early 1940s were a small number of Polish scholars who had devoted their professional lives to the study of Europe's Yiddish-speaking Jews at the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research. Faced with the devastating knowledge that returning to their former homes and resuming their scholarly work there was no longer viable, they sought to address their profound sense of loss by continuing their work, under radically different circumstances, to document the European Jewish lives, places, and ways of living that were being destroyed. In pursuing this daunting agenda, they decided to create a museum to memorialize East European Jewry and educate American Jews about this legacy. YIVO scholars determinedly pursued this undertaking for several years, publicizing the initiative and collecting materials to exhibit. However, the Museum of the Homes of the Past was abandoned shortly after the war ended.

Homes of the Past explores this largely unknown episode of modern Jewish history and museum history and demonstrates that the project, even though it was never realized, marked a critical inflection point in the dynamic interrelations between Jews in America and Eastern Europe.

Join YIVO for a discussion with author Jeffrey Shandler about this book, led by Deborah Dash Moore.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council. 

Ticket Info: Free; registration is required.


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book talk