Resource Guide

  1. BEGINNER
  2. INTERMEDIATE/ADVANCED
  3. OTHER MASTER LISTS
  4. RESOURCES IN ENGLISH
  5. RESOURCES IN POLISH
  6. TRANSLATION SERVICE OPTIONS AND WHERE TO BUY BOOKS
  7. OTHER INSTAGRAM ACCOUNTS TO FOLLOW
  8. THANK YOU TO

~Follow or check out our Instagram account @yiddishistke to see our posts on Yiddish culture and language!

~@Yiddishistke links organized by post

~Our Golden chain zine featuring the Nazi-resisting Paper Brigade, our thoughts on Yiddish queer cultural transmission, poems in original Yiddish and translation, and new art from our followers

~Our Yiddish music Spotify playlist 

BEGINNER

Resources to learn the alef beys:

  • Yiddish Book Center Chart
  • Yiddish Book Center video
  • Another great chart from Aarhus Universitet
  • A chart from Khayim Beyder, Illustrations by Natalia Kazak
  • Great chart from yiddishwit.com w/guide to YIVO transliteration
  • YIVO chart w/transliteration guide
  • Yiddish alphabet song
  • Help with handwriting
  • How to Learn Yiddish Online from Shuli Elisheva
  • Ashkenazi Greetings & Farewells for the Jewish Calendar Year, a Google doc from Jonah Sampson-Boyarin (Yoyneh Hirsh)

Yiddish keyboards:

  • Open-source Yiddish keyboard from Isaac Bleaman
  • Yiddish keyboard Keyman that you can download or use online (you can type in Latin characters according to YIVO transliteration and it turns then into Yiddish letters)
  • Yiddish multilingual keyboard you can use on the site
  • Yiddish typer in chrome webstore
  • Yiddish typer by Yankl-Perets Blum

Resources to learn Yiddish:

Places offering online classes of various levels

INTERMEDIATE OR ADVANCED

https://www.yiddishbookcenter.org/about/news/yiddish-ocr-live
https://j-air.com.au/the-kadimah-show/
  • Another Australian Yiddish podcast:
https://omny.fm/shows/amol-un-haynt
  • program broadcast from Birobidzhan:
https://biratv.ru/category/novosti-radio/mame-loshn/
  • Swedish Yiddish Sveriges Radio archives:
https://sverigesradio.se/jiddischfaralle
  • Our favorite old Yiddish movies:
    • Mamele
    • Az Men Gibt – Nemt Men 
    • Der Dybbuk
    • Yidl mitn fidl
  • Our favorite new TV shows/movies in Yiddish that are not necessarily widely available:
    • Beyle from the Yiddish Book Center
    • Yiddish: Un film de Nurith Aviv (sometimes in French, sometimes in other languages including Yiddish with French subtitles)
    • Woodski’s World, Swedish Public television show from January 2020 with Tomas Woodski (article)
    • Who Will Write Our History? (mostly in English with some subtitled Yiddish)

OTHER MASTER LISTS:

Pedagogy Resources on In geveb from Zachary Sholem Berger

http://ingeveb.org/pedagogy?tag=resources-in-yiddish-studies 

Yiddish Resource List from the California Institute for Yiddish Culture and Language

https://yiddishinstitute.org/yiddish-resources

Intro Guide and Some Resources from The Ohio State University

https://germanic.osu.edu/yiddish-ashkenazic

From Refoyl Finkl, late 1990s or early 2000s

https://www.cs.uky.edu/~raphael/yiddish.html

From Shane Baker, March 2020: https://www.facebook.com/youruncleDudley/posts/10221629475742439

Virtual Shtetl from Iosif and Shura Vaisman

Omniglot Yiddish

RESOURCES IN ENGLISH

Books:

  • A Rainbow Thread: An Anthology of Queer Jewish Texts from the First Century to 1969 by Noam Sienna, foreword by Judith Plaskow (2019)
  • Wonder of Wonders: A Cultural History of Fiddler on the Roof by Alisa Solomon (2013)
  • Found Treasures: Stories by Yiddish Women Writers, edited by Frieda Forman, Ethel Raicus, and Sarah Silberstein Swartz, 1994
  • A Few Words in the Mother Tongue: Poems, Selected and New (1971-1990) by Irena Klepfisz
  • Dreams of an Insomniac: Jewish Feminist Essays, Speeches and Diatribes Hardcover – January 1, 1993 by Irena Klepfisz  (Author), Evelyn Torton Beck (Introduction)
  • Diary of a Lonely Girl, Or The Battle Against Free Love by Miriam Karpilove, translated by Jessica Kirzane, 2019
  • Drunk from the Bitter Truth: Drunk from the Bitter Truth: The Poems of Anna Margolin, a bilingual book with translation by Shirley Kumove
  • Queer Expectations: A Genealogy of Jewish Women’s Poetry by Zohar Weiman-Kelman

Websites:

  • History of the Yiddish Language on My Jewish Learning
  • Preview of the YIVO Bruce and Francesca Cernia Slovin Online Museum
    • Read excerpts of books including a children’s book and Tom Sawyer in English and Yiddish
  • Yiddish Song of the Week (fabulous blog of lyrics, histories, recordings of songs)
  • Digital Yiddish Theater Project–fantastic resource on Yiddish theater with articles about history, translations, contemporary interviews etc.
  • Yiddish Book Center:
    • Unquiet Pages, great Yiddish Book Center online museum with articles on the Yiddish Torah, Soviet Yiddish, Yiddish of Holocaust survivors, Yiddish dictionaries, women writers, sweatshop poets and more
    • Celebrating Yiddish women writers resources (articles, podcast interviews, translations)
    • “Pakn Treger, member magazine from the Yiddish Book Center with great translations and articles about Yiddish history and culture
  • The YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe–amazing biographies of Eastern European important Yiddish figures and info about everyday life
  • Discovering Yiddish–online exhibits based on Ontario Archives
  • In Geveb–academic articles, more casual blog, side-by-side, translations, teaching guides, the hip and fascinating online journal of Yiddish studies 
  • Yiddishkayt–beautiful art and information about Yiddish past and future
  • Yiddishkayt Initiative–classes and information about Yiddish culture
  • Amanda Seigel’s blog for New York Public Library 
  • Cool blog about Jewish family genealogy from Hollander-Waas Jewish  Heritage Services
  • Lost Jews UK: Discovering and Documenting England’s Lost Jews
  • We Refugees Archive is a digital archive on refugeedom, past and present. It focuses on individual micro-histories and the city as a microcosm of refuge and new beginnings. Yiddish sources here
  • Inside the Yiddish Folk Song: scholarship and practical instruction and resources on the Yiddish folk song 
  • The Klezmer Institute was founded in the fall of 2018 to advance the study, preservation, and performance of Ashkenazic Jewish expressive culture through research, teaching, publishing and programming
  • Bat Kama At?: an archive documenting the history and culture of Lithuanian Jewry through the lens of Jewish education for girls in Telz, Lithuania during the interwar period. 
  • Tongue’s Memory | Thoughts on Learning Yiddish, On Poetry, On Loss and Renewal, blog by David Forman

Videos: 

CHASIDIC CULTURE

A useful Twitter thread from Izzy Posen that serves as a primer to Chasidic culture

RESOURCES IN POLISH

Der Alef Bet – Polish

Dictionary:

Classes:

  • Jidyszland: Oferujemy lektoraty jidysz i hebrajskiego, bogaty program zajęć w ramach Uniwersytetu Trzeciego Wieku oraz Żydowskiego Uniwersytetu Otwartego, warsztaty dla dzieci, warsztaty kaligrafii, wspólne śpiewanie w jidysz, spotkania w ramach Dyskusyjnego Klubu Filmowego Shalom i ciekawe rozmowy z autorami ważnych książek.

Instagram:

  • @szkola_jidysz

Books:

  • Majses: Free Bilingual Polish/Yiddish Children’s Books

TRANSLATION SERVICES OPTIONS:

PLACES TO BUY YIDDISH BOOKS:

OTHER INSTAGRAM ACCOUNTS:

Yiddish: @karowegner, peterudeshiyiddish, @ontariojewisharchives, @yidishwordoftheday, @yiddish_balagan, @yiddishbooks,@mayn_shtetele_riverdeyl, @vaybertaytch, @yiddishnewyork, @kulturkongres, @yaaana_yiddish, @in.geveb, @yiddishchicago, @greatjewishbooks, @yiddish_stories, @yiddish_book_center, @yivoinstitute, @dirozevepave, @mikhldarling, @bikher_chick, @yiddish_vinkl, @parisyiddish
Yiddish Music: @isleofklezbos, @tsibelemusic, @socalledentertainment, @theklezmatics, @lipa_schmeltzer, @tsveybrider, @burikes, @yiddishprincess
Jewish feminist publications:@lilithmagazine, @jewishwomensarchive, @hey.alma, @newvoicesmagazine, @jewishcurrentsmag, @jewishbookconcil, @prtcls
Specifically Sephardi/Mizrahi: @sephardicstudies, @sephardicbortherhood, @sephardicheritagemuseum, @sephardivoices, @smqnetwork, @zamancollective
Focus on Jews of Color: @joctorahacademy, @jewishmultircialnetwork, @globaljews
Jewish activism: @JFREJnyc, @Truahrabbis, @progressivejews, @Jews4BlackLives, @adameli, @popchassid, @never_again_action, @jcua_chicago, @abbychavastein, @bendthearc, 
Jewish art and artists: @Rena.Yehuda, @KarlaGudeon, @Adamkylometers, @jessica_tamar_deutch, @Maimonidez_nuts, @repealhyde, @micahbazant, @tsukunst, @aitchemel, @kayinayinhara, @songsofshira, @karolinakaseova
Jewish religious or cultural practices: @modern_ritual, @jewitchry, @ethnicjewess, @radicaljewishcalendar, @ritualwell, @jewishqueeryouth, @rabbisandra, @rabbisaama, @rabbidanyaruttenberg, @hasidiminusa, @cookinggene

THANK YOU TO:

  • some sources taken from Professor Jessica Kirzane, Sarah Biskowitz, and Shane Baker–a dank!