News & Features

The Yiddish Daily Forward ran two features focusing on YIVO on July 17: A geshikhte fun YIVO [A History of YIVO], a review of Cecile Kuznitz’s book YIVO and the Making of Modern Jewish Culture by Gennady Estraikh, YIVO’s new Albert B. Ratner Visiting Scholar in East European Jewish Literature; and Khayem Grades arkhiv antplekt [Chaim Grade’s Archive Revealed], a report on YIVO’s public program "YIVO's Newest Treasure: The Chaim Grade and Ina Hecker-Grade Archive" (July 13). Professor Estraikh is quoted, along with Professor Agi Legutko (director of the Yiddish language program at Columbia University and an instructor in the YIVO-Bard Winter Program on Ashkenazic Civilization) in a Jewish News Service article, "Nearly lost Yiddish language increasingly popular among Jewish college students."

This is the third post in a series about alumni of YIVO’s intensive summer program in Yiddish, offered by YIVO and Bard College. The program, which was established in 1968, is in its 47th year. This year’s session runs from June 23 – August 1, 2014. 

On May 22, 2014, four cultural organizations in Vilnius teamed up to present “Resonances from Vilna,” a concert at the Tolerance Center of the Vilna Gaon State Jewish Museum, featuring works by Jewish composers Joseph Achron, Alexander Krein, and other Jewish Lithuanian composers of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The ...

by ROBERTA NEWMAN In September 1953, Yedies celebrated the 15th anniversary of the YIVO Library and Archives in America with a detailed account of its history, beginning with the establishment of its predecessor, the Central Jewish Library and Archives, which had its first headquarters at 1133 Broadway, an office building which ...

Piotr Matywiecki of Warsaw, Poland has been named the recipient of the 2014 Karski Award. This annual award was endowed by Professor Jan Karski in 1992 for an author of published works documenting Polish-Jewish relations and Jewish contributions to Polish culture.

The winner was chosen by the Award Committee, whose members are Prof. Pawel Spiewak (Director, Jewish Historical Institute in Warsaw), Dr. Jonathan Brent (Executive Director YIVO Institute for Jewish Research), Dr. Joanna Nalewajko-Kulikov, Prof. Szymon Rudnicki, Dr. Joachim S. Russek, Prof. Jerzy Tomaszewski, and Prof. Feliks Tych. The award ceremony will be held in September at the Jewish Historical Institute in Warsaw.

On Thursday, July 17, 2014, The New York Times reported on the shutting down of the offices of the Congress for Jewish Culture. The organization was founded by writers and intellectuals in 1948 to promote the work of Yiddish language and culture and once also had offices in Paris and Buenos Aires.

Read more about the Congress for Jewish Culture.

The newly donated records will join an existing collection of Congress for Jewish Culture in the YIVO Archives (Record Group 1148).

This broadcast from February 14th, 1965 presents excerpts from the paper, “The Philosophy of the New Jewish Translation of the Torah into English” delivered by Dr. Harry (Tsvi Orlinsky), at YIVO’s annual conference, which had taken place the month before. Orlinsky was editor in chief of the Torah for The ...

Dr. Gennady Estraikh has been appointed YIVO’s first Albert B. Ratner Visiting Scholar in East European Jewish Literature for the fall semester 2014. The Albert B. Ratner Visiting Scholar in East European Jewish Literature is made possible with the generous support of the Seedlings Foundation.

Dr. Estraikh is an internationally recognized authority on Yiddish language and literature and Eastern European Jewish history. As the Albert B. Ratner Visiting Scholar, he will teach the course "Modernism in Yiddish Literature," give public presentations on the American Jewish novelist Howard Fast, and chair a symposium on Ukranian literary figure Taras Shevchenko. In addition, Estraikh will mentor YIVO fellows, conduct research and participate in the academic life of the YIVO Institute.

Leah Falk interviews Faith Jones, Jennifer Kronovet, and Samuel Solomon on their translation of Celia Dropkin’s poems in The Acrobat.

The first session of this year’s summer program theater class workshop met in an especially theatrical setting – the loft of New York’s acclaimed Circus Amok. Led by theater workshop instructors Jenny Romaine and Shane Baker, and special guest Itzik Gottesman, the students listened to ghost stories and “roasted marshmallows.”