YIVO Autobiography Collection the Subject of Sociological Study (1965)

On October 10th, 1965, YIVO Research Associate Moshe Kligsberg was interviewed by host Sheftl Zak about his newly published Child and Adolescent Behavior Under Stress, a study based on life stories of Jewish youth in Poland collected by YIVO in the 1930s in the course of two public autobiography contests. Kligsberg’s research was supported by a grant from the National Institutes of Health, the Department of Health, Education and Welfare. (Original drafts of the 34-page pamphlet can be found in YIVO RG 719, Papers of Moshe Kligsberg.)

Some of autobiographies collected for the contest have been anthologized in the book Awakening Lives: Autobiographies of Jewish Youth in Poland Before the Holocaust (Yale University Press).

From 1963-1976, YIVO had its own program on WEVD, the radio station established by the Socialist Party of America in 1927 (its call letters stand for the initials of American socialist leader Eugene V. Debs), which was purchased by the Jewish Daily Forward in 1932 and became a major venue from Yiddish programming.

YIVO used its spot on WEVD for Yiddish-language interviews and discussions with leading New York Yiddish cultural figures, as well as for reporting on its own scholarly and cultural work.

A new podcast of this program in the order in which it was originally broadcast will be posted here every two weeks.

Presentation of series curated by Matt Temkin, YIVO Sound Archives.

Listen to the program [in Yiddish].