Advanced I Yiddish
Tuition: $480 | YIVO members: $375**
Students: $240 (Must register with valid university email address)
This is a live, online course held weekly on Zoom. Enrollment will be capped at about 15 students. All course details (Zoom link, syllabus, handouts, assignments, etc.) will be posted to Canvas. Students will be granted access to the class on Canvas after registering for the class here on the YIVO website. This class will be conducted in Yiddish and English.
Instructor: Karolina Szymaniak
Who should take this course?
This course is appropriate for those who have completed Intermediate IV Yiddish or equivalent coursework.
What topics will this class cover?
This course will take students on a journey into the world of Yiddish culture from the past through the present. The focal point of this course will be short literary texts and historical documents (archival documents, including recordings), from the 20th and 21st centuries. We will study both poetry and prose, as well as different forms of historical writing. The author list includes but is not limited to: Avrom Sutzkever, Kadia Molodowsky, Anna Margolin, Froyim Kaganovski, Yosl Birstein, Rokhl Oyerbakh. The grammar and vocabulary will be adapted to the content of the texts studied. Students will further develop their writing skills with a focus on text summary, analyses of literary and historical texts, and creative writing. Speaking skills will include analyzing and debating texts, expressing opinions, and presenting a writer's profile. Listening skills will be developed based on selected recordings of the studied texts, interviews with the writers, and other audiovisual documents.
This course is designed for students who are already familiar with the basics of Yiddish grammar, including the declension of nouns and adjectives and the conjugation of verbs in the past tense and conditional mode. It requires familiarity with these topics but not their mastery. If you feel that these are topics you need to review, fear not – there will be space for this in the course. This course will adopt a needs-based approach to learning.
Is knowledge of the Yiddish alphabet required?
Yes, knowledge of the Yiddish alphabet is required.
Course Materials:
The instructor will provide all course materials digitally throughout the class on Canvas. These will include interactive exercises for vocabulary and grammar, as well as language games and recorded music.
Karolina Szymaniak is assistant professor of Yiddish at the Sorbonne University in Paris. Her research interests range across modern Yiddish literature, Polish-Jewish cultural relations, and translation studies. She is also co-founder of the Jewish Arts Institute/Yidisher Kunst-Institut, and co-editor-in-chief of East European Jewish Affairs. In addition to having taught Yiddish language and culture throughout Europe, she has also served as a consultant for the POLIN Museum in Warsaw and the Museum of Modern Art in Łódz. Her recent publications include Montages. Debora Vogel and the New Legend of the City and My wild goat. Anthology of women Yiddish poets (in Polish) and Hasidic Steam Engine and Other stories. Anthology of Yiddish short stories, 16th-21st centuries (in Polish). She is also the editor of Rachel Auerbach's ghetto writings, which received the 2016 Polityka History Award. Her new edition of Auerbach’s wartime and postwar writing is forthcoming in French.
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