Beginner I Yiddish (Thursday)
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: Malena Chinski
Who should take this course?
This course is appropriate for those who are new to Yiddish or would like a review.
What topics will this class cover?
Drawing on a communicative approach, this class will provide a basic background in Yiddish language, starting from the Yiddish alphabet and covering an initial range of communication goals, vocabulary, and grammar concepts. Throughout the semester, students will train to read both print and cursive letters and to write in the cursive. The class will be based on chapters 1-4 of In eynem: The New Yiddish Textbook, as well as the introductory Alefbeys chapter. We will also engage with additional materials provided by the instructor, such as songs and excerpts from original children textbooks.
Communication goals and vocabulary will include: getting acquainted and greetings, classroom expressions, geography and languages, talking about regular activities, and numerals. Grammar study will address: definite and indefinite articles, personal pronouns, regular and irregular verbs in the present tense, and word order. We will focus on each of the four language skills: reading, writing, speaking, and listening. The class will also discuss Shabbos and Jewish holidays that fall during the semester.
Is knowledge of the Yiddish alphabet required?
No, knowledge of the Yiddish alphabet is not required. However, students who have no prior experience with reading and writing the Yiddish or Hebrew alphabets are highly encouraged to familiarize themselves with the Yiddish alphabet before class, as the course will move at a fast pace. The tools and videos provided here will be helpful in getting a handle on reading and writing the alefbeys, and are designed for independent use.
Course Materials:
This course will use the textbook In eynem: The New Yiddish Textbook, Vol. I & II by Asya Vaisman Schulman, Jordan Brown, and Mikhl Yashinsky (Purchase).
Malena Chinski is a PhD in Social Sciences from the National University of General Sarmiento, in Argentina. Her doctoral dissertation addressed Shoah commemoration within the Jewish community of Buenos Aires during the first postwar decade. She completed a postdoctoral stay in France at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales with support from the Fondation pour la mémoire de la Shoah. Her current research addresses the reconstruction of Yiddish culture in Paris in the immediate postwar period, the itineraries of surviving Yiddish writers and scholars from Eastern Europe, and memories of the Shoah in the Parisian Yiddish press. She has published research articles in various specialized journals and collective volumes and co-edited with Alan Astro the collective volume Splendor, Decline, and Rediscovery of Yiddish in Latin America (Leiden, Brill, 2018).
Malena studied Yiddish at the IWO Foundation of Buenos Aires with professors Ester Szwarc and Avrom Lichtenbaum. She has taught beginner and intermediate classes at the University Paris-Sorbonne (Paris IV) and the Summer Program for Yiddish Language and Literature in Berlin. Currently, she teaches regular Yiddish classes in the virtual programs of YIVO and the Maison de la culture yiddish.
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