Michigan Conference Explores Yiddish in the Modern World
Submitted to: Education
Posted: April 15 2007
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15 April 2007 (Jewswire.com) - The Frankel Institute for Advanced Judaic Studies at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor is hosting an international conference on “Place & Displacement of Yiddish.” Over two dozen presenters will come to Ann Arbor from throughout Europe, Israel and North America to speak on Yiddish in the modern world from April 22-24. The UM conference is the second part of an international collaboration “The Cultural Geography of Yiddish” with the University of Haifa and Beth Shalom Aleichem in Tel Aviv.
The conference opens with a special session featuring Benjamin Harshav, Jacob & Hilda Blaustein Professor of Hebrew Language and Literature at Yale University and Anita Norich, Frankel Institute Director and Professor of English at the University of Michigan, on Sunday, April 22 at 3:30 p.m. in Rackham Amphitheatre, 915 E. Washington St. Harshav, author of the recent poetry anthology, Sing Stranger, will present “Yiddish Poetry: Geography and Poetics” and Norich will present “Yiddishism & Hebraism: Paradigms of Jewish Literary History.” A public reception follows the session.
Other conference program highlights include:
• Yiddish Literature: Texts and Translations
Sunday, April 22 at 6 p.m.
Rackham Amphitheatre
915 E. Washington St.
An evening of poetry & prose recited in both
Yiddish and English by renowned authors
including Benjamin and Barbara Harshav, Joseph
Sherman, and Aliza Shevrin and the works of
Chava Rosenfarb read by Anita Norich.
• My Father’s Shtetl has a Homepage Now
Monday, April 23 at 7:30 p.m.
Mendelssohn Theater
911 N. University St.
A free concert-lecture with Klezmer musician
Michael Alpert examining aspects of the
constantly evolving Yiddish culture and
identities of the 21st century. In English.
The “Place and Displacement of Yiddish” conference is free and open to all interested in Yiddish language. The majority of the conference programming will be spoken in English. For more information please call 734-763-9047 or email JudaicStudies@umich.edu
Ann Arbor has become one of the leading centers of Yiddish studies in the world. Over the past twenty years, University of Michigan has attracted more than half a dozen faculty, scores of graduate students and hundreds of undergraduates who study Yiddish, use the language in their scholarly work and teach it in their classrooms.
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