Yiddish Book Center

10/13/2026

Applications for the Yiddish Arts and Culture Initiative are now open!

Receive a $1500 seed grant, professional development, and support to curate a series of programs that will deepen and enrich your community’s creative and intellectual engagement with Yiddish culture. Join and learn from a vibrant network of organizations doing Yiddish cultural work across the U.S. and Canada.

Any U.S. or Canadian non-profit is eligible.

Learn more and apply at the link in comments.

10/11/2026

Join the authors of the new book The Pickled City: A Biography of New York Pickles for a fascinating journey through the history of the pickle. Trace its path from ancient Mesopotamia to Eastern Europe and ultimately to Manhattan’s Lower East Side, where generations of immigrant pickle makers helped shape New York’s culinary traditions, economy, and cultural identity.

Featuring historic photographs, documents, illustrations, and advertisements, this richly illustrated talk uncovers the surprising stories behind one of the world’s most recognizable foods. If you’re curious about the pickle’s rise from humble preserved vegetable to beloved snack, classic condiment, and modern TikTok sensation, The Pickled City offers a fresh perspective on an enduring icon.

This event will take place on Zoom on Sunday, October 18, 2:00 p.m. ET. Learn more and register at the link in comments.

10/09/2026

Meet the 2026–2027 translation fellows!

Nadav Pais-Greenapple is a scholar, writer, and educator living in metropolitan Detroit. His research and translation, published in Michigan Jewish History, In geveb, and forthcoming in American Jewish History, centers on Yiddish life and culture in the industrial urban Midwest of the early 20th century. As a vice president of the Jewish Historical Society of Michigan, he helped to develop an award-winning 2024 museum exhibit and public-history programming initiatives. He was awarded the 2025 JHSM Outstanding Knowledge Production Award and a 2025 YIVO Centennial Scholarship. His most recent publication for In geveb, “In Ford’s Factory,” is a translation of Yiddish writer Joseph Opatoshu’s 1929 report on working conditions in Ford’s River Rouge factory complex. He will be translating Moyshe Blekhman's Watertown.

10/08/2026

Join us tonight, October 8, for a talk about Moï Ver. Moï Ver was a remarkable twentieth-century photographer who studied at the Bauhaus, documented Jewish life in Vilna and Warsaw between the wars, and experimented with the novel technique of photomontage that made his photography equal parts art and science. He moved to Palestine in 1934, transitioned to graphic design and oil painting, and lived his later years in Safed as one of the founders of the Artists’ Colony there. Join Moï Ver's grandsons, Jonathan and Dan Falk, for a free online presentation about his photography and his unusual life.

Register at the link in comments.

10/06/2026

We are saddened by the passing of Gerald (Jerry) Weinstein, z’’l (1930-2026), whom we had the honor of interviewing here in Amherst in 2014. In his interview, Jerry described his childhood in Philadelphia, playing in his family’s Klezmer band, his path to becoming a professor of education, and his lifelong advocacy for racial justice.

Here is a clip of Jerry discussing how he broke traditional norms to share his love of Mambo music with his students as a counselor at Camp Yeshiva. Koved zayn likhtikn ondenk, honor his brilliant memory.

Jerry Weinstein was interviewed by Rola Younes on May 29, 2014 at the Yiddish Book Center in Amherst, Massachusetts. Watch his full interview here: https://www.yiddishbookcenter.org/collections/oral-histories/interviews/woh-fi-0000550/jerry-weinstein-2014

10/06/2026

10/02/2026

Our orchard is free and open to the public, and the harvest this year is insane! Come pick your apples with us!

10/02/2026

Moï Ver was a remarkable twentieth-century photographer who studied at the Bauhaus, documented Jewish life in Vilna and Warsaw between the wars, and experimented with the novel technique of photomontage that made his photography equal parts art and science. He moved to Palestine in 1934, transitioned to graphic design and oil painting, and lived his later years in Safed as one of the founders of the Artists’ Colony there. On October 8, join Moï Ver's grandsons, Jonathan and Dan Falk, for a free online presentation about his photography and his unusual life.

Register at the link in comments.

10/01/2026

Meet the 2026–2027 translation fellows!

Mordecai Martin (pictured with Modicut puppets) is a writer and translator from New York living in Mexico City with his wife, child, and their cat, Pharaoh-let-my-people-go. His translations and original works have appeared in Exchanges, Turkoslavia, Asymptote, ANMLY, Honey Literary, Catapult, and Timber Journal, among other literary magazines. In both translation and original writing he strives to capture the peculiarities, intricacies, and depth of Jewish voices. He holds an MFA from Randolph College. He will be translating the eclectic stories, poems, travelogues, and cartoons of Muntergang, by the radical leftist humorist, cartoonist, and puppeteer Yosl Cutler, who toured the Yiddish-speaking world of the early 1930s with his creative partner Zuni Maud and their Modicut puppet theater.

09/30/2026

Now that back-to-school is in full swing here in the U.S, many are observing the time-honored tradition of the class photo. For inspiration, we pulled a few of our favorite school photos from the Wexler Oral History Project artifact collection.

1. Photo of Yiddish educator Shulamis Friedman’s kindergarten class, which she attended while living in the Sholem Aleichem Cooperative Houses in the Bronx. The note says “kindergarten students and teachers”
2. Photo of Yiddish speaker Chana Rubin’s school class in Vilna
3. Class photo of the Sholem Aleichem Yiddish School in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, shared by Yiddishist and pedagogy professor Sonia Kramer