Abstract

Adi Mahalel, lecturer of Yiddish Studies at the University of Maryland, was interviewed by Christa Whitney on December 15, 2013, at the Association for Jewish Studies Conference in Boston, Massachusetts. Both Adi's grandfathers were born in Palestine; one was of Moroccan and Syrian descent and the other Lithuanian. His grandmothers came to Palestine in the 1930s from Brisk and Hamburg. Adi was born in Haifa in 1979 to Hebrew-speaking, secular parents. The Jewishness of his family was mainly expressed in their love for Hebrew literature. Adi talks about negative attitudes toward Yiddish in Israel, where many consider it the language of the Diaspora. He feels that choosing his field of study was "going against the grain." His first Yiddish classes in Haifa focused on reading and translating rather than speaking the language. Adi explains why he switched his major from engineering to the humanities, in part because he wanted to read Yiddish literature in the original. He describes his Yiddish classes in Haifa, in Tel Aviv, and at Columbia University. From the start he also enjoyed talking to native Yiddish speakers who were not academics. At Columbia, Adi took courses with Jeremy Dauber, Miriam Hoffman, David Roskies, Dovid Fishman, and Dan Miron. He became intrigued with the connection between Yiddish and leftist politics. While pursuing his doctorate at Columbia he also worked for the "Forverts" and taught at YIVO. He is still writing for the "Forverts" and for the last remaining Bundist journal, published in Israel. One of the reasons that he is drawn to Yiddish is that it was a language of an oppressed people. He believes that the world requires radical change and that for various reasons Jewish radicals felt less constrained expressing their ideologies in Yiddish, in part because only a select group would understand what they were saying. Adi mentions his work with the Hasidic community. He acted as interpreter on a film about the "Neturei Karta", an anti-Zionist ultra-Orthodox group with members in Monsey, New York. Adi discusses the place of Yiddish in the Israeli and American academies. Humanities programs are on the decline in both countries. He is hopeful that there is still a lot of interest, especially in this country. He is pleased that his classes fill up and often have waiting lists. He does not think that "revival" is an appropriate word when it comes to the current situation, because Yiddish is a living language in some religious communities. Adi believes that he is the first sabra (Jewish person born and raised in Palestine/Israel) to be hired as a Yiddish journalist. He advises students taking Yiddish classes to be open to the human experience and rich culture of the people who spoke this language.

Addeddate

2014-01-17 17:46:06.387778

Art-themes

Forverts

Citation

Adi Mahalel Oral History Interview, interviewed by Christa Whitney, Yiddish Book Center's Wexler Oral History Project, Boston, Massachusetts, December 15, 2013. Video recording, https://archive.org/details/AdiMahalel15december2013YiddishBookCenter ( [date accessed] )

Color

color

Controlled-themes

Advice | Family histories | Childhood | Jewish Identity | Yiddish language | Yiddish teaching | Yiddish learning | Yiddish speaker | Immigration and migration | Hebrew | Career and Professional Life | Academia | Education | Jewish education | Secular | Israel | Zionism | Eastern Europe | United States | Heritage | Shabbos

Date-themes

1990s | 2000s | 2010s

Excerpts

3074, 3075, 3076

Geographic-themes

Haifa, Israel | Tel Aviv, Israel | New York City | Israel | Eastern Europe | United States

Identifier

AdiMahalel15december2013YiddishBookCenter

Interview-date

12/15/2013

Interview-location

Association for Jewish Studies Conference in Boston, Massachusetts

Narrator-birth-place

Haifa, Israel

Narrator-birth-year

1979

Narrator-first-name

Adi

Narrator-last-name

Mahalel

Organization-themes

YIVO Institute for Jewish Research | Columbia Unviersity

People-themes

Arye Leyb Pilowsky | Rachel Rojanski | Dan Miron | Jeremy Dauber | Itzhak Luden

Series

Yiddish in the Academy: scholars, language instructors, and students
Yiddish in the Academy: scholars, language instructors, and students

Sound

sound

Uncontrolled-themes

Haifa | Tel Aviv | New York City | Arye Pilowsky | Rachel Rojanski | Dan Miron | Jeremy Dauber | Yitshok Luden | Forverts | Yiddish Daily Forward | YIVO | Columbia University | 1990s | 2000s | 2010s | Yiddishism |

Uncontrolled-themes2

Haifa, Israel | Tel Aviv, Israel | New York City | Arye Leyb Pilowsky | Rachel Rojanski | Dan Miron | Jeremy Dauber | Itzhak Luden | Forverts | YIVO Institute for Jewish Research | Columbia Unviersity | 1990s | 2000s | 2010s | Yiddishism

Wohp-interview-id

509

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