Jeffrey Veidlinger

Item Information

Title:
Jeffrey Veidlinger
Description:
Professor Jeffrey Veidlinger was interviewed by Christa Whitney on December 19, 2011 at the Association for Jewish Studies Conference in Washington, D.C. Veidlinger's interview begins with a detailed description of his family's background, beginning with his paternal heritage in Hungary and then moving on to his maternal heritage which is grounded in Canada, though it reaches back to Poland. Growing up, Veidlinger explains, his home felt very Jewish. He recalls that Jewishness permeated his young life, especially as he went to the Bialik School in Toronto where he started learning Hebrew in first grade and Yiddish and French in third grade. He shares interesting and humorous stories about his formal education - both during his undergraduate career at McGill University and his graduate career at Georgetown University - as he describes his mentors and the pivotal assignments and classes that steered his interests away from Russian history and into Jewish Studies. The middle section of Veidlinger's interview focuses heavily on his work with the AHEYM Project (The Archives of Historical and Ethnographic Yiddish Memories), which he conducts with his colleagues at Indiana University, Dov-Ber Kerler and Dovid Katz. He explains the project, its goals, and even some of the common questions asked during the interviews with Yiddish speakers. Veidlinger describes his first day on the project in Kiev as being "plopped into the Yiddish world," a world that he did not expect to exist with such vibrancy. After explaining how the project is expanding, he shares personal stories of returning to places where his family had lived before immigrating to Canada. The final portion of Veidlinger's interview attempts to untangle the complicated relationship Yiddish has with the academy, with Jewish organizations, and with the smattering of Jewish identities developing and collapsing around the world. He explains that with many college-age students acquiring a Jewish education at the university level, academics currently balance being critical and analytic while providing students with something they can take with them in their personal lives. He also comments on the growing interest in Yiddish, especially how he sees klezmer musicians and writers playing with Yiddish and its meaning in their new productions. Veidlinger ends his interview advising Yiddish language learners to take advantage of the diversity of their newly-growing consortium of colleagues. To learn more about the Wexler Oral History Project, visit: http://www.yiddishbookcenter.org/tell-your-story To cite this interview: Professor Jeffrey Veidlinger Oral History Interview, interviewed by Christa Whitney, Yiddish Book Center’s Wexler Oral History Project, at the Association for Jewish Studies Conference in Washington, D.C, December 19, 2011. Video recording, [https://archive.org/details/JeffreyVeidlinger19december2011YiddishBookCenter] ([date accessed])
Creator:
Yiddish Book Center (Emily)
Date:
December 19, 2011
Format:
Film/Video
Location:
Yiddish Book Center
Collection (local):
Oral Histories
Subjects:
Advice
Childhood
Jewish Identity
Yiddish language (feelings of/about
Meaning
Descriptions of)
Yiddish learning
Coming back to Yiddish
Music
Literature
Career and Professional Life
Scholarship
Holocaust
Education
Religion and ritual
Eastern Europe
Soviet Union
United States
Canada
Youth group
Transmission (intergenerational
Cultural
Social... parenting)
Roots/heritage
Jewish community (descriptions of place and social dynamics in a particular time)
Rural
Urban
Shtetl
Assimilation
Travel
Ukraine
Jewish History
Jeffrey Veidlinger
Yiddish Book Center
National Yiddish Book Center
Wexler Oral History Project
Nybc
Ybc
Yiddish
Jewish culture
Link to Item:
https://www.yiddishbookcenter.org/collections/oral-histories/interviews/woh-fi-0000226
Terms of Use:
Rights status not evaluated.
Contact host institution for more information.
Language:
English