Northern California Region

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For additional information on Workmen’s Circle programs in San Francisco, please contact Diana Scott at (415) 566-7235 or dmscott01yahoo.com.

Centennial Celebration of Secular Yiddish Shuln
Sunday, December 12, 2010 – reception at 1:00 p.m., talk at 2:00 p.m.
Presentation (in English) by Marti Krow-Lucal
“The Hidden History of American Yiddish Shuln,”

Location: BJE Jewish Community Library, 1835 Ellis Street, San Francisco (between Scott and Pierce), free parking (entrance on Pierce, between Ellis Eddy)

Sponsors: BJE Jewish Community Library, Workmen’s Circle/Arbeter Ring of No. CA, Tri-Valley Cultural Jews, Judy Baston, KlezCalifornia, Taube Center for Jewish Studies at Stanford University.
Info:  (415) 567-3327, x703 <ajgreen@bjesf.org>

Yiddish-English Poetry Reading
Yiddish-English Poetry Reading
Sunday, January 30, 2011 at 2:00 p.m.
Reading by translators Jack Hirschman and Zachary Baker (with a few Glik songs )
New English translations of Yiddish songs and poems by Vilna ghetto author Hirsh Glik (Partisan Hymn, “Zog Nit Keyn Mol / Don’t Ever Say” and other poems of Jewish resistance) 

Location: SFSU Labor Archive and Research Center, 480 Winston Drive (between Stonestown Galleria and Lake Merced Drive)

Free event, followed by reception.

Sponsored by the Workmen’s Circle of Northern California

Info: (415) 566-7235 <dmscott01@yahoo.com>

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Past Events

Art Exhibit
Rivington Street: Yiddish Culture in Comic Strips
Stories by Joel Schechter, Art by Spain
Exhibit runs: March 1 – July 26, 2009

Opening reception: Sunday, March 8, 2 – 4 P.M.

San Francisco writer Joel Schechter collaborates with illustrator Spain Rodriguez (just “Spain” to readers of underground comics in the 1960s) to create a series of comic strips about Jewish culture. Their illustrated stories tell about popular Yiddish actors, poets, and artists such as Menasha Skulnik, Ida Kaminska, Chayale Ash, William Gropper, Yosl Cutler, and Leo Fuchs. On display are original drawings and reproductions first published in the journal Jewish Currents.

Support for this exhibit provided, in part, by the Puffin Foundation

Sholem Aleichem: Dangerous Novels and Fiddler on the Roof
A Talk by Gabriella Safran

Tuesday, March 24, 7:30 P.M.

Gabriella Safran will discuss the brilliant Yiddish comic writer Sholem Aleichem and his attitude toward Russian literature and culture, posing the question, “What happens when Tevye’s daughters read Russian literature?”

Arguing with the Storm: Stories by Yiddish Women Writers
A Reading and Talk by editor Rhea Tregebov
Thursday, April 23, 7:30 P.M.

Arguing with the Storm began as a communal project of the Winnipeg Women’s Yiddish Reading Circle, a group of seniors who translated, discussed, and selected these stories and narratives, many by women whose writing was not previously available in English.

Yiddish Literature: From the Kitchen to the Avant-Garde
A Talk by Yael Chaver
Tuesday, May 5, 7:30 P.M.

Yael Chaver, who teaches Yiddish language and literature at UC Berkeley, surveys Yiddish literature from its origins to modern times.

The An-sky Expedition: Exploring Yiddish Song in Russia
with the intrepid Jeanette Lewicki
Thursday, May 7, 7:30 P.M. 

Singing accordionist Jeanette Lewicki explores the musical territory opened up by the An-sky expedition of 1912, when three members of the St. Petersburg Jewish Folk Music Society set out by horse and wagon with an Edison phonograph to record Yiddish folk culture in Russia’s Pale of Settlement. Kindred spirit Lewicki brings her undisciplined imagination and vagabond accordion to explore this material, painstakingly collected on the eve of World War I.

Station Identification:
A Cultural History of Yiddish Radio in the United States
A Multi-Media Presentation by Ari Y. Kelman
Wednesday, May 13, 7:30 P.M.

Yiddish-language radio in the United States sounded no different in many respects from its English-language counterpart, with serial dramas, quiz shows, newscasts, musical variety programs, and advertisements. Through audio clips, vintage advertisements, and photographs, Ari Kelman will illustrate the rise and fall of Yiddish radio from before the first broadcast through the mid-1950s.

Jewish Film Class: Screening the Yiddish Word Part I
The Light Ahead  (Di Klyatshe)
Tuesday, March 17, 7 P.M.

Chaver Paver’s adaptation of writings by Mendele Mokher Sforim takes a decidedly unsentimental view of shtetl life. The film tells the story of two lovers whose community reacts to an outbreak of cholera by embracing superstition. Film is shown in video projection; discussion follows screening. USA, 1939. 94 minutes, in Yiddish with English subtitles.

Jewish Film Class: Screening the Yiddish Word Part II
Tevye
Tuesday, April 21, 7 P.M.

Maurice Schwartz produced, directed, and starred in this loose adaptation of two stories from Sholem Aleichem’s Tevye the Dairyman cycle. Tevye and his family are plunged into conflict and despair when they learn that their daughter Chava has fallen in love with a freethinking gentile from their village. Film is shown in video projection; discussion follows screening. USA, 1939. 76 minutes, in Yiddish with English subtitles.

Jewish Film Class: Screening the Yiddish Word Part III

Uncle Moses

Tuesday, May 19, 7 P.M.