The Shmooze, The Yiddish Book Center's Podcast

Aaron Lansky visits with Professor Devin Naar to discuss Ladino, the Judaeo-Spanish language which was developed in parallel with Yiddish. We learn about the origins of the language and Naar's groundbreaking work collecting Ladino books. Episode 0085 August 6, 2014 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

We visit with Myra Melamed, daughter of Yiddish singer Herschel Melamed, to learn about the recently produced CD, "Herschel Melamed: 18 Songs." Episode 0084 July 8, 2014 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

Curator Laura Kruger discusses the work of artist Nathan Hilu. Kruger is the curator of "Nathan Hilu's Journal: Word, Image, Memory" which is currently on exhibit in the Yiddish Book Center's Brechner Gallery. Hilu's work draws on biblical stories and his Lower East Side surroundings. Episode 0083 June 10, 2014 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

We visit with Anita Garlick, a ninety-year old 'sit-down' Jewish comedian who came to comedy late in life. Anita's comedy draws from her Jewish roots and her early exposure to the Borscht Belt comedians. Episode 0082 June 2, 2014 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

We visit with translator Faith Jones to learn about the recently published "The Acrobat: the Selected Poems of Celia Dropkin." Jones, who collaborated on the translation of Dropkin's (1887-1956) experimental poetry, shares a bit about the poet and reads a few verses. Episode 0081 May 14, 2014 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

We visit with author Alice Hoffman to talk about her latest work, "The Museum of Extraordinary Things." During our visit we learn about Hoffman's grandfather, a Yiddish writer whose work she found on the Yiddish Book Center's Steven Spielberg Digital Yiddish Library. Episode 0080 April 27, 2014 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

The 'Grandma' behind Grandma's Chicken Soup tells us how she launched a mail-order chicken soup business. From her kitchen to your table (matzoh balls included.) Try a bowl, visit www.grandmaschickensoup.com. Episode 0079 April 11, 2014 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

In a conversation with Randy Settenbrino, owner of the Blue Moon Hotel in New York, we learn how he transformed a 19th-century Lower East Side tenement into a 21st-century hotel. Settenbrino shares the history of the building, once inhabited by immigrants and factory workers, and reminisces about the surrounding neighborhood. Episode 0078 March 5, 2014 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

Aaron Lansky visits with George Ellenbogen, author of the recently published memoir "A Stone in My Shoe: In Search of a Neighbourhood." Ellenbogen, who grew up in the Jewish district of Montreal, writes about the concept of neighbourhood and community and provides us with a window into the immigrant neighbourhood of his youth. Episode 0077 February 26, 2014 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachuset...

In a visit with author Jeffrey Veidlinger we learn how his recently published book, "In the Shadow of the Shtetl," tells the story of traditional small-town Jewish life in the years between 1917 and 1948. The stories, collected by the "AHEYM" oral history project at Indiana University, are drawn from interviews with over 100 Yiddish speakers. Episode 0076 February 6, 2014 Yiddish Book Center Amher...

Aaron Lansky visits with Sebastian Schulman to learn what is new in the field of Yiddish translation - from the recent launch of the Center's groundbreaking translation website tatysh.org to the Center's Yiddish Translation Fellowship, new venues for publication, and more. Creating new opportunities to mentor and train Yiddish translators, employing new technologies to "crowd-source" Yiddish trans...

Ruth Behar, an anthropologist from the University of Michigan, talks to Adela Dworin, president of the Jewish Community of Cuba in Havana. Last fall, Behar led a Yiddish Book Center tour to Cuba, where the group explored the Jewish history and culture in that nation, where an active Jewish community exists despite the fact that most Jews left after the revolution. Episode 0094 January 13, 2015 Yid...

Aaron Lansky visits with Jeremy Dauber, author of the recently published "The Worlds of Sholem Aleichem." Dauber and Lansky discuss this most beloved of Yiddish writers, and we learn why it has taken almost one hundred years for a major biography of him to appear. Episode 0074 December 20, 2013 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

In a visit with curator Patricia Klindienst we learn how a simple postcard led her to reconstruct the story of Abram Spiwak and Sophie Schochetman - their immigration from Czarist Russia to America, their courtship, marriage, and the making of their life together. Klindienst's exhibit, "No One Remembers Alone: Memory, Migration, and the Making of an American Family," tells the universal story of t...

Naomi Jaye, director of "The Pin," shares the story behind this Yiddish-language film about two young people who experience love and loss while in hiding during World War II. "The Pin" (2013) is the first Yiddish-language film (with English subtitles) to be shot in Canada, and the second in North America in over 70 years. Episode 0072 November 7, 2013 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

A lively and informative visit with Jules Chametzky, critic of Jewish American literature and author of the recently published "Out of Brownsville: Encounters with Nobel Laureates and Other Jewish Writers." Professor Chametzky recalls his encounters with notable Jewish writers - everyone from Isaac Bashevis Singer, Grace Paley, and Irving Howe to Allen Ginsberg and Amoz Oz. Episode 0071 October 9,...

In a visit with film historian Bruce Lawton, we learn about the early work of Danny Kaye - from his first appearances on stages in the Borscht Belt to his screen debut in four little known 'two-reelers'. Lawton will be presenting his multi-media presentation "Meet Nikolai Nikolaevich!...The Not Yet 'Re-Fined' Danny Kaye!" at the Yiddish Book Center on September 29, 2013. Episode 0070 September 11,...

Aaron Lansky visits with Mark Cohen, author of the recently released "Overweight Sensation: The Life and Comedy of Allan Sherman." We learn about Sherman - whose songs are legendary to a generation - and the representation of Jews in popular culture in the early 1960s. Cohen helps us understand who Sherman was and where he fits into the landscape of twentieth century Jewish comedians. Sherman infl...

In a recent visit with Heidi Urich, co-chair of the IAJGS conference, we learned how Urich has spent the past twenty years working to build her family tree. Urich also shared a preview of what's in store at the upcoming conference on Jewish Genealogy that will take place in Boston August 4-9, 2013. Episode 0068 July 23, 2013 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

We visit with film critic Kenneth Turan to talk about the documentary film "The Life and Times of Hank Greenberg." The film will be screened at the Yiddish Book Center on Sunday, July 7th, 2013, at 2PM. Episode 0067 July 2, 2013 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

Sebastian Schulman visits with scholar and author Dr. Jess Olson to learn about Olson's newly published book "Nathan Birnbaum and Jewish Modernity." Episode 0066 June 18, 2013 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

Aaron Lansky visits with Christa Whitney, the Yiddish Book Center's Wexler Oral History Project director, to talk about her recent fieldwork in Poland and her new project to interview the children of Yiddish writers. Episode 0065 June 11, 2013 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

We visit with scholar Sasha Senderovich to learn about "The Zelmenyaners," one of the great comic novels of the twentieth century, now in a new English translation by Hillel Halkin. The translation, published by the New Yiddish Library, is a collaboration between Yale University Press and the Yiddish Book Center. Episode 0064 June 4, 2013 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

We visit with author, music critic, and Yidstock program director Seth Rogovoy to learn about Yidstock 2013 - from the opening concert with the Klezmer Conservatory Band to the Yidstock All-stars closing concert, as well as the workshop and talks that will take place at Yidstock 2013 (July 18-21 at the Yiddish Book Center). For more information and to purchase tickets http://www.yiddishbookcenter....

We visit with artist Liana Finck to learn about her illustration exhibit "A Bintel Brief." On display at the Yiddish Book Center through October, 2013, "A Bintel Brief" is a graphic novel based on letters to the Forverts newspaper's advice column. Episode 0062 May 7, 2013 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts