Asya Vaisman Schulman, Sebastian Schulman: Judaism Unbound Episode 205 - A Yiddish Family
Asya Vaisman Schulman and Sebastian Schulman join Dan Libenson and Lex Rofeberg to talk about each of their individual relationships to Yiddish language and culture, along with their collective relationship to Yiddish that is embodied through their nuclear family. [1] This episode is the third in a series of episodes produced in collaboration with the Yiddish Book Center, as part of its Decade of Discovery initiative, in honor of 40 years since the Yiddish Book Center’s founding.
Typically, we refer to guests via their last name in our shownotes. For clarity’s sake, because “Schulman” is part of both guests’ last-names, we will refer to the guests on this episode via their first name.
(0:01 - 15:11): To begin the episode, Asya and Sebastian speak to their shared experience of raising a daughter with Yiddish as one of her primary languages. [2] Sebastian discusses how in certain senses, it was a “no-brainer” to raise their daughter in Yiddish, given how deeply connected both parents are to Yiddish language and culture. Asya adds that, in her family, Yiddish has been spoken through the generations, dating back 1,000 years. The two guests explore the role of Yiddish today as it relates to Ultra-Orthodox communities (where Yiddish is a primary language), along with its less centralized role in other communities. They assert that even as Yiddish has lost some influence in certain spaces, there are some major differences between its place today and modern Hebrew’s 100 years ago (when Hebrew hadn’t been spoken as a primary language, outside of prayer and study, for a very long time). Asya and Sebastian also reflect on the role that Yiddish played in their upbringing.
(15:12 - 29:35): Continuing in his reflection, Sebastian looks back on his time in Moldova (a Jewish locale that contains a high proportion of Yiddish speakers), working for the Joint Distribution Committee. [3] He asserts that living in Yiddish, on a daily basis, helped him understand what it means for Jewishness to be truly global. As an example of what it means to “live in Yiddish,” he explores the differences between a word like “Saturday” (in English) and the word “Shabbes” (which is the word for “Saturday,” in Yiddish, but also connotes much more than what “Saturday” does in English). Asya takes on the question of “what is Yiddish” in historical context. She describes its many influences, from German, romance languages, Slavic languages, and Hebrew. Sebastian connects these threads to the phenomenon of Esperanto, [4] a language that was deeply influenced by Yiddish, and which helps add layers to a conversation about Yiddish’s relationship to both particularism and universalism.
(29:36 - 44:07): Asya and Sebastian consider the ways in which Yiddish can resonate beyond those who trace their heritage to those who spoke it as their first language. [5] They apply this question both to Jews who aren’t Ashkenazi, and to individuals who aren’t Jewish at all. Shifting gears, Asya and Sebastian examine a variety of ways in which Yiddish culture transcends just speaking the language, highlighting Yiddish music as one particularly resonant realm of Yiddish culture for many people — some of whom speak Yiddish as a language and others of whom do not. To close the episode, both guests call on listeners to immerse in the waters of Yiddish language and culture, through either individual learning or institutional participation, through organizations like the Yiddish Book Center or KlezKanada.
[1] Learn more about Asya Vaisman Schulman here, and learn more about Sebastian Schulman here. Check out the Steiner Summer Yiddish Program, which Vaisman Schulman facilitates, here. Explore KlezKanada’s offerings at KlezKanada.org.
[2] Check out a profile of another star of the Vaisman Schulman family, Tzina (along with her parents!), through this 2016 article in the Daily Hampshire Gazette.
[3] For an article looking at recent developments in Moldova’s Jewish community, see this 2017 piece from JTA, entitled “How a single mom revolutionized Moldova’s Jewish community.”
[4] For a brief window into Esperanto, check out this 2016 piece in Time Magazine, entitled “The Serious History Behind Esperanto,” which looks at the origins of Esperanto (including its primary inventor, L.L. Zamenhof) and its ongoing community of passionate followers today.
[5] Sebastian alludes to the work of Rokhl Kafrissen here. For a relevant piece by her about Yiddishists (and the many misconceptions about Yiddishists) see “What I wish people knew about Yiddishists,” published in 2019 by JTA.