The Yiddish Club Is About More Than Language
BY LILLY COHEN
Photo by Zona Schreiber If it’s Tuesday morning at 10:30,
every seat in the Coleridge
Lounge on the lower level of
Building Three is filled by members
of the Yiddish Club. They’ve
been meeting there weekly for
an hour for more than ten years.
Originally set up by Migdal/
Hadassah’s first president, Carolyn
Dinofsky, a dynamic Jewish
educator, the club is currently
led by Zona Schreiber, another
dynamic educator and active
Migdal leader.
The Yiddish Club is about much
more than Yiddish, a language
most Club members heard at home.
Some members can speak Yiddish,
some can read it, and other can only
understand it. But everyone knows
numerous Yiddish expressions.
What binds the group together is
a strong sense of Jewish identity,
nostalgia and a deep interest in
Jewish culture and history.
Historically, Yiddish is the everyday
language used by Ashkenazic
Jews of Central and Eastern Europe
and immigrants to America. It’s a
fusion of Medieval German dialects,
Hebrew, Aramaic, Romance and
Slavic languages and always written
using Hebrew letters. A resurgence
of interest in the use and study of
Yiddish language and literature in
recent years has helped the Migdal
Yiddish Club flourish.
These weekly sessions are informal,
relaxed and fun. Members
contribute jokes, readings, songs,
bits of Talmudic wisdom and
whatever they think will interest
the group. While this is primarily
a women’s group, retired Rabbi
Murray Stadtmauer, whose late wife
Claire was a devoted member of
the Club, is also a comfortable and
key member of the group. He adds
both wisdom, deep knowledge and
humor to the proceedings.
A recent session I attended
included the following bits and
pieces: Zona Schreiber’s review
of some Yiddish vocabulary; a
class member singing Yiddish
songs from her childhood; a brief
report on the American Jewish
Committee’s refusal in 1940 to
help Jews in Europe and Israel;
Zona’s telling the group there are
270 male names in the Bible, but
only 50 female names, so over
the years Jewish, women have
adapted first names from other
lands; a book report about the
Catskills which features a history
of Grossinger’s Hotel; the new
phenomenon of female Orthodox
rabbis; and much more.
Many of the Yiddish Club members
continue their conversations
after class over lunch at the Towers
Restaurant. One member characterized
her devotion to the group
this way, “The Yiddish Club offers
me nutrients for the mind and the
body.”
Yiddish Club convenes—always a good turnout!
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38 NORTH SHORE TOWERS COURIER ¢ August 2018