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Hiding in Plain Sight: Toward a Celebration of Hebraica Catalogers
Full text linkThis article offers a chance to readers to know better the Hebraica catalogers who have been active in the United States and Canada, currently active, retired and deceased.
There are two parts in this article. First the author presents how the article came into being, the source the author used and the existing bibliography. Then the author presents the field of Hebraica and Judaica librarianship in the “longue durée.” The second part contains testimonies of Hebraica catalogers who accepted to contribute to this article.
A History of YIVO’s Prewar Archival Collections from 1925 to 2001
Full text linkThis article discusses YIVO's prewar collections, their looting and dispersion during the Holocaust, and the various subsequent efforts to recover them. The article includes a brief overview of YIVO's founding and prewar activities; a discussion of the Nazi looting of YIVO's materials during the Holocaust and the heroic efforts by Jews to save these materials during and after the war; YIVO's shift of its headquarters to New York City in 1939–1940; the US Government restitution of materials to YIVO in 1947; and efforts to reclaim additional materials from Lithuania from 1989 to 2001. The article closes with a brief note on YIVO's newly completed Vilna Collections Project to digitally reunite YIVO's pre-war materials in New York City with materials housed in three Lithuanian repositories.
Workers’ Libraries in Interwar Poland: Selections Translated from a Yiddish Handbook
Full text linkInterwar Poland saw an explosion in the establishment of all kinds of libraries, notably workers' libraries, run by political or labor organizations for the edification and education of working people. In 1929, under the auspices of the Linke Poale Zion, I. Rauchfleisch and L. Weiss published their Handbook for Libraries. This 73-page book was desiged to provide anyone desiring to open such a library as much information as they needed, in clear language and adequate detail, to operate such an institution in line with modern library practices
Jewish Identity and American Acceptance: Welcoming a Firstborn Son in Two Classic Children's Books
Full text linkJewish-American-themed children’s fiction often includes descriptions of ritual observance. Yet, although ritual circumcision (brit milah, or bris) is a requirement in halacha (Jewish religious law) for all newborn males, this event is virtually absent from Jewish children’s books; the incorporation of a surgical procedure would create obvious narrative difficulties. Sydney Taylor and Sadie Rose Weilerstein, two of the most important twentieth century Jewish-American children’s authors, each wrote a series of books including a newborn son. Instead of a bris, they both included the less common, nonsurgical ritual of pidyon ha-ben. Thus, they eluded a problematic description, while informing readers about a lesser-known Jewish practice
Book Review: Caroline Jessen, Kanon im Exil: Lektüren deutsch-jüdischer Emigranten in Palästina/ Israel. Göttingen: Wallstein Verlag, 2019. 398 p. ISBN: 9783835333482. [German]
Full text linkWho Owns Jewish Culture Heritage? : Association of Jewish Libraries Rosaline and Meyer Feinstein Memorial Lecture
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It’s Raining Lemons! How the COVID-19 Pandemic Reshaped the Association of Jewish Libraries
Full text linkThe COVID-19 pandemic hit in early 2020, changing expectations and work around the globe. The pandemic forced the Association of Jewish Libraries (AJL) to expedite changes that had been moving along slowly, leading to a completely revamped organization. This article goes through some of the background leading up to COVID-19 and how AJL was already changing and continues to change to meet the needs of its members
Two Articles by Ber Borokhov about Judaica Libraries and Librarians
Full text linkTwo translated articles published by Ber Borokhov (1881–1917) in the Yiddish newspaper Di varhayt (Warheit) in New York, in 1917. The translations are accompanied by an essay that recounts Borokhov's history, scholarship, and keen interst in Jewish libraries
Provenance Research, Memory Culture, and the Futurity of Archives: Three Essential Resources for Researching the Nazi Past
Full text linkThe rising significance of Holocaust commemoration has advanced provenance research of Nazi-looted material Jewish heritage and has shown the urgent need for reliable resources in order to cope with the particular challenges of identifying Judaica objects. This review essay examines the theoretical foundations of provenance research in Germany and presents two indispensalbe resources that help with practical provenance research. The Lost Art Database, maintained by the Lost Art Foundation, documents cultural assets beeing illegaly confiscated by the Nazis. The Handbook on Judaica Provenance Research: Ceremonial Object, an open access electronic publication, funded by Claims Conference and the World Jewish Restitution Organization (WJRO), provides detailed information to identify Jewish cultural objects. The theoretical framework of memory culture in Germany is explored in the book by Dora Osborne, What Remains: The Post-Holocaust Archive in German Memory Culture. In this oustanding analysis of the functions of archives in the process of coming to terms with the Nazi past, Osborne rightly emphasizes the archival turn in German memory culture and proves its importance.