Yiddish and the Creation of Soviet Jewish Culture gives voice to the Soviet Jewish activists empowered by the state to create a Soviet Jewish national culture. Jewish activists were interested in building a Soviet Jewish culture because they were striving for a national revolution - the creation of a new culture through which Jews would identify as Jews on new, secular, Soviet terms. This book explores the ways in which Jews were part of, not apart from, the Soviet system and Jewish history. Soviet Jewish culture worked within contemporary Jewish national and cultural 1920s trends and simultaneously participated in the larger project of propagating the Soviet state and ideology. Soviet Jewish activists were not nationalists or Soviets, but both at once. David Shneer addresses some of the painful truths about the Jews' own implication and imbrication in the system and places his analysis in the context of wider twentieth-century culture.
By:
David Shneer (University of Denver)
Imprint: Cambridge University Pres
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions:
Height: 229mm,
Width: 152mm,
Spine: 21mm
Weight: 630g
ISBN: 9780521826303
ISBN 10: 0521826306
Pages: 310
Publication Date: 14 July 2004
Audience:
Professional and scholarly
,
College/higher education
,
Undergraduate
,
Primary
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active
Introduction; 1. Soviet nationalities policies and the making of the Soviet Yiddish Intelligentsia; 2. Ideology and Jewish language politics: How Yiddish became the national language of Soviet Jewry; 3. Modernising Yiddish; 4. Who owns the means of cultural production? The Soviet Yiddish publishing industry of the 1920s; 5. Engineers of Jewish souls: Soviet Yiddish writers envisioning the Jewish past, present and future; 6. Becoming revolutionary: Izi Kharik and the question of aesthetics, politics and ideology; Afterword. How does the story end?; Appendices; Notes; Bibliography; Index.
Reviews for Yiddish and the Creation of Soviet Jewish Culture: 1918–1930
...enlightening and...enjoyable. American Historical Review ...an important contribution...moves beyond many of the stereotypically conventional ways historians have portrayed Soviet Jewish intellectuals in the past...well-documented study. Mark L. von Hagen, Columbia University Shneer's masterful account of Soviet nationalities policy and Yiddish language politics sets the stage for his discussion of how activists like Esther Frumkina, Moshe Litvakov, and Semen Dimanshteyn promoted Yiddish as Soviet policy. Russian Review, Sean Martin, Cleveland, Ohio [an] astute and comprehensive study Journal of Modern History Abraham Brumberg, Chevy Chase, Marlyand This book is a welcome addition to the literature on Jews in eastern Europe. It will appeal to readers in the fields of Russian, Jewish and cultural studies. It could also interest people delving into the cultural aspects of the Jewish past. - Allan Laine Kagedan, Carleton University
- Commended for National Jewish Book Award (Eastern European Studies) 2005
