Alef: The NEXT Conversation

01: Old Country

This week we introduce Issue #1: Old Country.

For the opportunity to contribute to future issues of Alef, please see our Contribute section.

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American Jews are a diverse lot, more so now than ever. But regardless of our actual family history or bloodline, we all seem to have at least some roots - literal or mythic - in the “Old Country.” Whether it is a Yiddish phrase or Klezmer wedding tune, the high esteem we give smoked fish or how we appreciate a tale well told, almost all Jews feel the Old Country in who they are.

Nearly two million Ashkenazic Jews migrated from Russia - or the lands with ever-shifting borders in Russia’s shadows - from 1880-1924, bringing with them a rich, Yiddish-infused culture, and a fervent desire to get out of a place that was cold, poor, and not all that nice to its Jewish inhabitants. Out of these Shtetls of Poland, Russia, the Ukraine, Romania, and Hungary, came children and grandchildren that unleashed a wave of cultural influence that reached all the way from Ivy League schools to Hollywood (and a lot of things in-between), shaping the America we know and the Jewish mosaic that we are. A second wave of more recent Jewish immigrants from the former Soviet Union have continued the trend.

Whether we can trace our recent ancestry to the “the Old Country” or not, almost all of us are under its spell, and for good reason. The Old Country seems to have provided us with much of our Jewish soul and societal outlook. As anyone who has seen the brilliant new Coen brothers’ film, “A Serious Man” knows, it all starts over there, in that cold, exotic place. The Blues wouldn’t be the blues without the Mississippi river delta and its heartache, so too it is hard to imagine what it means to be Jewish - from the entertainers to the scholars, the hipsters to the black hats - without our Old Country antecedents.

For the next week we’ll be exploring the Old Country, and how our connection to it continues to shape and influence the Jewish people. That’s why we’re also curious about your background. We’d love to hear where in the Old Country your roots are. Let us know by leaving a comment.

-Alef

Photo by sunnyUK, licensed under Creative Commons.

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Old Country Posts:

Monologues: Ilya
Foreign Accent Syndrome
To Brighton
A Coat For The Ages: Part I
A Coat For The Ages: Part II
Monologues: Boris
I’ve Got a Crush on Regina Spektor
A Herring Restoration

Tags: Old Country

Posted by Ruvym, Wednesday, September 9th, 2009, 4:29 pm, Old Country.