What was life like in the old country? Through the eyes of Lisa Cooper’s grandmother Pearl, we experience family life in the Russian Empire in the late 19th and early 20th centuries in the context of pogroms, World War I, the Russian Revolution, and civil war. Pearl's son recorded his mother's memories, which give a lively sense of life and culture in the Pale of our ancestors. Lisa Cooper is a British writer, journalist and artist. While spending a year…

YIVO’s collections include more than 2.5 million documents and 12,000 books that were long thought to be lost and represent over 500 years of Jewish history in Eastern Europe.  The landmark Edward Blank YIVO Vilna project will preserve and digitize these materials, making them available to researchers.  Dr. Jonathan Brent’s talk describes the project and the political and social roles these records play in contemporary Lithuanian society and 21stcentury Jewish identity. Jonathan Brent Dr. Jonathan Brent is the Executive Director…

Sponsored by Temple Emanuel and JGSGB Schelly Talalay Dardashti digs deeply into Sephardic Jewish history in discussing the post-1391 and post-1492 migrations from Spain and Portugal into the Balkans, North Africa, and the New World. She also addresses Sephardic DNA project results and genetic medical conditions (including BRCA1). A journalist and genealogist, Schelly has written widely on Sephardic Jewish genealogy. She founded the enormously popular and helpful Facebook group “Tracing the Tribe” and has spoken at many conferences on Jewish…

(Feldberg Meeting Room, lower level) Research Sundays are an opportunity to: Get help with using your genealogy software Consult experienced researchers for help with your research questions in 30-minute scheduled appointments Work with a strategist to plan your next steps Get translation help with documents written in various foreign languages in 20-minute scheduled appointments Learn how to read your DNA results or decide if DNA testing is for you Examine our extensive research collection of books and maps on your…

Do you have your latkes with applesauce or sour cream? Does your family eat rice during Passover? Award-winning chef, food journalist, and author Joan Nathan will show us how the foods we ate growing up were influenced by our families’ ethnic and geographical origins. Dedicating her life to examining Jewish food through a historical perspective, she will explain how and why these customs started and “how the foods we eat share a deeper cultural connection than we might imagine.” Joan…