{"id":49782,"date":"2026-09-04T00:38:00","date_gmt":"2026-09-04T07:38:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/?p=49782"},"modified":"2026-09-26T10:14:54","modified_gmt":"2026-09-26T17:14:54","slug":"migration-and-familial-duty","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/2026\/09\/04\/migration-and-familial-duty\/","title":{"rendered":"Migration and familial duty"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

On June 25, Gabriella Safran, the Eva Chernov Lokey Professor of Jewish Studies at Stanford University, presented Give Alms to the Jewish King Lear: Eldercare in Yiddish Literature. It was the last of four online public talks from the Peretz Centre for Secular Jewish Culture\u2019s latest Zhargon Speaker Series, which \u201coffers the opportunity for leading figures in Yiddish studies and contemporary Yiddish arts and culture to share their work,\u201d said Jess Goodman, who co-organizes the series and introduced the speaker.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"photo
Earlier this summer, as part of a Peretz Centre for Secular Jewish Culture online speakers series, Prof. Gabriella Safran of Stanford University gave a talk on eldercare as depicted in Yiddish literature. (photo from shc.stanford.edushc.stanford.edu)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Safran has published articles and books on Russian and Yiddish literature and intellectual history prior to 1917. She recently has turned her attention to the literature of eldercare and Jewish migration. In her June talk, she discussed the various ways popular culture and the arts have reflected and responded to family eldercare challenges faced by Jewish immigrants to the United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

She shared a photograph that appeared in a 1925 edition of the Yiddish newspaper Forverts (Forward)<\/em>. It was part of a series the paper commissioned from photographer Alter Kacyzne to show Polish Jewish life in the 1920s and \u201930s, which offered a glimpse of the people the recent Jewish emigr\u00e9s left behind in the \u201cold country.\u201d The picture shows an elderly woman wearing a headscarf and holding a siddur as she peers out a window, which illuminates her face. The caption says she is Hannah Kolsky, a 106-year-old widow living in Warsaw, who maintains a simple daily routine. It also states that \u201cshe has an 80-year-old son in America who does not believe that she is alive.\u2019\u2019 Safran commented that \u201cthis photo and its caption ask us to think about questions of care and the obligations of children to parents, and it also asks us to think about how those duties and their fulfilment are affected by distance, by migration.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She said the Forverts<\/em> editors \u201cknew their readers were interested in and could somehow be helped by representations of other people\u2019s experiences and the choices they made around aging and eldercare in situations of migration.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The mass migration of Jews from Eastern Europe began around 1875 and ended with the closure of the United States border in 1924, said Safran. She pointed out that, by the end of that period, more than 2.7 million Jews had left Eastern Europe, including one-third of the Jews living in the Russian Empire. Compared with other groups, the Jewish migrant population consisted of more working-age women, children and elders, but many elders did remain behind, she said, noting that the term \u201celderly\u201d officially referred to anyone older than 44.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Safran played a recording of a 1907 song that was popular for many years, called \u201cA Abrivele der Mamen<\/em>\u201d (\u201cA Little Letter to Mama\u201d). It \u201csuggested some migrants responded to the plight of their elders back in the old country by shirking their duty,\u201d she said. The lyrics tell of a mother who patiently awaits a letter from her son who has gone to America \u2013 she writes frequently, but he never responds. Eventually, the mother dies, but not before expressing hope that her son will at least say Kaddish for her.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This \u201cschmaltzy\u201d song is part of \u201ca genre of pop songs about letters,\u201d although some have happier endings, said Safran. She pointed out the shame- or guilt-inducing aspects of this song and said they also occurred in many other cultural presentations, perhaps to motivate immigrants \u201cto do the right thing,\u201d as \u201csome of the popular culture that they produced and consumed made it seem that they were at risk of making some bad mistakes.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During this era, Yiddish newspaper advice columns were an outlet for new immigrants and their families. The heartfelt letters, sent anonymously, allowed the writers to unburden themselves emotionally, as well as receive advice on a range of issues, including complex family obligations and the emotional cost of distanced relationships.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cLike the rabbis of the Talmud, the newspaper editors understood eldercare issues needed case-by-case pragmatic solutions, not necessarily one-size-fits-all rules,\u201d said Safran. Often a more nuanced approach was needed, she said, not just guilt and\/or shame, as the letter songs depicted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Safran also described two popular plays by Yiddish playwright and social reformer Jacob Gordin. The plays are similar, in that they are based on Shakespeare\u2019s King Lear<\/em> and were adapted to explore themes related the obligation of Jewish children to support their parents, in this case the  family patriarch. However, they are dissimilar in how they explore the complexities of eldercare. In the earlier play, Der Yidisher Kenig Lir<\/em> (The Yiddish King Lear<\/em>), written in 1892, the daughters had to be shamed into using some of the money their father had given to them earlier to help him when his health declined. The later play, from 1898, is Mirele Efros<\/em> (often called The Jewish Queen Lear<\/em>) and, like the newspaper advice columns, takes a more nuanced approach to filial responsibility, stressing individual ethical decision-making and responsible behaviour. It touches on the topic of shame by having one character warn others not to make decisions based on fear of public criticism, but to rely on their own judgment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Safran concluded with a warning about making assumptions today about eldercare in the past. She advised people to avoid the tendency to \u201cidealize the family relations of the past,\u201d which can happen \u201cbecause today\u2019s adult children sometimes feel shame \u2026 about not doing enough for elderly parents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe think that, in the past, things were easier,\u201d she said. \u201cThere were clear norms \u2013 everyone knew what they were supposed to do and they did it \u2013 but this was not always the case.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For more information about the Peretz Centre or the next Zhargon series, visit peretz-centre.org<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ann Daskal<\/strong> is an independent writer and retired social worker.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On June 25, Gabriella Safran, the Eva Chernov Lokey Professor of Jewish Studies at Stanford University, presented Give Alms to the Jewish King Lear: Eldercare in Yiddish Literature. It was the last of four online public talks from the Peretz Centre for Secular Jewish Culture\u2019s latest Zhargon Speaker Series, which \u201coffers the opportunity for leading […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":49787,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[784],"tags":[974,25024,25026,3225,4242,356,2529,25025],"class_list":["post-49782","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-books","tag-books-2","tag-elder-care","tag-gabriella-safran","tag-health-care","tag-history","tag-immigration","tag-newspapers","tag-yiddish-literature"],"blocksy_meta":{"styles_descriptor":{"styles":{"desktop":"","tablet":"","mobile":""},"google_fonts":[],"version":8}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49782","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=49782"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49782\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":49785,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49782\/revisions\/49785"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/49787"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49782"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49782"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49782"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}