‘Izoom’ – Lectures on Israeli-Jewish Culture for Russian Speakers

Development of Community entrepreneurship

Many Russian speaking adults have spent extended periods of time at home during the Corona crisis, leading them to search for new and interesting content on the internet. At the same time, many lecturers from the field of Israeli Judaism with expertise in Russian speaking communities have been left without a platform for their talents.

In response, the Sapir Center and the Diaspora Museumhave developed a series of high-quality online lectures in Russian on subjects of Jewish-Israeli culture that were delivered by lecturers from a range of Jewish movements and which presented a wide and pluralistic range of views.

The lectures were held twice a week during the afternoon via Zoom and were broadcasted live in Russian on the Diaspora Museum Facebook page.

A sample of the lecturers and lecture topics are presented below:

  1. Shlomo Voskoboinik – Jewish / Israeli – The Components of Contemporary Israeli Culture
  2. Yehudit Gross – A Universal View of the Jewish Holidays: Introspection, Interpersonal, Humankind and Nature
  3. Shalom Boguslavsky – Secular but Different: Differences between Secular Judaism of the Soviet Union and Ashkenazi Israeli Secular Judaism
  4. Ze’ev Volkov – Main Characteristics of Odessa Jewry
  5. Eleonora Mitnitsky – The World of the Jewish Woman and Jewish Women; The Character of Jewish Women Since Biblical Times
  6. Yosef Hersonski – The World of the Modern Ultra-Orthodox Jew ([Haredi); How the Term ‘Haredi’ was Created, Differences in the Approaches of the Different Haredi Movements, and Haredim in the Digital Age
  7. Max Lesovoy – “Every spot on which your foot treads” – Historical Sites and their Connection to the Bible
  8. Benny Mintz – The Map of Holy Secular Jerusalem
  9. Irena Kudman – Kibbutz, Commune, and the Power of Love. The Story of the Crimean Settlement through the story of the pioneer poetess who migrated from the Jewish Settlement in the Land of Israel to Crimea Sasha Klyachkina – What’s the Deal with Secular Judaism? What Exactly is ‘Secular Judaism’? On ‘Secular Jews’ and the Origin of the Term
  10. Sasha Klyachkina – What’s the Deal with Secular Judaism? What Exactly is ‘Secular Judaism’? On ‘Secular Jews’ and the Origin of the Term
  11. 11. Alexandra Mandelbaum – The Place of Uman in Contemporary Israeli Ritual

Sample Lecture