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2008-10-30
Vilnius seminar series continues...

VILNIUS UNIVERSITY

Vilnius Yiddish Institute

Vilnius Seminar Series on the Eastern European Jewish Heritage

Sponsored by the Dutch Jewish Humanitarian Fund (www.jhf.nl)

Date: October 29, 2008

Speaker: Prof. Mordechai Zalkin [Department. of Jewish History, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Israel]

Lecture: Did they know not the glory of nature nor see skies azure? Experience of childhood and its formation in the East European traditional Jewish society.

During the second half of the 20^th century the terms “children” and “childhood”, and their meaning in the pre-modern societies, attracted the attention of a many historians. Yet, the world of the Jewish child was left in the margins of the historical research, mainly due to the assumption that he spent most of his time in the Heder, and in fact did not have any non-religious world of experiences. The main aim of this presentation is to undermine this assumption, while, based on a wide range of sources, drawing a different and a colorful picture of these children’s daily social life.