Take Five: Building a Bibliographic Database of the Soviet Yiddish Press (1917–1970)
Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: Between 1917 and 1941, hundreds of periodicals were published in Yiddish in the Soviet Union. This article describes a project of collecting, unifying, and building a database of bibliographical information on Soviet Yiddish periodicals held in four major libraries in Russia and Ukraine. A description of the relevant library holdings in Russia and Ukraine, as of 2021, is also provided. The statistical results, which were published and visualized in a specially built web application, are discussed. A comparison to other digital projects, as well as four comprehensive bibliographies dedicated to the Yiddish press in the USSR, show that even though many Soviet Yiddish periodicals were already described, the current project provides a more structured and comprehensive perspective on the Soviet Yiddish press. It also covers some previously underrepresented types of periodicals, such as factory and rural presses, which demonstrate their particular features: an abundance of working correspondents’ contributions and the multilingual composition of the issues.
Source: East European Jewish Affairs
Authors: Ilia Uchitel, Arsenii Lukashevskyi
Language: English
Subfield: Literature and Literary Theory
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: hybrid
OpenAlex ID: W7154894680