So maybe you grew up in a Jewish household, and maybe you’ve spent your childhood schlepping your tuchus to the deli for some nosheri. Students from Yiddish and non Yiddish backgrounds alike are turning to an emerging discipline: Yiddish Studies. The rising trend of Yiddish in academia implies that this mix of the German, Hebrew and Slavic languages is gaining credibility and significance.

Professor Jeremy Dauber, Associate Professor of German Language, Literature and Culture and Director of Yiddish Studies at Columbia, didn’t have a Yiddish-saturated childhood. Translated Yiddish literature drew him to the subject. “I appreciated [these texts] because they were great works of literature,” recalls Dauber. “[Yiddish] is a way into a vibrant Jewish culture that lasted a thousand years.”

Columbia’s Yiddish Studies graduate program, founded in 1952, is the first of its kind in America. Relatively few schools offer full-blown majors in Yiddish Studies, and even fewer actually have established Yiddish departments. Still, many Jewish Studies programs have sub-programs in Yiddish. Brandeis offers a minor in Yiddish and East European Culture. A considerable number of schools with Jewish Studies programs, like University of Virginia and Ohio State University, offer students contact with the “language of the Ashkenaz.”

At first glance, Yiddish scholarship doesn’t seem to be a bastion of practicality. However, according to Dauber, studying the traditional language of Eastern European Jews (and many New Yorkers) can unlock stores of untapped literature, art and history.

The pursuit of Yiddish literature has gained importance over the past few decades as scholars have rushed to save the fruits of this vibrant culture from rotting. The National Yiddish Book Center in Massachusetts was born of an effort to preserve Yiddish books that otherwise would have been thrown out by their non- Yiddish-speaking owners.

Since Aaron Lansky founded the center in 1980, he has saved approximately 1.5 million books, and counting. Want to put that number into perspective? Estimates from 1980 placed the number of salvageable Yiddish books at 70,000. The unexpected expansiveness of this halfburied literary world presents a daunting and a thrilling opportunity, Lansky says. With so many works to be rediscovered, let alone translated and studied, Yiddish scholars have their work cut out for them.

And fear not, Yiddish scholars who don’t want to live in a kastn. These students can pursue their passions and get paid to boot. Literature rescue efforts such as the National Yiddish Book Center, Yiddish contemporary theatres and Jewish cultural organizations offer careers for those with Yiddish backgrounds.

And don’t forget good old academia. “With the increase of interest in Yiddish from an academic perspective, it’s likely that more programs might be attracted to hiring a faculty member who works in the field,” says Dauber.

And who said that your undergraduate studies have to match up exactly with your career choice? In the grand scheme of things, studying Yiddish is like studying any other aspect of any other culture.

“It helps you to gain skills to study your own language, literature, and history,” says Dauber.

It looks like pursuing a B.A. in Yiddish doesn’t make you meshugener, after all.

leah KREVITT