Doikayt: Histories of Jews Going West

Program Description

When did Jews begin to settle on Coast Salish lands? What was the Jewish Colonization Association, and what did it have to do with mass migration from Europe? How did Jewish railroad barons and bootleggers shape society? Who was David Oppenheimer, the first Jewish mayor of Vancouver? When did the centre of Vancouver Jewish life move from Strathcona to Oakridge? Why were Jews associated with radicals and communists? How did they respond to antisemitism across the political spectrum? And why do all (rail)roads lead back to Winnipeg? In this 6-week, in-person seminar, we will trace the histories of Jewish migration and settlement on the west coast from 1880 through the 1930s. Each class will involve participatory learning and discussion by opening pathways into fragmented worlds of archival materials (including oral histories, memoires, newspapers, maps, immigration documents, and more). We will consider how this collaborative learning helps us understand the relationship between Jewish and Canadian identities, what role Jews played in the colonial project of Canada and the political landscape of the emerging nation-state, and what all this means for us here and now. Rather than providing answers, the goal of this course is to engage with questions we bring into, and that emerge from, a critical study of the place where we live. ***Schedule & Fees*** This new course includes 6 in-person classes from Feb. 3 to Mar. 17 (Tuesdays, 7-9pm) PLUS full access to the Doikayt Speaker Series (4 online talks by local scholars and organizers connecting us to the place where we live), dates TBA. The course fee is $54. We acknowledge the support of the Canadian Race Relations Foundation with funding provided by the Government of Canada. ***Instructor Bios*** Adi Burton is an interdisciplinary scholar and community organizer. She became the co-executive director of the Peretz Centre in 2024 after completing her PhD at the University of British Columbia on the responsibility of activists in the face of genocide. As a teacher, she draws on Jewish political and ethical thought, postcolonialism, memory studies, and philosophy of education. Michal Israeli is an activist, political educator, and Hebrew language teacher specializing in decolonizing second language education and transformative and critical pedagogies. A journalist with an MA in Media & Cultural Studies, she is an MEd student in Modern Language Education at the University of British Columbia.