The seminar "Pearls of Yiddish Culture" was held on March 19-21, 2018 at the Faculty of History and Philosophy of the Odessa National University named after Ilya Mechnikov. It became an integral part of the particular academic program "Modern Jewish and Israeli Studies".

The seminar was provided by two WJC JC top-ranked representatives: prof. Wolf Moskovich (Professor Emeritus, formerly chairperson of the Department of Russian and Slavic Studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem), and Dr. Mordechay Yushkovsky (WJC YC academic director).

15 people were enrolled for the seminar. However, in fact, 26 attended the lectures. Those were mostly students, postgraduate students and lecturers of the Faculty of History and Philosophy.

Certificates were issued to 13 students who attended all the classes; among them - a teacher from Kiev who learned about the seminar in Odessa from the Internet and specially arrived here.

Academic discussions of the origin and specifics of the Odessa language and humor, suggested by Prof. Moskovich, aroused great interest. Listeners reacted vividly, brought examples from their own lives, quoted local newspapers.

Dr. Yushkovsky's lecture "Yiddish culture on the map of Ukraine" was being listened to most attentively, revealing lots of facts to the students. He gave two more talks: "Yiddish culture as a treasury of our collective national memory" and "Odessa in Yiddish literature and folklore".

The final round table was devoted to the modern Odessa situation, the state of historical memory, Jewish Odessa, Odessa mythology.