TAGLIT-BIRTHRIGHT ISRAEL AND

HEBREW:

THE ERA OF DREAMERS

by GIDI MARK and BARRY CHAZAN

HAPPY STORY

T here is consensus today that Taglit-Birthright Israel is one of the important developments of the last decade in terms of affecting Jewish identity and the connections between Israel and world Jewry. This naturally gives the founders and professionals of Birthright Israel a feeling of gratitude. They labored diligently to create a financially viable and educationally significant enterprise, and the evidence seems to point to great success. Much success can be attributed to thoughtful planning, hard work and trial and error. But it must be said that some of the success is the result of surprises and discoveries that surfaced along the way.

One of these surprises is related to Hebrew language and culture.

SURPRISE, SURPRISE

Early on and increasingly throughout the program, various sources — research, anecdotes, and program evaluation — pointed to the impact of experiencing Hebrew as a living language of a modern Jewish country among Birthright Israel participants.

The interest in this subject is revealed by such oft-repeated but still gripping statements as “Wow, even the dogs and cats speak Hebrew,” and by the ongoing research findings of Brandeis University’s Cohen Center for Modern Jewish Studies that one of the most powerful take-backs of Taglit participants is the desire to study Hebrew at their universities or at an ulpan upon return. In short, exposure to Hebrew culture plays a much bigger role in the Taglit experience than any of us had realized.

FROM HEBREW SCHOOL TO HEBREW HAMBURGERS

What is it about coming to Israel for ten days on Taglit that turns the “unhappy” subject of Hebrew into a new beacon for young adult Jews?

In order to answer this question, we must first ask what has been the general experience of most American young people with the Hebrew language. For some, it was Hebrew school — a supplementary school experience that has had a checkered history. For others, it was rote learning of an alphabet and word configuration in order to recite blessings and a haftarah at one’s bar or bat mitzvah, or a holy language studied in order to read sentences in the prayer book or other Jewish texts. For still others, it was a foreign language studied at the depth of basic conversations about daily matters (weather, family, holidays). All of these are important and reflect the diverse efforts — under conditions that were not always easy — of American Jewish education to teach Hebrew.

When young adults come to Israel, they suddenly experience Hebrew as a living language of a contemporary people that is used to:

Whereas in the past, Hebrew has most often been connected to ritual and religion, the Taglit-Birthright Israel participant comes to Israel for ten days and suddenly sees and hears a society doing everything in Hebrew — fixing cars, praying, playing, ordering a hamburger, arguing about the meaning of life and trying to hook up with a friend or set up a date. Hebrew becomes linked to life and people. Research has made it clear that Taglit participants return with many things — closeness to Israel; a greater ability to explain Israel; a greater feeling for the linkage of Jews, Judaism and Israel; and a general heightened “Jewish feeling.” What has not yet been studied enough — but which we believe to be true — is the conscious and sub-conscious impact of breathing “Hebrew oxygen” and hearing “Hebrew voices” — one of the most powerful experiences Israel provides. Let us be clear and honest: Taglit participants do not learn

Hebrew in ten days, and this is not one of Taglit’s overtly stated goals (although today all trip organizers have realized the potential of Hebrew, and each incorporates it in its own way). But we increasingly believe participants return with some kind of a “Hebrew virus.”

WHY BIRTHRIGHT ISRAEL OFFERS NEW POSSIBILITIES

Research on Americans visiting Israel either on high-school or post-high school trips emphasizes the power of the visit. However, such research also reveals one discordant note — the lack of contact with Hebrew culture and society. Samuel Heilman’s 1995 study of a high-school trip emphasizes its overall power, but also notes that young people live in what the author describes as a kind of American “bubble.” Research points to disappointment among overseas college students that they had not improved their Hebrew:

The 626 students interviewed by the American Jewish Committee in the late 1980s for its study on North American Jewish students at Hebrew University’s Rothberg International School (RIS) “commented that their Israeli experience could have been more rewarding if more contacts were established with Israeli students.” Hebrew University sociologist Erik Cohen found in 1993 that 83 percent of students wanted to study in Israel to improve their Hebrew skills… (Allison Good, “American And Israeli College Students: A Missed Opportunity,” The Jewish Week, December 28, 2010)

In its own way, Taglit-Birthright Israel remedies these problems. Participants do not spend ten days in an isolated bubble. While they are part of a group and the group is the central environment, the group is in Israel. It travels, sees and hears Israel firsthand. Second, and even more important, Taglit participants live with Israelis for five days or more. They may interact in English but they breathe, hear and even experiment in Modern Hebrew. Taglit-Birthright Israel is an Israel experience as well as a Hebrew experience.

What is even more surprising is the impact this seems to have on participants’ consciousness. Young adults seem to understand better than others the integral connection between language and sense of self. They want to learn Hebrew because they seem to realize language is part of identity, and mastering a language is changing one’s self in some way. The culture and oxygen of Hebrew may indeed have a viral effect on Taglit participants.

FROM TEN DAYS IN ISRAEL TO A HEBREW CULTURE IN AMERICA

So what might be the takeaway and challenge from the reality we have described? When returnees say “it changed my life” or “it transformed me,” they may be referring both to what happened in the past ten days and to what could happen in the months and years ahead. Perhaps hidden in the “Taglit effect” is the awakening of a new American Hebrew culture. What if participants were to return with a desire to learn Hebrew, and we were to respond to that seriously? What if programming and activities after Taglit were to encompass a major new national Taglit Hebrew ulpan community that would spread across North America? What if we were to utilize the sparks that clearly have been ignited, and that the research definitively documents, to create a fire of Hebrew interest? Maybe, just maybe, we might create the new Eliezer Ben Yehudas of Hebrew in North America.

Ironically, this may be the most promising resource for a Hebrew renaissance — thousands of young adults who study Hebrew not because they have to in order to recite a haftarah, but because they want to because a spark has been lit. Is it possible? Without being too grandiose, over 100 years ago they laughed at Herzl when he spoke about a Jewish State. They laughed at Eliezer Ben Yehuda when he said “Ivri, daber Ivrit” (“Hebrew person, speak Hebrew”). Many laughed in the late 1990s when the State of Israel, Jewish philanthropists and Jewish communities said they were going to try to crack the logjam of non-travel to Israel.

Maybe Saul Tchernikovsky was right when he said, “Laugh laugh at all my dreams, I the dreamer tell you they will come true” (“Creed,” reprinted in Selected Poems, Jewish Education Committee, 1944). Maybe laughing at apparently big dreams is a precarious and doubtful road to take. One man at the beginning of the last century and a group of people at the end of the last century may have renewed the long-standing credibility of the Jewish people as a nation of Hebrew dreamers. ■

Gidi Mark is the International CEO of Taglit-Birthright Israel. Before 2008, he served as the project’s International Director of Marketing and Community Relations. Mr. Mark joined the project at its inception after leaving Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, where he served as a diplomat in New York, Germany and Turkey. Barry Chazan has been International Director of Education of Taglit-Birthright Israel since its inception. He is Professor Emeritus of Education of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and author of books and articles on Jewish education, moral education and Israel education.

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