64 Friday, October 5, 1979 THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS Russian Immigrants: Overcoming Language and Culture-Shock ' By BARBARA LEWIS Jewish Welfare Federation Tatiana Vulman didn't know she was Jewish till she was in the third grade. The teachers had it writ- ten down in their books what the st'slents were; and a friend of mine saw that I was Jewish and she told me," said the pretty, fair- haired 13-year-old. "I was the only Jewish girl in my class." It's a long way from Mos- • cow, where Tatiana's par- ents had to protect her from the knowledge of her reli- gious origins, to Berkley, Mich., where the Vulmans have lived since moving to the U.S. a year ago. Living openly as a Jew is just one of –the many changes Tatiana and other immigrant children have had to face. But if she and two of her friends, Inna Lib- kind and Irini Yudkovich, are any example, the transi- tion is not too difficult. Their biggest problem, the girls agreed, is their lack of fluency in English. Although they started learning English two years, ago, most of their knowledge has been acquired since they ar- rived here. Irina's family came to Detroit last spring; Inna's family ar- rived just a few months ago. Both girls are from Leningrad, which Irina describes nostalgically as "a beautiful city." All the girls had been to a synagogue only once. "In Moscow there is only one synagogue," Tatiana said. "I went once, but it was very crowded and I couldn't get inside." at enrolled Now Yeshivath Beth Yehuda, the girls are learning about their Jewish heritage in addition to English and other school subjects. Their families have begun to attend synagogue services regularly and to openly celebrate the Jewish holi- days. Professional educators and social workers who deal with immigrant children agree with the three teens that mastering English is their biggest problem. Younger children adjust more easily, both to the lan- guage and to the cultural differences. "Russian schools offer a lot less freedom than our schools," said Alicia Karr, casework super-, visor at Resettlement Service, the Jewish Wel- fare Federation member agency which coordi- nates community serv- ices to Soviet refugees. "Russian teens want to conform to their American peers, and at-the same time they want to live up to the expectations of their par- ents, who are used to the Russian educational sys- tem. This sometimes causes social conflicts for them." "In high school, about half the immigrant stu- dents do well and the other half not so well," said George Giannetti, director of bilingual programs for the Oak Park Public Schools, where many new- comers' children are enrolled. "Attendance is some- times a problem — some of the Russian students tend to skip classes a lot. I think it's a problem of culture- shock, not just ordinary ado- lescent problems." The Oak Park district, which has immigrant students from more than a half-dozen ethnic groups, has a bilingual Two of Detroit's three Jewish day schools, which are supported by the Allied Jewish Campaign - Israel Emergency Fund, also have substantial numbers of Russian students. Hillel Day School has about 20 Russian stu- dents, mainly in grades 1 through 4. Yeshivath Beth Yehuda has more than 50 children from the USSR. Akiva Day School currently has only one Russian children work side-by-side with Ameri- cans in both English and Hebrew classes at Hillel Day School. program in which stu- Russian student. "When we get them dents learn English; in addition some regular young enough they perform school subjects are like the rest of our students taught in the students' — some great, some not so great," said Rabbi Robert first language. "Some are able to switch Abramson, Hillel's head- over to all-English classes master. "Their problems are in one year," said Giannetti. individual problems, not problems unique to Rus- "Most take three years." The district has a Russian sians as a group." bilingual advisory commit- One of the most impor- tee, composed of students' tant functions of Hillel, and parents, which meets other Jewish schools, is periodically and has been turning the students on to "very supportive," Gian- knowledge and enjoyment netti said. of their Jewishness, he said. "A family's level of Yid- dishkeit depends on where in the USSR they came from and what were their mo- tives for leaving Russia. Some left because they wanted to be practicing Jews, others because they wanted material benefits or more personal freedom," he said. "Jews from Moscow generally don't know Pesach from popovers. But Lithuania, and sev- eral other areas, were not part of the USSR until after World War II. In families from these areas, some parents, many grandparents, learned Hebrew and managed to maintain some Jewish atmosphere in their homes." About 20 Russian chil- dren attended Camp Tamarack last summer. They adapt well to the camp program, since there are similar programs in the USSR, Berman said. "They don't get homesick, but they need someone to talk to. They don't like to talk to the counselors, either because of the language barrier or because of a general dis- trust of authority." Tamarack has started to hire older Russian teena- gers as kitchen and mainte- nance staffers, he said. "Having them around helps the younger kids, even though they aren't directly involved with them." The Jewish Community Center has also hired a few teenagers — to act as trans- lators for the Russian chil- dren. Almost all the immig- rant children are placed at Tamarack br the Center day camp during their first two summers here. "We try to place two Russian children to- gether within a group, as a sort of 'buddy system'," said Cal Lefton, director of group services at the Center. "And we try to place them with the more experienced counselors." Many of the day -ginpers have a parent e ad in the Center's Englisii classes for immigrants. "They ar- rive and depart on the bus with their parents, rather than with the other cam- pers," he said. Younger children are placed in the Center's nur- sery program, both during the school year and in the summer. "We have a buddy system there too," Lefton said. "We usually assign an American child to each Rus- sian child, and we have a Russian speaker on staff. The children seem to over- come the cultural dif- ferences really easily, but language is a big problem." Most of the Russian chil- dren attend the day schools and camping programs on scholarships. "We turn down applicants only if we feel they're too old to adjust to our program," said Hillel's Rabbi Abram- son. "Otherwise, we've been able to accommodate all. Some families who have been here four or five years are now starting to contrib- ute to their children's tui- tion." The Moral Bankruptcy of U.S. Black Leadership By JULIUS LESTER (Editor's note: Lester is a former member of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee. This article is reprinted from the Sept. 10 Village Voice.) - And so, Jews are being used as scapegoats again. I cannot interpret other- wise the recent positions taken by black leaders on the Mideast and black- Jewish relations. And I am angered by how self- righteous and arrogant black leaders sounded: "Jews must show more sen- sitivity and be prepared for more consultation before taking positions contrary to the best interests of the black community." While I understand that such a statement comes from years of anger at active Jewish opposition to affir- mative action, and how de- eply blacks were hurt by this opposition to what was in our "best interests," black leadership still seems to be ignorant of the fact that Jews have been hurt by black indifference to the fate of Israel. I don't recall angry pronouncements from black leadership when 18 Jews were killed at Kiryat Shmona by Pales- tinian terrorists. I don't remember black hands held out in sympathy when 20 Jewish children were murdered at Maalot, where Palesti- nians held a school of children hostage. When 31 Jews were killed in a Palestinian attack on a bus, black leadership did not gather before the television cameras and microphones to say, "No! No! No! Not another Jew can be murdered on this earth." Because blacks have been silent while Jews continued 4-ityq.464 4 to be murdered, I am appal- led that they dare come for- ward now to self- righteously lecture Jews to "show .more sensitivity" when black . leadership is guilty of ethnocentric in- sehsitivity. Arrogance is, however, a common fault of oppressed people when they believe that their status as victims gives them the ad- vantage of moral superior- ity. But morality is not found in lecturing others on morality. Morality is pain- fully earned by constant awareness of one's own limitations, mistakes, and fragile humanity. Morality comes by constantly adjur- ing yourself and not others to "show more sensitivity." It is the absence of sen- sitivity to point the finger at Israel's relations with South Africa when black leadership has failed to exemplify the least concern about the oppression of Soviet Jewry. How dare black leadership thrust it- self into foreign affairs on the issue of Palestinian rights after failing to take an interest when Jews were fighting against the expira- tion of the statute of limita- tions on Nazi war crimes in West Germany! The lack of black sensitivity on matters of deep and abiding concern to Jews has wounded Jews as much as Jewish opposi- tion to affirmative action has wounded us. However, black leader- ship not only wraps itself in a cloak of moral excellence it goes further and chooses sides in the Mideast con- flict. I shouldn't have been surprised by this, because, as Reverend Wyatt Tee Walker expressed it, "The Palestinians are the niggers of the Middle East." Such a statement is sickeningly obscene. Any pro- Palestinian sympathies I might have had died in Munich when 11 members, of the Israeli Olympic team were murdered. But maybe blacks have become so Western that we don't think it is "to the best interests of the black community" to care that there are still people in the world who want to a. 4e,ws because they But who in the civili- zation has ever cared when Jews were killed? Why, then, should blacks be different? Not being different, black leadership takes its stand for "human rights and self- determination for Palesti- nians." This sounds reason- able, but something deep within me says that is wrong to talk about Pales- tinian human rights as long as Israeli children live with the prospect of death at Palestinian hands. How can black leadership even think about self-determination for people who attack chil- dren? To do so implicitly condones the murder of children. Black leadership should know about the murder of children, or have we forgot- ten the four children mur- dered in that Birmingham church in 1963? And surely we've forgotten that at the memorial services and ral- lies after the bombing, it was Jews, more so than other Americans, who stood beside us and shared our pain. Black leadership insults this very real part of black history, not to mention in- sulting Jews, when it says that Jewish support for the black struggle was given when it was "in their (Jews) best interest to do so." No, that is not true, because those Jews who supported, worked, and died in the civil rights movement remem- bered in their souls the pog- roms in Russia, the Holocaust, the dying that is so constant in Israel, and because they remembered, they made our struggle a part of their lives. That Jews have not supported affirmative action does nothing to negate this. But this does not seem good enough for black leadership, which takes the position that the support Jews gave in the past is to be denig- rated now. I -nnot understand wl ,lack leadership lacks the sim- ple humanity to express gratitude for past sup- port, as well as the anger we feel now in the face of Jewish conservatism. Instead, black leadership has acted as if Jews were re- sponsible for Andy Young's resignation. I thought Andy was responsible for that, and, with great dignity, he explained that he needed to be free to speak as he wished. But, as Western history amply demon- strates, whenever some- thing goes wrong it is easy to blame the Jews.