Zelda Kahan Newman is a linguist whose specialty is Yiddish language and culture. She has translated the poems of Rivke Basman Ben-Hayim and written about the interface of Yiddish and Hebrew in language as well as in literature. Her most important paper was a demonstration that modern Yiddish intonation derives from the way the original settlers of Ashkenaz chanted the Jerusalem Talmud.
Kahan Newman lived in Beer Sheva, where she taught at the University of the Negev and was active in MASLAN, a Negev-based women’s organization that helps victims of violence. She is currently living in New York and teaching at Lehman College of the City University of New York.
