Memories for a Blessing Jewish Mourning Rituals and Commemorative Practices in Postwar Belarus and Ukraine, 1944-1991 by Sarah Garibov A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy (History) in University of Michigan 2017 Doctoral Committee: Professor Ronald Suny, Co-Chair Professor Jeffrey Veidlinger, Co-Chair Emeritus Professor Todd Endelman Professor Zvi Gitelman Sarah Garibov [email protected] ORCID ID: 0000-0001-5417-6616 © Sarah Garibov 2017 DEDICATION To Grandma Grace (z”l), who took unbounded joy in the adventures and accomplishments of her grandchildren. ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS First and foremost, I am forever indebted to my remarkable committee. The faculty labor involved in producing a single graduate is something I have never taken for granted, and I am extremely fortunate to have had a committee of outstanding academics and genuine mentshn. Jeffrey Veidlinger, thank you for arriving at Michigan at the perfect moment and for taking me on mid-degree. From the beginning, you have offered me a winning balance of autonomy and accountability. I appreciate your generous feedback on my drafts and your guidance on everything from fellowships to career development. Ronald Suny, thank you for always being a shining light of positivity and for contributing your profound insight at all the right moments. Todd Endelman, thank you for guiding me through modern Jewish history prelims with generosity and rigor. You were the first to embrace this dissertation project, and you have faithfully encouraged me throughout the writing process. Zvi Gitelman, where would I be without your wit and seykhl? Thank you for shepherding me through several tumultuous years and for remaining a steadfast mentor and ally. The faculty of the Frankel Center for Judaic Studies and the Department of History have exemplified a generous, collaborative spirit and have contributed immeasurably to my development as a scholar. I especially wish to acknowledge Mikhail Krutikov for the valuable suggestions and thoughtful comments that he has offered on my research. Brian Porter-Szucs led me though a challenging prelims field on East European interethnic and interreligious relations that has had an enduring impact on my research and teaching. It was a privilege to GSI twice for iii Victor Lieberman and Anne Berg, and Martin Pernick launched my lasting interest in pedagogical methods. I would also like to acknowledge Julian Levinson, my fellow students in the Judaic Studies capstone seminar, the Russian/Soviet History Workshop, and a series of three Sweetland writing groups for their generous feedback and perceptive suggestions on my chapter drafts. Each has contributed tremendously to my growth as a writer and scholar. To my wonderful language teachers at UM (Levana Aronson, Eugene Bondarenko, Sasha Hoffman, Mikhail Krutikov, Anita Norich, Svetlana Rogovyk) as well as my teachers at the University of Washington (James Augerot, Hadar Khazzam-Horovitz, Zoya Pollack, Valentina Zaitseva), Nassau Community College (Vladimir Konovaliuk), Hofstra University (Constantine Kallaur, Alexander Mihailovic), and the outstanding faculty of numerous summer programs (Hebrew University’s Ulpan, Middlebury Language Schools, St. Petersburg State University, YIVO): thank you for giving me the linguistic and cultural tools necessary to conduct the research that this project demanded. Learning a language changes brain structures, but it also changes souls. I feel incredibly lucky to have had so many teachers and languages touch my life. Over the last seven years, I have enjoyed the guidance and camaraderie of many scholars at both the University of Michigan and beyond. I am grateful to Elissa Bemporad for her advice on conducting research in Belarus and for her insightful comments on an early draft of my second chapter. Karen Auerbach, Ben Baader, Monique Balbuena, Rivka Bliboim (z”l), Marc Caplan, Liora Halperin, Reuven Kiperwasser, Devi Mays, Andrew Sloin, Sasha Senderovich, and Max Strassfeld have each become treasured friends, mentors, and role models. I owe many debts to the UM candidates who graduated before me, including Yoni Brack, Ian Campbell, Sara Feldman, Krista Goff, Sasha Hoffman, Austin McCoy, Ben Pollak, Kate Rosenblatt, Ronit Stahl, Cookie Woolner, and others—your success has been the single greatest inspiration and iv encouragement that your junior colleagues could require. Thank you for generously sharing your wisdom and for the monumental contributions you are making to your profession and the broader world. I am also grateful to my numerous classmates, fellow GSIs, and friends from Judaic Studies, History, Architecture, American Cultures, Anthropology, English, Near Eastern Studies, and Slavic Languages and Literatures. There are too many to name individually, but it has been a pleasure to spend the last seven years in your company, and I hope our paths will continue to cross in the future. During my time at the University of Michigan, I have benefitted tremendously from the vast resources available to graduate students. I am especially grateful to the History staff (Kathleen, Lorna, Diana, Kimberly, and others), UM Libraries, the Center for Research and Learning on Teaching, and Counseling and Psychological Services for helping me to navigate a time of vigorous scholarly, pedagogical, and personal growth. In the last two years, I have had the privilege of participating in three emerging scholars’ workshops that provided crucial advice on professional development and opportunities to connect with an international peer group. These included: the 2015 International Forum of Young Scholars on East European Jewry, the 2015 Graduate Workshop in Modern Jewish History, and the 2016 Workshop on New Directions in the Use of Oral Testimonies: Soviet Experiences of the Holocaust. Many thanks to the devoted organizers of these workshops, including Deborah Dash Moore and Zvi Gitelman, for their generous service to the profession. The fieldwork for this dissertation was one of the most emotionally and physically demanding experiences of my life. This was especially true in Belarus and Ukraine where I traveled alone and changed locations on average once a week. My work would have been v impossible without the help of numerous, dedicated Jewish communal leaders who generously showed me around, introduced me to interviewees, and helped me find food and lodging. In Israel, I spent most of my time at the Central Archive for the History of the Jewish People and was given outstanding support by the staff, including Benyomin Lukin, Yochai, Eli, and Bebe. I was also fortunate to enjoy the company of Inbal, Nevo, and Noa who welcomed me into their family; and I was lucky to meet Lena and Nadia who offered their friendship, encouragement, and aid in the direst moments. In Belarus, Vadim Akopian helped me to obtain a visa and facilitated my research in Minsk. I’m especially grateful to Elina, Itzik, Baruch, and the Beis Yisroel community for helping me navigate Belarus and for providing me a place to call home for three months. In Mogilev, I was fortunate to meet Alexander Litin and Ida Shenderovich who introduced me to local Jewish history and to many enthusiastic interviewees. It is rare to find a young person so engaged with cemeteries and their preservation, but Taras Prakapenka shared his knowledge of Gomel’s burial landscape and made my time there both nourishing and productive. I am also grateful to Rabbi David Kantrovich and the Beit Iakov synagogue for their hospitality. In Bobruisk, Rabbi Shaul and Rebbetzin Mina Bababo were kind hosts and helpful guides. In Ukraine, Masha, Anya, and Anya at the Kyiv Moishe House generously hosted me and introduced me to the city. Ira and Nastya also hosted me and shared their experiences at Maidan and their hopes for Ukraine’s future. Leonid Finberg at the Institute for Judaica in Kyiv was very supportive of my project and provided important leads as I began my time in Ukraine. I am also grateful to Rabbi Raphael Rutman, his wife, Dvorah, and their lovely family for their hospitality and for a memorable Rosh Hashanah at Beit Chana in Dnipropetrovs’k. While in Odesa, I was fortunate to meet Babushka Malka and to spend Sukkot with her and the lovely Tikvah vi Synagogue. Batya and the staff at Migdal were also instrumental in facilitating my research in the Odesa Oblast. My fieldwork and subsequent years of writing would have been impossible without generous support from a Rackham Graduate Research Grant, the Frankel Center’s Summer Research Award, the Brandeis-Genesis Institute for Russian Jewry’s Research Grant, the Association for Jewish Studies’ Dissertation Completion Fellowship, and the Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture’s Doctoral Scholarship. January-August 2016, I was fortunate to be a visiting fellow at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. While there I benefitted tremendously from the collections, the warmth and knowledge of my “fellow fellows,” and the expertise of Ronald Coleman, Megan Lewis, Vincent Slatt, Elena Jakel, Emil Kerenij, and Natalya Lazar. It is only fitting that I acknowledge Dmitri Shostakovich—the composer who launched my interest in Russian Jewish history. After hearing From Jewish Folk Poetry, the next logical step was, of course, to learn Yiddish. Even so, my academic adventures would never have gotten off the ground without Stephen Hanson, Barbara Henry, and Deborah Porter. They somehow guided my fledgling interests into successful projects and encouraged me to forge new dreams for myself. At the same time, they set a high bar of intellectual rigor, generosity, and humility that continues to inspire me. At UM, I was lucky to meet Rabbi Seth Winberg who helped me to track down Jewish sources on mourning and to navigate occasions when rabbinic law and Jewish folk practice were not necessarily in lockstep. I am forever grateful to my partner, Etty, for her patience and loving encouragement during this grueling process. Lastly, but first in my heart, I would like to acknowledge my parents, Jean and Lee Cunningham.