Disciplines

Jewish Studies

Abstract

Summarizer: Sophia Maier

Eileen Langer is a lifelong Bronxite. Despite her world travels, she identifies the Bronx as her home. As a child, she lived in Roosevelt Gardens on the Grand Concourse and remembers walking to see her grandmother across the Concourse. As she got older, Langer remembers going to the movies, going shopping, eating ice cream, and attending the Sephardic synagogue all along the Grand Concourse. Though she went to college at City College, she completed all of her other schooling in the Bronx, including a master’s degree from Lehman College. Becoming an educator herself, she has taught and mentored at a Bronx K-12 schools, Lehman College, Bronx Community College, and more. Langer has lived in Riverdale for the last 50 years, since she got married.

Langer’s family kept kosher and would gather every Sunday with extended family at her grandparents’ apartment. They observed the holidays, but did not attend synagogue weekly, though since marrying she has become Modern Orthodox. Langer’s own Sephardic heritage is different from her husband’s Ashkenazi upbringing in some religious practices and traditional foods. Her grandmother was a great cook who made traditional Sephardic foods like pasteles and yaprakes. Langer’s grandparents spoke Ladino when they didn’t want the children to understand.

Langer feels she got a great education in the Bronx, though less collaborative than students today. In college, Langer was a member of Alpha Sigma Rho sorority. Outside of school, she enjoyed playing tennis and going to the theater. Her parents did not complete college, but she remembers her father as very intelligent and knowledgeable about world news and her mother as talented and artistic. The family moved to Co-op City when Langer had just married, and she taught high school at night there.

Langer, who originally wanted a job in publishing before becoming a lifelong educator, describes the draw of women to elementary education during that time period: pensions, benefits, off at the same time as their children. She herself preferred the older ages, her favorite being freshman English at Lehman. To this day, Langer loves mentoring young educators and loves being in Riverdale, particularly going to Wave Hill. She remembers her childhood in the Bronx as wonderful.

Keywords: Grand Concourse, Roosevelt Gardens, Sephardic, Co-op City, Lehman College, City College, Van Cortlandt Park, Wave Hill, Riverdale, food, Modern Orthodox, Ladino, Alpha Sigma Rho, education, Catskills, Alexander’s, Loehmann’s, English, gender

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