Walking around Providence’s East Side, it’s possible to forget that this is the Diaspora. Instead of calling for “Mom,” kids on my block cry “Ima!”

Neighborhood synagogues are etched in Hebrew lettering; colorful cutouts of the aleph-bet hang in school windows. Even Israeli bumper stickers cling to cars with local license plates.

Many in Providence credit this love affair with ‘all things Hebrew’ to Esther Elkin, a local educator whose 100th year was honored on July 12 at Temple Emanu-El in Providence by a crowd that was, according to Rabbi Alvan Kaunfer, 180 strong.

Elkin described how she was chosen by her Hebrew high school principal to introduce Hayyim Nahman Bialik, now considered Israel’s national poet, to a student assembly. Bialik, surprised by her fluency, hugged her, and asked if Hebrew was taught in her home.

It wasn’t Hebrew, but Yiddish that was her mother tongue. Elkin mastered Hebrew in a Zionist after-school program in Manhattan. Her relationship with Hebrew deepened when she met her husband, the late Harry Elkin (Director of the Bureau of Jewish Education from 1954-64 and for whom the High School Midrasha program is named). Their courtship took the form of Hebrew poetry exchanges and readings. “Until the children came along, we spoke only Hebrew,” she reminisced.

“Maybe tonight she’ll forget about the Hebrew class.” That was a constant refrain running through one child’s head, when he received Hebrew tutoring classes five days a week from Esther Elkin.

That child, Joshua Elkin, said, “I was an active child and didn’t like having to sit still through the lessons. But, my mother never forgot [about the lessons].”

As a rabbi and the executive director of the Partnership for Excellence in Jewish Education, Elkin now champions Hebrew instruction. It’s “taken a hit,” he lamented, because of a lack of funding and a shift in priorities. Echoing Rabbi Mordechai Kaplan, founder of the Reconstructionist movement, he said, “Every civilization, including Judaism, has a language. Hebrew is our connection to thousands of years of Jewish history.”

A 2009 study by professors at Hebrew Union College surveyed more than 40,000 Jews and found that the number of American Jews who call themselves Hebrew speakers ranges from a mere 10 percent to a generous 50 percent. The different interpretations of what it means to know Hebrew – from letter recognition to oral proficiency – skewed those results, the surveyors believe.

Elkin represents an increasingly rare subset of American Jews who consider Hebrew an integral part of their Jewish identity, said Ruth Adler Ben-Yehuda, Hebrew instructor at Brown University and coordinator of Hebrew language at the Jewish Community Day School of Rhode Island. A challenge for today’s educators, she said, was the globalization of ‘Israeliness’ in which Hebrew study is seen as just one of many options American Jews might pursue.

Many adults have signed on for Hebrew tutoring with Elkin.

After participating in an adult bar mitzvah program and watching his daughter prepare for her own bat mitzvah, Steve Subotnick felt inspired to study Hebrew. Despite suffering serious health setbacks in 2008, Elkin still teaches students like Subotnick, who visits her for tutoring.

Liz Kaplan began studying Hebrew with Elkin as part of a conversion class. Kaplan discovered that the language gave her access to fundamental Jewish ideas: “At synagogue there are inspirational words etched into the stained glass. When I started learning Hebrew, I literally could read the writing on the wall.”

In a follow-up phone conversation, Kaunfer sang Elkin’s praises. “She’s an amazing person; at almost 100, she’s still so mentally alert, engaged and articulate. She often offers meaningful philological footnotes to Hebrew words.” A recent example, Kaunfer said, was Elkin’s analysis of the Hebrew origin of the word “Tamarisk.”

Elkin comes from a family of highly literate, Jewishly active and thoughtful people, added Kaunfer, explaining that her siblings lived into their 90s. “As Jewish educators, we all admire Esther tremendously.”

Elkin decided, in her 90s, to learn how to chant haftarah, and began studying cantillation with Kaplan, her former student.

What advice does Elkin, this master teacher, offer?

In fluent, flawless Hebrew, Elkin quoted Pirkei Avot: “Find a teacher, Get a friend.”

Contributions to the Esther Elkin Hebrew Language Fund may be sent to the JFRI, attention Bradley Laye.