LL-L 'Yiddish' 2007.02.11 (05) [E]

Mon Feb 12 01:26:56 UTC 2007

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L O W L A N D S - L - 10 February 2007 - Volume 05

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From: Mark Williamson <node.ue at gmail.com>
Subject: LL-L 'Lexicon' 2007.02.10 (03) [E/Yiddish]

Speaking of which, does anyone know if I can find any information on
Western Yiddish online? I've only seen sociolinguistic accounts so
far, nothing that actually gives even a vague sample of the language,
except for mediaeval texts.

Mark

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From: Lee Goldberg <leybl_goldberg at yahoo.com>
Subject: LL-L 'Lexicon' 2007.02.10 (03) [E/Yiddish]

There have been a number of errors, confusions, and mis-statements in this
discussion in connection with Yiddish.  For starters, "betn" and "got" are
ordinary, everyday Yiddish words (that they could be dismissed with such
apparent confidence amazes me).  "davenen" (probably ultimately from Arabic
'dawa', according to Paul Wexler) is the term refering specifically to
Jewish prayer (especially suggesting its characteristic swaying motion),
"mispalel zayn" the cultural neutral (incidentally, the word for 'neutral'
in Yiddish is "neytral", with an /ej/ distinct from the /aj/ in "lataynish"
'Latin').  "betn" and "tfile ton" are general.  There's no basis for
restricting "lehavdl" ('to distinguish') or "koydesh-khol" (sacred-profane)
pairs (pairs in which one member is favorable, the other unfavorable, or one
refers to Jews, the other non-Jews, or one humans, the other animals, etc.)
to nouns, for example, "esn" vs. "fresn" (humans as against animals),
"shtarbn"  vs. "peygern" for 'die'.  "leyenen" vs. "lezn" also works for
some speakers influenced by "Daytshmerish" (a Germanizing trend popular in
the early 20th century), as Ron observed. Also, "ikh" is perfectly good
Yiddish, and the universal written form, pronounced in my dialect
(Ukrainian) /jix/ and in other dialects /ix/, /ex/, or /jax/. Finally,
Weinreich's dictionary isn't a very good source for establishing Yiddish
usage; Uriel Weinreich was a notorious prescriptivist who filled his
dictionary with "recommended" forms that he wished Yiddish speakers would
use, rather than those they actually used.

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From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com>
Subject: Yiddish

Mark:

> Speaking of which, does anyone know if I can find any information on Western
Yiddish online?

Mark, that makes two of us looking.  For years now have I been looking for a
copy of the 17th/18th-century Western Yiddish original of Glikl Hameln's
Zikhroynes.

Lee:

> For starters, "betn" and "got" are ordinary, everyday Yiddish words (that
they could be dismissed with such apparent confidence amazes me).

Again, this makes two of us.

Thanks for "cleaning up the mess."  This is needed since Yiddish is one of
the more frequently mentioned peripheral languages here.  Much tends to get
smothered between Daytshmerizms, half-knowledge and stereotyping, not to
mention loads of butchered Yiddish expressions flying around in North
America and elsewhere.

For a fairly long time I lived among Yiddish speakers from all over the
world, and many of them spoke Yiddish with me on a daily basis, particularly
those from Poland (which explains my occasional lapses and overcompensation
when it comes to ay and ey). In the beginning, some of them would use some
Daytshmerizms in lieu of Hebrew words to accommodate me, but I asked them to
stop that and they did as they felt confident in my Hebrew. Some of them
where religious, and others were agnostic or atheist.  I dare say that all
of them used the word got, and I would hear it at least once a day.

Lee, your position about Weinreich's dictionary is well-known and probably
well-founded, considering that I have heard other people criticize it for
the same reason (which, of course, should not detract from the good things
Weinreich did do for the language and for linguistics).  (I guess I ought to
invest in a copy of the Russian-Yiddish dictionary one of these days.)
Having said this, I'll nevertheless show below the idiomatic expressions
with got listed by Weinreich, in part because I'm familiar with most of
them. (The literal translations are mine.)

danken got (Thank God!)
got di neshome shuldik ("owe God the soul" = entirely innocent)
got fun avrom ("God of Abraham," prayer said mainly by women at the close of
the Sabbath)
got helf ("(May) God help" = Hello! Hi!)
got iz mit dir/aykh ("God is with you" = What's the matter with you?)
got mayner ("God mine" = My God!)
got tsu dankn ("God to thank" = Thank God!)
hobn Got in hartsn ("have God in the heart" = be merciful)
on got in hartsn ("without God in the heart" = unscrupulous)
vi got hot gebotn ("as God had decreed" = properly)
vi got iz dir lib ("As God loves you" = For God's sake!)

And -- since it comes up occasionally -- a final word about the romanization
system of the YIVO (Yidisher Visnshaftlekher Institut).  It is not a tran
scription system but a transliteration system. Each Hebrew letter is
represented by one or two Roman letters in non-Semitic words. Semitic
loanwords are written out as they are said in Yiddish, but again not
"phonetically" but how they would be written did the Yiddish system not
retain Semitic spelling. This makes the system as "neutral" as the
Hebrew-based system.  "Phonetic" spelling is limited to cases in which
dialectical differences are relevant.  Love it or hate it, or be indifferent
toward it -- it's now the predominant system used internationally.

Details: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yiddish_orthography

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron

•

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