Tell me about Yiddish

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It's basically a dialect of German with some Hebrew words thrown in, yeah?

What script is it written in, Roman or Hebrew?

Do people still speak it as a first language?

― DV (dirtyvicar), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 15:59 (twenty years ago)

it's written in hebrew script. some people (mostly hasids) still speak it on a daily basis.

and yeah, it's basically middle high german + some hebrew.

― s1ocki (slutsky), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:01 (twenty years ago)

what he said

― I'd still rather be in Tokyo (nordicskilla), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:01 (twenty years ago)

interestingly, there's also a sephardic equivalent in ladino, which is archaic spanish with hebrew bits thrown in.

― s1ocki (slutsky), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:02 (twenty years ago)

I know a fair bit of Yiddish but only from hearing my grandparents speak, most of it I've never even seen written down!

― I'd still rather be in Tokyo (nordicskilla), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:02 (twenty years ago)

there are also some polish words thrown in, for taste i guess. (e.g., "nudnik" comes from the polish word "nudzic," which means "to rub" or "to annoy").

― Eisbär (llamasfur), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:03 (twenty years ago)

to me, yiddish is really the language of the (ashkenazi) jews. hebrew is actually a relatively recent language--of course hebrew is ancient, but it was for all intents & purposes a dead language (ie not a vernacular) prior to the 20th century, when it was revived. i think the revival of hebrew kidn of trampled yiddish. it's sorta sad

― s1ocki (slutsky), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:03 (twenty years ago)

It's not a dialect of German, but it is a Germanic language, as are Norwegian, Dutch, Swedish, etc.

― MindInRewind (Barry Bruner), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:05 (twenty years ago)

whenever i'm trying to teach people yiddish phrases, i realize i know much more than i thought i did. it's such a great, useful language!

― president carter loves repetition (Jody Beth Rosen), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:05 (twenty years ago)

another yiddish analog = quebec french

― s1ocki (slutsky), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:06 (twenty years ago)

Quebecois has a yiddish influence?

― Trayce (trayce), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:07 (twenty years ago)

no, but it has a lot of 19th-century français de la france in it, the same way yiddish is derived from and still shows many traces of a now-archaic period of german

― s1ocki (slutsky), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:08 (twenty years ago)

(i guess "now" in that sentence is redundant. please ignore)

― s1ocki (slutsky), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:09 (twenty years ago)

I never thought of it that way ... although the Yiddish/German split happened a lot earlier.

― MindInRewind (Barry Bruner), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:10 (twenty years ago)

It's not a dialect of German, but it is a Germanic language, as are Norwegian, Dutch, Swedish, etc.

My impression is that it's more like German than any of those languages are. Whenever I've seen snippets of Yiddish written in Roman script, once I know what it is it always looks like German spelt funny.

― DV (dirtyvicar), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:10 (twenty years ago)

(e.g., "nudnik" comes from the polish word "nudzic," which means "to rub" or "to annoy").

yeah, "nudzh" is used in yiddish a lot. it basically means "nudge," but in a more irritating way. e.g., "stop being a nudzh!" (it's pronounced sorta like the "nuge" in "nugent" but the "u" is pronounced like the "oo" in "book.")

― president carter loves repetition (Jody Beth Rosen), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:11 (twenty years ago)

once I know what it is it always looks like German spelt funny

I find the same to be true of Dutch and Norwiegan -- I think they all have roughly the same overlap with German, since all of them developed and split from German at around the same time.

― MindInRewind (Barry Bruner), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:13 (twenty years ago)

How do you spell "schmutter"? (sic?)

― I'd still rather be in Tokyo (nordicskilla), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:14 (twenty years ago)

"shmatte," you mean?

― president carter loves repetition (Jody Beth Rosen), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:16 (twenty years ago)

yeah!

― I'd still rather be in Tokyo (nordicskilla), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:16 (twenty years ago)

שמתה

― s1ocki (slutsky), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:18 (twenty years ago)

my favorite yiddish word is schmekldekker (probably mispelled). it means "condom".

― Shakey Mo Collier, Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:20 (twenty years ago)

"ongepotshket"!

― president carter loves repetition (Jody Beth Rosen), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:24 (twenty years ago)

but that shatner thread may be better for the posting of random words.

― president carter loves repetition (Jody Beth Rosen), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:26 (twenty years ago)

Actually, s1ocki, it's

שמאטע

― MindInRewind (Barry Bruner), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:27 (twenty years ago)

I find the same to be true of Dutch and Norwiegan -- I think they all have roughly the same overlap with German, since all of them developed and split from German at around the same time.

I'll have to try and hear some spoken Yiddish. Dutch and Norwegian *sound* very different to real German, so I wonder if the same is true of Yiddish.

Is the word "Yiddish" in anyway derived from something like Yisrael Deutsch or something?

― DV (dirtyvicar), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:28 (twenty years ago)

unicode tablet for hebrew characters

― s1ocki (slutsky), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:32 (twenty years ago)

oh yeah barry, you're totally right!

― s1ocki (slutsky), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:32 (twenty years ago)

That brings back some horrible memories from Sunday school.

― Felix Leiter (nordicskilla), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:33 (twenty years ago)

Is the word "Yiddish" in anyway derived from something like Yisrael Deutsch or something?

"Jüdisch" is German for "Jewish." In Yiddish the "y" is equivalent to the "j."

― president carter loves repetition (Jody Beth Rosen), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 16:37 (twenty years ago)

All the books about Yiddish that I have only have the transliterations, which sort of annoys me.

I totally want to learn it.

― tokyo nursery school: afternoon session (rosemary), Thursday, 14 July 2005 02:08 (twenty years ago)

the famous yiddish phrasebook that came out in the late '60s is supposedly full of misspellings, mistakes, and half-truths. people who study language don't take it seriously as an academic book (and they shouldn't; it's just meant to be entertainment, i think).

― president carter loves repetition (Jody Beth Rosen), Thursday, 14 July 2005 02:11 (twenty years ago)

DV, you should check out Miriam Weinstein's Yiddish: A Nation of Words

jbr: the Rosten book?

― tokyo nursery school: afternoon session (rosemary), Thursday, 14 July 2005 02:12 (twenty years ago)

yes!

― president carter loves repetition (Jody Beth Rosen), Thursday, 14 July 2005 02:15 (twenty years ago)

http://images.amazon.com/images/P/067172813X.01._SCLZZZZZZZ_.jpg

― president carter loves repetition (Jody Beth Rosen), Thursday, 14 July 2005 02:16 (twenty years ago)

What does everyone think of the YIVO standards for spelling?

― tokyo nursery school: afternoon session (rosemary), Thursday, 14 July 2005 02:19 (twenty years ago)

Just today I figured out the sight gag in Top Secret! where the hotel is called "Hotel Gey Schluffen"!

― Spencer Chow (spencermfi), Thursday, 14 July 2005 02:25 (twenty years ago)

i don't have enough experience with yiddish as a written language to make an informed comment about yivo -- i'm sure their judgment is trustworthy though.

― president carter loves repetition (Jody Beth Rosen), Thursday, 14 July 2005 02:35 (twenty years ago)

"gey schluffen" = "go to sleep"! the german is "geh schlafen."

― president carter loves repetition (Jody Beth Rosen), Thursday, 14 July 2005 02:37 (twenty years ago)

it does make sense, although it's kind of funny to see the words spelled khale and beygl

― tokyo nursery school: afternoon session (rosemary), Thursday, 14 July 2005 02:39 (twenty years ago)

Rawther scholarly recent book I read about Yiddish was Words on Fire: the Unfinished History of Yiddish (by Dovid Katz). Actually I didn't read the whole thing, got bogged down and switched to Outwitting History: the Amazing Adventures of a Man who Rescued a Million Yiddish Books (by Aaron Lansky), which is a quick read, charming, and has lots to say about the fall and rise (as of late) of Yiddish in America. Highly recommend esp for the anecdotes and the window on Yiddish as the mama-loshn (mother tongue) for daily life. Highly recommend!

― Laurel, Thursday, 14 July 2005 02:44 (twenty years ago)

http://www.mandypatinkin.net/IMAGES/mlcov.jpeg

― president carter loves repetition (Jody Beth Rosen), Thursday, 14 July 2005 02:47 (twenty years ago)

heh, they played his version of Take Me Out to the Ballgame on JM in the AM the other week

― tokyo nursery school: afternoon session (rosemary), Thursday, 14 July 2005 02:50 (twenty years ago)

i wonder if "loshen" (which doesn't mean "language" or "tongue" in german) has its roots in "lecchÅ?n" (old high german for "to lick," also "liccian" in old english).

― president carter loves repetition (Jody Beth Rosen), Thursday, 14 July 2005 02:57 (twenty years ago)

oh okay, i'm sort of right: it's from the hebrew "lashon" (tongue).

― president carter loves repetition (Jody Beth Rosen), Thursday, 14 July 2005 03:04 (twenty years ago)

Nem mikh oys tsu der ball game
Nem mikh oys mit dem oylem
Koyf mir di nussen un crackerjack
Ich mach mir nisht oys oyf ikh keyn nisht avek

(that's all I can remember) (I think that's right) (I love it)

I'm heard many good things about Lansky's book.

I don't mind the YIVO spelling standards, they only look a bit wierd because we're used to everybody just making up their own spelling .

― MindInRewind (Barry Bruner), Thursday, 14 July 2005 03:16 (twenty years ago)

Here's YIVO's guide to pronunciation and transliteration.

If you want to hear some Yiddish, go to this site. Click on excerpt that you'd like to read, and then click on the little man to hear the excerpt read (.mp3).

― you better believe it (you better believe it), Thursday, 14 July 2005 11:28 (twenty years ago)

It's not a dialect of German, but it is a Germanic language, as are Norwegian, Dutch, Swedish, etc.

As is English of course!

― Dadaismus (Dada), Thursday, 14 July 2005 11:48 (twenty years ago)

But Yiddish is way more like German than English is.

It's going to be a while before I hear some of this fascinating language, given my shite internet connection, but as a written language nothing I am seeing on this thread makes me think it is less like German than Norwegian, Dutch, Swedish, etc.

― DV (dirtyvicar), Friday, 15 July 2005 22:50 (twenty years ago)

I'm reminded of Ewing's Law Of Languages: That all continental European languages are the same, it's just impolite to say this out loud.

― DV (dirtyvicar), Friday, 15 July 2005 22:50 (twenty years ago)

spoken yiddish would be 90% comprehensible to someone fluent in german, so yeah, it's basically an offshoot of german.

there was a lot of ladino on tablets and such in the jewish museum in paris, taken from historical jewish communities in spain and portugal. in hebrew school (hehe "hebrew school"--just proves slocki's point, in my mom's day it was "jewish school") we learned a hanukkah song in ladino.

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Friday, 15 July 2005 23:56 (twenty years ago)

omg jody the guy on that site with the mp3s is so annoying!

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Friday, 15 July 2005 23:57 (twenty years ago)

spoken yiddish would be 90% comprehensible to someone fluent in german, so yeah, it's basically an offshoot of german.

This is wrong, but the degree to which it is wrong depends on where you go in the German-speaking world. Hoch Deutsch and (essentially any dialect of) Yiddish are mutually near-incomprehensible, not because the root words aren't the same, but because the vowel sounds are completely different. However, Bavarian and Austrian dialects sound quite similar to the Western dialect of Yiddish that was spoken in places like Hungary (geographically, this makes sense, of course).

― 30 Bangin' Tunes That You've Already Got ... IN A DIFFERENT ORDER! (Barry Brune, Saturday, 16 July 2005 13:12 (twenty years ago)

Indeed. There are different types of Yiddish, varying with geography. And what is called Yiddish varies from a full language to 'Yinglish', where occasional words are used for emphasis, or to render something that is untranslatable.

interestingly, there's also a sephardic equivalent in ladino, which is archaic spanish with hebrew bits thrown in.
-- s1ocki (slytus...), July 13th, 2005.
Even more interesting is that some religious Sephardic jews, even Tunisian jews in France, who generally speak French with Hebrew and Arabic words thrown in, speak Yiddish, because of the influence of Chabad Lubavitch. I have very rarely heard Ladino in Paris, but have frequently heard Tunisians speaking Yiddish...

― jadrenos (jadrenos), Saturday, 16 July 2005 13:41 (twenty years ago)

isn't ladino a dead language?

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Saturday, 16 July 2005 14:07 (twenty years ago)

My favourite everyday Yiddish word is "Ayayayayayayay....."

― JTS, Saturday, 16 July 2005 23:12 (twenty years ago)

It's nice to know we're above Jewish stereotyping on this forum.

― PC gonna getcha, Saturday, 16 July 2005 23:16 (twenty years ago)

i watched an old eddie cantor move recently, he says ay veyshmer a lot

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Saturday, 16 July 2005 23:40 (twenty years ago)

Kenneth Rexroth says somewhere that the Yiddish (possibly anarchist?) literary journals in the U.S. published translations of modern (or anyway late Symbolist) French poetry before the English language ones did.

― Yo soy Rockist Scientist (RSLaRue), Saturday, 16 July 2005 23:52 (twenty years ago)

I've always thought that was a little bit interesting.

― Yo soy Rockist Scientist (RSLaRue), Saturday, 16 July 2005 23:53 (twenty years ago)

They had a whole segment about Ladino on NPR recently.

― tokyo nursery school: afternoon session (rosemary), Sunday, 17 July 2005 00:48 (twenty years ago)

my great-great-uncle wrote the first hebrew-yiddish-english dictionary, it's still in use, and when i've mentioned this fact to yiddish scholars they go nuts with the nachas.

― s1ocki (slutsky), Sunday, 17 July 2005 01:59 (twenty years ago)

omg jody the guy on that site with the mp3s is so annoying!

don't blame me, i didn't post that link!

re tunisian jews: nick valensi from the strokes!!

― jody heatherton (Jody Beth Rosen), Sunday, 17 July 2005 17:12 (twenty years ago)

s1ocki -- that's the coolest thing ever. What was his name?

― 30 Bangin' Tunes That You've Already Got ... IN A DIFFERENT ORDER! (Barry Brune, Sunday, 17 July 2005 17:20 (twenty years ago)

aleksander (avram) harkavi!

we have a movie of a trip he made back to the shtetl in the 20s/late teens!! it's crazy!

― s1ocki (slutsky), Sunday, 17 July 2005 18:19 (twenty years ago)

five years pass...

nocturnal - nakhtish (נאַכטיש)

― kid 606: the nultness (nakhchivan), Friday, 18 March 2011 13:25 (fourteen years ago)

three years pass...

oy, you want i should translate some phone-call transcriptions?

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/13/nyregion/malcolm-a-smiths-bribery-trial-held-up-by-recordings-in-yiddish.html?hp

― I dunno. (amateurist), Thursday, 12 June 2014 23:29 (eleven years ago)

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