Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ______________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 1 no. 25 June 17, 1991 1) Introduction (Mina Graur) 2) Paul Wexler and a request (Mina Graur) 3) Clarifications for all and several (Mikhl Herzog) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 02 Jun 91 10:17:39 IST From: Dan Graur Subject: MENDELE My name is Mina Graur and I am a researcher at the Dinor Institute (the Hebrew University in Jerusalem). I finished my Ph.D. dissertation at Rice University in Houston, and I wrote a biography of an anarchist called Rudolf Rocker, who for a quarter of a century edited the "Arbeiter Fraint" the main anarchist newspaper in the yiddish language in London's east end. i am now working on the history of the Jewish labor movement in the USA with special emphasis on the Jewish trade unions. Best wishes. 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 17 Jun 91 12:19:56 IST From: Dan Graur Subject: Paul Wexler and a request 1. Dr. Paul Wexler from the Department of Linguistics at Tel Aviv University has no e-mail, nor does he seem to believe in such forms of communciations. He told me that people interested in communications with him should use the regular mail. 2. I am interested in locating books in Yiddish by Dr. Hillel Solotaroff and Saul Yanovsky, both American anarchists, the latter was the editor of the "Arbeter Fraint." Mina Graur H03 @ TAUNIVN 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sat, 15 Jun 91 01:00 EDT From: ZOGUR@CUVMB.BITNET Subject: 1. tsu, tse, tsi; 2. To Sigrid, David, Noyekh Re: "tsuzamen": untangling the plonter In my 'tikn-toes', the other day, I spoke of the Litvak having gotten the better of me. What was that about? Yiddish has the following: 1. TSU i) the preposition 'to' [tsu der tir 'to the door']: often unstressed, pronounced "tsi" (short "i", better transcribed as 'shwa'), written tsadik-vov; ii) the adverb 'too' [tsu fil 'too much']; prima- ry or secondary stress, never pronounced 'tsi', written tsadik-vov. iii) the verb complement (comparable to the "sepa- rable prefix" in German grammar) "tsUgeyn" 'to approach'--always stressed--"gey tsU tsu der tir (i.e. stressed "tsU" followed by unstressed "tsi") 'go over to the door'. Note: i) the category of Yiddish verb complement can't be equated with the German separable prefix because it includes a multitude of stressed Hebrew-origin invariants (the so-called periphrastic verbs): e.g mOYre hobn. er hot mOYre, nekOme nemen, etc. ii) 'er hot mOYyre tsUtsugeyn tsu der tir' (He's afraid to go over to the door. In this sequence, the first 'tsu' is stressed, the second may have secondary stress, the third is unstressed. Southern Yiddish speakers (Poland, the Ukraine, etc.) would say "tsI:tsigeyn (with long I:, or 'tsI:tsigayn') tsi di/der tir". 2. TSE The (inseperable) prefix, always unstressed, written tsadik-ayin: tsegeyn 'to melt'; tselakhn zikh 'to burst into laughter. THE LITVAK OFTEN PRONOUNCES THIS 'tsu' TOO'. "er vil tsUgeyn ahin eyder der shney vet tsegeyn" 3. TSI 'whether'; interrogative; unstressed: "Du kumst tsi nit"? "Tsi kumstu tsi nit?" "Ikh veys nit tsi du kumst". Again, THE LITVAK OFTEN PRONOUNCES THIS 'tsu' TOO'. So? The word that started this whole sermon is spelled 'tsuzamen' and pronounced 'tse/tsizamen'. Properly transliterated it should be spelled 'tsuzamen'. Tran- scribed, it's more like 'tse/tsizamen'. In either case, the "a" is stressed. I guess I didn't know whether I was transliterating (as usual) or transcribing. Hence the confusion. To: Sigrid Peterson Regards from the upper West Side. Come back for a summer and get a good start study- ing Yiddish intensively at the Columbia YIVO summer program. A Yiddish proverb states: "oyb a mame zogt af ir kind mamzer, meg men ir gleybn". If Mr. Lenowitz (may he forgive me) says he doesn't know Yiddish, believe him, and find yourself another teacher. If his CV really talks about a Yiddish film called "di mensh ohne velt" find out what the title is supposed to mean. The Yiddish word is "mentsh", either masculine "der mentsh" or neuter "dos mentsh", the latter a dialect form meaning 'woman'. In any event, never "di mentsh". And, of course, "ohne" is German. The Yiddish is "on". An aid to the "vitsn": Find a copy of Olsvanger's "Royte Pomerantsn", a book of Yiddish anecdotes in Latin letters, in the author's Latvian Yiddish dialect. It's really quite a wonderful collection and the words you're apt not to understand are glossed. Seek out the anecdote called "Daytsh" for some insight into the problems you're having with comprehension in different contexts. To: David Sherman Since Hebrew-origin words retain their traditional spellings in Yiddish, regardless of pronunciation, dictionaries have to list differently spelled entries even if they are pronounced identically. The UW Dictio- nary, lists the pronunciations "ole(ha)sholem" (femi- nine), "olevasholem" (masculine), "aleyem hasholem" (plural). Harkavy lists both singular forms but does- n't provide the pronunciation of either. Various pro- nouncing dictionaries of Hebrew-Aramaic words in Yid- dish that I've consulted also distinguish the two. I can claim only that I had heard reference to "di bobe oleVasholem" (the "masculine" form) long before I was aware of the grammatical differentiation in Hebrew. I don't know whether I would venture to say that I heard the same word for the plural too. To: Noyekh Miller 1. "melintses" is a real variant, not a mocking form. A Slavist to the rescue, please. 2. Are you referring to the so-called "Geolinguistic" theory? I don't think its propositions, concerning chronological inferences to be drawn various patterns of geographic distribution of linguistic variants, were necessarily discredited. You'll find similar, quite important propositions in Edward Sapir's 1915 article "Time Perspective in Aboriginal American Culture". The problem may lie in trying to make inferences about the chronology of linguistic (or cultural) change, or the compass direction of change, from the geographic pat- terns alone (without reference to the linguistic "sub- stance" or to historical sources). On the other hand, certain (recurrent) geographic patterns generally do permit the formulation of alternative, reasonable hypotheses to explain them. (See, e.g. MH "The Yiddish Language in Northern Poland: Its Geography and Histo- ry". Bloomington & The Hague, 1965). 3. Comparing notes on whether pop sociologists or pop linguists have more trouble is a subject unto itself. ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol 1.25