Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ______________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 1 no. 179 February 20, 1992 1) Sacred Yiddish (Ellen Prince) 2) Yiddishculture/Jewish culture (Ellen Prince) 3) Final vowels (Martin Davis) 4) Yiddish/Yiddishkeit (Bob Werman) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 19 Feb 92 15:16:32 EST From: Ellen Prince Subject: RE: Mendele Vol 1.177 to add to meylekh's feeings about saying sholem aleykhem etc in the bathroom, i have a personal anecdote. my mother, born in harlem in 1905, not 'religious' by her standards, and illiterate in yiddish tho fluent, would scream when my father, born in a khasidic community in slovakia in 1899, read the yiddish newspaper ('der tog') in the bathroom, since the letters were hebrew and hence holy. he would call her an american ignoramus and go on reading... ellen prince 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 19 Feb 92 15:16:32 EST From: Ellen Prince Subject: RE: Mendele Vol 1.177 [David Neal Miller says in Mendele Vol 1.172:] >Why "mezuza" and "mezuzot" in L.P.'s posting to _Mendele_ >1:172? >Is it not bowing to Hebraist hegemonism to privilege >transcription from modern Hebrew?... >Vaynraykh has "mezuzah" >(pp. 203, 553); I prefer "mezuze" (i.e. the standard >romanization), italicized. might i point out that, when the early speakers of yiddish borrowed the term into yiddish in the first place, they were 'bowing to hebraist hegemonism', as you put it? in addition, it's not an item of *yiddish* culture, like yortsayt lamps and gefilte fish, but of *jewish* culture and is known to jews whether from columbus, lvov, istanbul, or aleppo... i assume that is why weinreich wrote it the way he did. ellen prince 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 19 Feb 92 15:46:42 -0500 From: davism@turing.cs.nyu.edu Subject: the movement of final vowels to long E I have heard many Yiddish words spoken by American Jews (not please "Jewish people") with the final vowel sound degrading to a common long E. E.g.: "bobee" (grandmother), "matzee" etc. I associate this pronunciation with the Chicago area (we say "Chicagee" as a family joke). Am I right about this? Elucidation from the professionals would be appreciated. Martin Davis 4)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 20 Feb 92 15:41 +0200 From: RWERMAN@HUJIVMS.HUJI.AC.IL Subject: The Yiddish Origins of Mendele Readers; Dissociation from Religion I limp in Yiddish and can barely follow many of the learned threads on Mendele. But one thing obvious to me is that my ignorance in Yiddish does not take second place to the ignorance of yiddishkeit (religion, if you will) of many of Mendele's partners. It cannot have been all that long ago when all Yiddish speakers were themselves experienced in the rituals and routines of yiddishkeit as well as the language of prayer and the synagogue or within a generation of that intimate contact. This is clearly no longer the case; with the exception of a few readers (I can count two or three who were clearly brought up religious and at least two ba'ale tshuva on the list), most seem to be remote from what we used to call yiddishkeit. Otherwise certain phenomena could never be explained. (I have even come across a mathematician now writing on Mendele who existed in overlapping circles of my childhood, 40 years ago.) What phenomena? The absence of anyone who knew that klavte was an Aramaic word. The definitions that come by, such as "mussaf" (a fiction not substantially different from the real example I fail to cite to avoid too simple identification) being a prayer recited on Yom Kippur (true but far from a satisfactory definition, except for someone who has never been in shul except on Yom Kippur). I can testify that the Yiddish of the haredim whom I know well is hardly literary, even when it appears to be literate. I imagine the Bund and Bund schools serve as in important bridge for many of those now renewing their interest in Yiddish. Am I right? An interesting parallel here in Israel is the translation of texts in the movies or on TV. The translators frequently fail to recognize that the text is the King James version of a verse from Tanach (scripture), usually from T'hilim (psalms) and translate into modern Hebrew. __Bob Werman rwerman@hujivms.bitnet rwerman@vms.huji.ac.il Jerusalem ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol 1.179