Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ______________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 2 no. 161 March 18, 1993 1) Mutual comprehensibility (Rick Turkel) 2) Yo (Mikhl Herzog) 3) Yo/ye (Elyet Hersh Gertl) 4) The Mendele archive (Harold L. Orbach) 5) Humpik (Bob Rothstein) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed Mar 17 16:15:26 1993 From: rmt51@CAS.ORG Subject: Mutual comprehensibility (or lack thereof) Zev bar-Lev's item in mendele 2#160 reminds me of an amusing incident I had more years ago than I care to count. My American-born mother came to visit while I was doing a post-doctoral fellowship in Israel, and I took her to visit her only Israeli relative, a cousin who had been born in Poland and moved to Israel during the 1930's. Theoretically, they shared the same dialect of Yiddish as a common language; however, my mother's Yiddish was, by then, three-quarters English, and her cousin's was one-quarter Polish and one-half Hebrew. They managed to communicate only on the most rudimentary level without me translating for them. Rick Turkel 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed Mar 17 20:08:30 1993 From: ZOGUR@CUVMB.COLUMBIA.EDU Subject: Yo Bob, Generally, "jo", NEVER "ju", sometimes (in Courland) "ja", even "joj" (in the Transcarpathian area), and DEFINITELY "je" in the Lithuanian-Belorussian area. Not to be confused with English "yeah". Whence "je" in Yiddish. I'm not certain at the moment. A search through Lexer's Middle High German Dictionary (3 volumes, not the pocket version or even of Grimm, may reveal the answer. A lesson to be learned (from an about to become a grandfather). az a bob zogt, meg men ir gleybn. Good wishes, Mikhl. 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed Mar 17 21:50:35 1993 From: EGERTEL@FULLERTON.EDU Subject: yo/ye Legabe Berl Hobermans bamerkungen (Mendele 2:159): Kh'hob keynmol in ergets nisht gehert az emetser zol zogn "yu" tsu meynen voz iz af klal-yidish "yo." Mayne tate-mame lemoshl vos zey zenen redners fun azoy gerufene ukrainishn (podolier)/tsemishtn yidish af eyn zayt un galitsianer yidish af der anderer un ale unzere kroyvim zogn "yo" vos se gramt mit englishn "jaw." Vegn dem "ye" iz gor interesant. Di "native speakers" in unzer meshpokhe zogn oykh "ye" fun tsayt tsu tsayt. Kh'hob shtendik gemeynt az dos iz take fun unter der hashpoe fun amerikanishn english. Nor se dakht zikh az kh'hob gehert (efsher az kh'hob zikh in england gelernt) az ergets vu (in sheytekh fun dem azoy-gerufenem litvish) hot men yo (ye) aroysgeredt "ye" far yo. Nor nishto keyn litvakes in der meshpokhe. Mestom veln mir hern nokh a bisl vegn dem dozikn inyen... Elyet Hersh Gertl 4)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 17 Mar 93 18:21 CST From: "Harold L. Orbach" Subject: RE: New Mendele archive I hope to contribute something of substance in a while, such as a favorite epithet of my mother's that has always fascinated me with regard to origin, but I have little sense of how to put Yiddish into our alphabet. Is there some work that provides a key to this? I seem to notice variations in different sources. The new archive system works smoothly and perfectly. One minor note: when I typed 'bye' to get out, after "getting" a few numbers of Mendele, that command was not recognized. 'Quit' did work, however, as it usually does in most systems. As a newcomer to Mendele I find the material very fascinating. I'm a 64 year old sociologist, born in Paterson, N.J., and raised there and in Passaic and Manhattan, N.Y. of parents from Poland. My mother's family from Lodz, my fathers from there and near Warsaw. While my first language was Yiddish, I have lost the easy ability to speak and I never did learn to read. I do understand spoken Yiddish fairly well and speak with some hesitancy, easy among relatives, useful when travelling as in parts of Europe where I find myself "switching" with German. My mother- in-law was of Polish origin but raised in Germany and spoke only German, not Yiddish, which helped "corrupt" my Yiddish. I am getting a few issues at a time to try and catch up to all the material you have, and noticing old friends or people I have known from different contexts from time to time. Martin Lakin I knew/knew of in the context of his work in gerontology a few decades ago, when the field was small and less divided. Zachary Baker is the son of an older friend whom I knew as a graduate student and when Zach was a bright Minneapolis youngster. I have wanted to reclaim the Yiddish that was my original tongue as a child in New Jersey and which was limited to conversation with older family and friends, now departed. My cousins in Canada had a better Yiddish education due to the institutions in Toronto. They learned to read and write. I always find it very difficult to express anything in Yiddish in written form, or formally for that matter so you'll excuse my Goyishe salutation, Best wishes, Harold L. Orbach P.S. My Yiddish name is Hirsh Liebish, or familiarly Hershel, or the even more familiar, childhood diminutive of Heshy. But its been a long time since I heard the last one from older cousins and playmates; family friends, aunts and uncles always used Hershel. 5)---------------------------------------------------- Date: 17 Mar 1993 23:00:08 -0500 (EST) From: rar@titan.ucs.umass.edu Subject: Humpik Avi Joseph Hyman (2.158) asked about a word _humpike_. In _Yidish shprakh_ 4 (1944) Raphael Mahler has an article on the Yiddish of Nowy Sacz (with a "tail" on the _a_, Yiddish "Sandz"--in southern Poland). On page 70 he includes the word _humpik_, which he glosses as 'a kleyn dik mentshele'. I don't know whether this has anything to do with the word in question, and I can't offer any obvious etymology. Bob Rothstein ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol 2.161 If your message is intended for MENDELE, please write to: mendele@yalevm.ycc.yale.edu If your node is Bitnet-only and is not connected to the Internet, please send your message to: mendele@yalevm If you want to discuss personal business or have a shmues with the shames, please write to: nmiller@dot.trincoll.edu Please sign your articles.