Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ______________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 3.139 November 21, 1993 1) Lezn/Yiddish tish (Arn Abramson) 2) Spelling (Yankel Lantz) 3) The female equivalent for "Reb" (Aviva Starkman) 4) Leyenen un leyzn (Marion Aptroot) 5) Starting with a verb (Noyekh Miller) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sat Nov 20 12:21:22 1993 From: Arn Abramson Subject: Lezn/Yiddish tish Harkavy says that the past participle of lezn is gelezn. In the useful posting about Yiddish cultural activities everywhere, the Yiddish tish of the Center for Judaic Studies at The University of Connecticut was said to meet Wednesday noon. We do not meet EVERY week but rather twice a month. The next meeting is to be Wednesday Dec. 8th. Arn 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sat Nov 20 20:11:36 1993 From: RWLANTZ%JMUVAX.bitnet@YaleVM.YCC.Yale.Edu Subject: spelling Problem is, we are not just speaking of spelling. We are really talking about transliteration. Thus the funny English spelling doesn't really apply as an example of what happens when you do not adhere to the standard. I have had a fair amount of discussion with one of our fellow Mendelniks (who is no doubt smirking at his terminal) about the "spelling" of a rude Yiddish word which starts with shin. Because of my German academic background, I transliterate shin as "sch." Our colleague (he knows who he is) is a native speaker of German, but he takes me to task for using "sch" instead of "sh." So what's the big deal? If we were using Hebrew characters then we could argue about spelling. As it is, we are trying to approximate the pronunciation of the Hebrew/Yiddish alphabet. What is written in transliteration is not the real language. So why argue? I wonder if this sort of discussion happens involving Russian or Chinese. Yankel Lantz 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sat Nov 20 23:58:38 1993 From: gt5549d@prism.gatech.edu (Aviva Starkman) Subject: No female equivalent for "reb" First let me just say that I've been reading Mendele for almost a year now and I enjoy seeing Yiddish in use. My grandfather, originally from Kalish, Poland, says that there is no female equivalent to the word "reb". In Europe, men would be called to the Torah as "Reb Yaakov ben Reb Moshe" rather than the general American custom, "Yaakov ben Moshe" as a matter of respect. "Rebetzin" might be considered the feminine for "Reb," except that we understand that to mean the wife of a rabbi. In Poland, "Rebetzin" meant the wife of a Rav, not any ordinary rabbi. Aviva Starkman (or spelled backwards, avivA) 4)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun Nov 21 12:12:17 1993 From: Marion Aptroot Subject: Leyenen un lezn _leyenen_ (or rather: _layen_) and _lezn_ can also be found in Western Yiddish in the 16th and 17th century and beyond (and probably earlier). The usage is very much the same as in modern Eastern Yiddish: _lezn_ for books and _leyenen_ either exclusively for the reading of the law in shul or that and the reading of religious texts. I think that _leyenen_ was most often reserved for the balkoyre, but in future I will pay more attention to its use. Nowadays, Dutch Jews use _layenen_ exclusively for the reading aloud of Torah in synagogue. In these older texts, the past participle of _lezn_ is often _gelezt_, but one also finds _gelezn_. Marion Aptroot 5)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sat Nov 20 18:20:13 1993 From: noyekh miller Subject: Starting with a verb Zogt Hershl Berman: You cannot start off with the verb on its own. It's all in Weinreich. Years ago at a meeting of professional philosophers someone declared that while there are double negatives in English (no no) there were no double positives. Upon which Sidney Morgenbesser from the back of the room sang out: yeah yeah. Since I'm not a linguist, what follows is probably irresponsible in the extreme and I expect (gently?) chiding notes from my linguist friends for this caper. Nevertheless, here are the lines of two popular Yiddish songs: 1. Gey ikh mir shpatsirn, tralalalalala.. 2. Geyt a Id in beys-medresh arayn. Not to mention the familiar opening line of the Yiddish writer we honor: "Omar Mendele Moykher Sforim (Zogt Mendele..)". Or for that matter the opening line of this message. So what am I missing? Noyekh ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol. 3.139 Mendele has 2 rules: 1. Provide a Subject: line. 2. Sign your article. Send submissions/responses to: mendele@yalevm.ycc.yale.edu Other business: nmiller@starbase.trincoll.edu Anonymous ftp archives available on: ftp.mendele.trincoll.edu in the directory pub/mendele/files