Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ______________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 3.311 April 6, 1994 1) Brave old world (Kathleen Noe) 2) Mendele (Rick Gildemeister) 3) Names (Yude Rozof) 4) Yiddish radio shows (Khayim 'eynakh Sapoznik) 5) Introduction (Marty Morgenbesser) 6) A Table of Contents for Mendele (Noyekh Miller) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue Apr 5 14:47:21 1994 From: Kathleen_NOE@umail.umd.edu (kn11) Subject: Brave old world my first question is for michael alpert. i heard from a reliable source that you + brave old world will perform in berlin for 2 months in the summer - zi iz dos gerekht? could you give more specific info, like when and where in berlin? a sheynem dank oykh! btw, your music is wonderful. conc. yiddish/jewish culture in greece: can anyone give me a good source that discusses this? a while back romaniot jews were mentioned but i can't remember the context exactly. the geographic area of interest in thessaloniki, in case there are various studies. kathleen noe 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue Apr 5 15:15:22 1994 From: Subject: Mendele Noyekh -- I've only been on Mendele a short time, and I'm already making new friends, meeting people with varied interests. It's not to early, I don't think, to thank you. I just came back from lunch, and I knew the latest issue of Mendele would be there. Ikh fil zikh zat fun esn, un zat fun leyenen di "maycholim" vos du shenkst undz yedn tog! Rick Gildemeister [Vi azoy zogt men af Idish symbiosis?] 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed Apr 6 00:27:48 1994 From: jrosof@sas.upenn.edu Subject: Names I have long been fascinated with my grandmother's ('aleha ha-shalom) name. My grandmother was an immigrant from Eastern Galicia, from what was then Austria(Francis Joseph was a good king). She was born in one of the following three towns or villages: Tarnopol, Zborow, or Aberzhantse. The last named is a tiny village in the vicinity of the other two towns. Its spelling reflects my grandmother's pronunciation. Her father was a rabbi, so she probably was not born in Aberzhantse, where according to my research, there were no Jews after WWI. My grandmother pronounced her Yiddish name as /Sushe Gitl/. Gitl presents no difficulties, but Sushe is less easily spelled. The local rabbi reccomended the Hebrew (Aramaic) Sasya -samekh samekh yud aleph. If this is voweled with a kometz, then in her East galician Yiddish, the name would in theory be pronounced /Susye/. Would the sye ending be assimilated to a -she ending? Is Dvosye pronounced Dvosye or Dvoshe/Dvushe? My grandmother had a sister named /Reyzheydl/. If I am not mistaken, this is spelled Reyze Eydl. Is Reyze (instead of Yidish Royz/Reyzl) a Slavic name? Was Reyze commonly combined with Eydl and slurred together to /Reyzheydl/? On last names: In America, my grandmother's maiden name was written Zamore. The name seems neither Germanic or Slavic. The closest East European Jewish names of which I am aware are Zamir and the town of Zamoszc (Yiddish: Zamish). The only possibility which I could think of was the Spanish city of Zamora. Although in modern Castilian this would be pronounced THAMORA, in Southern Spain and among the Sephardim, the pronunciation is SAMORA. On a hunch I asked my grandma's elder brother how the name was pronounced in Europe. He told me ZAMOYRE. This would seem to be a perfect Yiddishification of SAMORA. A Spanish surname for a Galitsiyanerke seemed initially farfetched, but the Encyclopaedia Judaica lists Zamora as among the most common of Sephardic surnames under the article "names." I would be interested in knowing of any other Zamoras/Zamores, particularly Ashkenazic ones. Is it possible that a distant ancestor migrated north to Galicia from Turkey? Or would they have arrived via northern Germany and Holland? What is known about Sephardic geneaology among the Ashkenazim? Whence did other Zamores emigrate to America. Were they also Galitsiyaners? Yude Rozof 4---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed Apr 6 01:08:08 1994 From: sapoznik@aol.com Subject: Yiddish radio shows For the last 5 years National Public Radio producer Andy Lancet and I have been documenting the history of Yiddish radio in America from 1925-1955. Our research has uncovered hundreds of hours of unique, vibrant and exciting Yiddish and Jewish broadcasting from this period. The completed documentary "The Stations That Spoke Your Language: Jewish-American Radio 1925-1955 will air on National Public Radio in December of 1995. If any Mendelniks are interested in this field we would be happy to hear from you. As a Producer/host of WEVD's all-Yiddish "Forverts sho" since 1991, I have many hours of the programs the station has aired. Anyone who is interested in current and classic Yiddish radio programs or have information or broadcasts to share are invited to contact us at: Living Tradtions 430 W.14th St suite 514 NYC 10014 Khayim 'eynakh Sapoznik 5)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed Apr 6 15:22:08 1994 From: kleyzemer@aol.com Subject: Introduction Greetings. I am a Yiddish-impaired Klezmer accordionist from Sebastopol (not far from Santa Rosa), California. I currently play with a band called Sevastopol (not far from Simferopol). Michael Alpert suggested I join this mailing list, so here I am. Mine is the typical story; parents only spoke Yiddish when they didn't want me to understand. It worked. I've enjoyed the writings and ramblings of Michael Wex. Wex, are you out there? I know what my last name means in Yiddish, but I haven't gotten around to figuring out whether it denotes optimism or procrastination. Perhaps someone can help me figure it out? Pleased to be here, Marty Morgenbesser 6)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed Apr 6 16:33:11 1994 From: nmiller@starbase.trincoll.edu Subject: A Table of Contents for Mendele There have been many requests for Bob Rothstein's wonderful table of contents. Now requests are coming in about retrieving the files themselves. I don't know this end of the business as well as I should and I hope that the more sophisticated among Mendele's readers will be forbearing. Better yet, let them give good eytses. Beginning today, the table of contents is found in 3 files: CONTENTS.V1 CONTENTS.V2 CONTENTS.V3 These, as well as _all_ of Mendele's back numbers are available by "anonymous ftp". The procedure sounds daunting but isn't. Here is how it's done: 1. Begin by typing "ftp ftp.mendele.trincoll.edu" 2. At the request for Name, type "anonymous" 3. At the request for Password, type your username 4. At the message "Guest login ok, access restrictions apply", type "cd /pub/mendele/files". 5. The message "CWD command successful" means that you can now retrieve any file you like. a. For a list of the files, type "dir". b. To download a file to your computer, type "get filename" 6. When finished, type "quit" or "bye". Below is an actual log of an ftp session. In order to make it easier to follow, the user's input is shown in upper-case. This is for illustrative purposes only; in actual use, stay with lower-case. ***************************************** >FTP FTP.MENDELE.TRINCOLL.EDU Wollongong FTP User Process (Version 5.2-05) Trying 157.252.16.7 ... Connection Opened Using 8-bit bytes 220 dot FTP server (SunOS 4.1) ready. Name (dot.cs.trincoll.edu:nmiller): ANONYMOUS 331 Guest login ok, send ident as password. Password: NMILLER 230 Guest login ok, access restrictions apply. >CD /PUB/MENDELE/FILES 250 CWD command successful. >GET VOL2.101 200 PORT command successful. 150 ASCII data connection for vol2.101 (157.252.10.30,2085) (4968 bytes). 226 ASCII Transfer complete. Local: DUA2:[FACULTY.NMILLER]VOL2.101; Remote: vol2.101 5110 bytes transfered in 0.55 seconds (9.07 Kbytes/second) >GET VOL2.104 200 PORT command successful. 150 ASCII data connection for vol2.104 (157.252.10.30,2086) (3750 bytes). 226 ASCII Transfer complete. Local: DUA2:[FACULTY.NMILLER]VOL2.104; Remote: vol2.104 3856 bytes transfered in 0.42 seconds (8.97 Kbytes/second) >QUIT 221 Goodbye ********************* It's as simple as that. If you have any problems, let me know (nmiller@dot.trincoll.edu) and I'll try to help. Noyekh ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol. 3.311 To subscribe, send SUB MENDELE FIRSTNAME LASTNAME to: LISTSERV@YALEVM.YCC.YALE.EDU 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 Archives available via gopher on: gopher.cic.net