Mendele: Yiddish literature and language
______________________________________________________
Contents of Vol. 4.228
December 11, 1994

1) Introduction (Gil Wiedermann)
2) Yiddish theater in Germany(Michael Steinlauf)
3) Nit and nisht (Dovid Braun)

1)----------------------------------------------------
Date: Sat, 10 Dec 94 17:02:24
From: gil.wiedermann@chrysalis.org
Subject: Introduction

I have been very interested in Yiddish for a long time. I have started
trying to really learn Yiddish for a few months now.  Here in Dallas we
have started a small Yiddish group -- just 4 of us.  One of our members
took the University of Wisconsin correspondence course, and another has
attended the Oxford summer program.

I am studying Uriel Weinreich's College Yiddish in my spare time.  I
studied Der Yiddisher Lerer several months ago to sort of "jump start" my
Yiddish from literally nothing.  I wish I could take off a few weeks from
work and go to the Columbia or Oxford program but I can't take off from
work that long.  My current plan is to take the University of Wisconsin
correspondence course soon.  However before I do that I would gladly
accept any comments or suggestions from anyone on good ways to learn
Yiddish.  I live in Dallas and unfortunately the "pickings are slim" for
learning it. Nevertheless, challenges are meant to be overcome.  I would
like to know about any programs, courses, methods, etc. that someone
could suggest.  I realize it would be better to spend a few semesters in
class, but "a bisl un a bisl vert a fule shisl" as they say.

I found out about the mailing list from Itzik Gottesman who teaches
Yiddish at the University of Texas at Austin.

A little extra about me: I'm 31 years old, single and looking, a CPA with
the power company here, TU Electric.  I have a BBA from UT Austin and an
MBA from UT Dallas.

That's really all about me.  I'm ready to read and learn from the rest of
you!

Gil Wiedermann

2)----------------------------------------------------
Date: Fri, 09 Dec 1994 15:25:17 -0500 (EST)
From: m_steinlauf@acad.fandm.edu
Subject: Yiddish theater in Germany

In response to David Brenner's query about Yiddish theater in Imperial
and Weimar Germany:

There were two papers on the subject at the Yiddish theater conference in
Warsaw a year ago. Both these papers, as well as two others on Yiddish
theater in Vienna, were by graduate students working under
Prof.Hans-Peter Bayerdorfer at the Institut fur Theaterwissenschaft of
the University of Munich, 8000 Munchen 22, Ludwigstr. 25. I have
abstracts of these papers; contact me privately and I'll be happy to
share them. In addition, a young Polish scholar presented a paper (of
which I also have an abstract) on Yiddish theater in Danzig in the
1930's.

Michael Steinlauf

3)----------------------------------------------------
Date: Fri, 09 Dec 1994 22:53:54 EST
From: dovid@mit.edu
Subject: nit and nisht

Dvosye Bilik:

I have heard it said and seen it written that _nit_ is largely the
litvish form and that _nisht_ is largely everybody else's form.  Poylishe
yidn are well-known for _nish'_ and from litvishe yidn, you are bound to
here (predominantly, always?) _nit_, and loss of the /t/ when _nit_ meets
the prefix _ge-_.  For example, [nigeven] = 'nit geven', [nigehat] = 'nit
gehat'.  I said "pseudo-litvakes" because, in my Yiddish which has most
of the vowels of litvish Yiddish, _nit_ and _nisht_ are interchangeable.
In fact, they can even coincide:  gornit nisht, gornisht nit.  (You will
also see this is print.  It has struck me as especially common in Soviet
Yiddish publications.  They're mostly under the influence of litvish
[Northeastern] and voliner [Southeastern] Yiddish.  Why Soviet Yiddish
should be so gung-ho over them is beyond me, though.)

But notwithstanding my "litvisher yikhes" -- most of my vowels, that is
-- I also have a thing or two that a true-blue litvak doesn't, and that's
the sound [ow] which alternates in free variation with [oy], as in
[arojs] and [arows]. Not to mention a couple of lexical items which are
more commonly associated with voliner Yiddish.  So I'm never sure of
classifying myself as a litvak.  I'm not familiar with the towns you,
Dvosye Bilik, mentioned, but if they're Lithuania/Latvia proper and if
your memory of nit/nisht-interchangeability is correct, then the received
knowledge that _nisht_ is uncommon in litvish usage is wrong.  Maybe the
Atlas will treat us to a clearer picture?

Furthermore about the classification:  a litvak tsu a litvak iz nit
glaykh. People who say [teyre] and [aroys]/[aruys] are usually classified
as litvakes by other people; that doesn't mean that they classify
_themselves_ as such.  I think I've told this story on Mendele before:
once talking with my grandmother (born and raised in Sukhovolye, in the
Sakolke county [powiat] in the province of Grodne) about our
"litvishkayt", she said that only in America was she called a
"litvetshke" (and quite obviously:  because of her vowels).  My question:
"Vos far a yidn zaynen mir den?"  Her answer: "Vaysrusishe."  (And
historically, the area between Grodne and Byalistok is White Russia.)
Having heard us referred to as "vaysrusishe" and being a tad familiar
with the Slavic languages, I asked whether she had ever heard
"vaysrusish" or known "vaysrusn" (all my life I had only known of the
local Slavic language as being Polish and the non-Jewish inhabitants of
her town as being Poles).  The answer:  "There is no such thing [as a
White Russian or White Russian language]", i.e. these just didn't exist
in her area, although the area itself was called (amongst Jews at least)
White Russia (since historically this _was_ White Russia).

I have heard the same litvish-vaysrusish distinction from other people as
well. M. Schaechter remarked on this distinction somewhere, where he
notes tellingly that the Vaad Arbe Arotses ['Council of 4 Lands'] was
comprised of "poyln, lite, raysn [=vaysrusland], zamet".  (I think these
were the 4 components.  Whatever they were, two of them were definitely
_lite_ and _raysn_, showing that the communities definitely held
themselves to be distinct.)

And that's the story.

p.s. While /t/ falls out before the prefix _ge-_ in true-blue litvish
speech (as far as I have heard), it doesn't fall out in my psuedo-litvish
(read: "vaysrusish") speech.  So _nit geven_ is pronounced [nidgeven] and
not [nigeven].

Dovid Braun

______________________________________________________
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