Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ______________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 3.140 November 22, 1993 1) Starting with a verb (Moshe Taube) 2) Lezn/sch/leading with verbs (Ellen Prince) 3) Leyenen/lezn (Pe'rets Mett) 4) Leyenen un lezn (un lernen) (Michael Shimshoni 5) Jewish Years and Dovid Katz (Michael Shimshoni) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun Nov 21 15:42:21 1993 From: Taube Moshe Subject: Starting with a verb For Noyekh Miller, Of course you're missing nothing. Sentences in Yiddish can and do begin wit verbs, and the examples you gave are but a few of the various functions this word-order has in Yiddish. Someone must have read too much grammars instead of literature (this coming from a linguist). Moshe Taube 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun Nov 21 16:14:15 1993 From: "Ellen F. Prince" Subject: lezn/sch/leading with verbs Subject: past participle of lezn mea culpa, i was wrong about 'remembering' /geleyznt/. the subsequent posts have had their proustian effect on me and of course it was /geleyzn/. ----------------------- Subject: Yankel Lantz's _sch_: the problem with writing _sch_ for yiddish shin is that _sch_ always has the value /sh/ only in german and not in any known international phonemic transcription system and not in english. most english words i can think of which _sch_ are in fact pronounced /sk/ (school, scheme, schedule...). so, given that we're writing english here (if not yiddish), why use a german system? it is as strange as using the french one would be, where we'd represent /sh/ as _ch_. unless, of course, you think yiddish is a variety of german... ;) ----------------------- Subject: reb noyekh's 'caper': well, you won't get any chiding from THIS linguist, just some additions to your list: 3. bin ikh mir a shnayderl... 4. forn mekhutonim... 5. hob ikh a por oksn... 6. zitst a shnayder, neyt un neyt... >So what am I missing? not a blessed thing. yiddish (like icelandic) has a very productive verb-first declarative form, only very incompletely (and, apparently, misleadingly) described in weinreich. ellen prince 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon Nov 22 05:51:39 1993 From: P.Mett@open.ac.uk (Percy Mett) Subject: Leyenen/lezn I am a bit puzzled about this. In fact I have always assumed lezn to be a germanism. We certainly use leynen (not *leyenen* !) for "read" whether it be koydesh or khol. When I started to hear people use Leyenen for "reading the toyre" as an =English= expression it took me a long time to get used to it. Maybe the distinction is a purely litvishe one. Correct me if I am wrong, but my feeling is that the difference between koydesh and khol uses of words with otherwise similar meanings is rstricted to nouns, and in any event, the koydesh use is a word of Hebrew origin e.g. seyfer - bukh. pe'rets 4)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon Nov 22 08:26:30 1993 From: Michael Shimshoni Subject: Leyenen un lezn (un lernen) Using my German Orthodox background, I can support the statement of Marion Aptroot. In Germany (at least in the early 1930's) leinen (I spell it as if it was a German word) was used for reading at shul from the Torah Scroll. As far as I recall, it was not used for the Haftara. Lesen was used for any other form or reading. There was also an unusual use of the word lernen (learn). If applied to an ordinary subject, it was like the English to learn or learning. When on the other hand one said about someone that "er kann lernen" (he can learn) it did not mean that he was no imbecile, and could be taught, but that he was *knowledgeable* in the Talmud etc. Is that the same also in Yiddish? Michael Shimshoni 5)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon Nov 22 08:52:53 1993 From: Michael Shimshoni Subject: Re: Jewish Years and Dovid Katz Jeremy Stern explains and at the end he asks: >Ellen's question reminds me of a problem I had when I read Katz's >Grammar. In order to illustrate the principle of forming the Jewish >years and vocalizing them, he chose the example of 5748, or 1987/8. >However, whereas most Jews pronounced that year "tismakh," Katz had >it "tashmakh." It is common to deviate from the standard >vocalization, especially to avoid a ominous word or to change to a >hopeful one. In a similar vein, the year 5744 was changed to >"tisdam" to avoid tashmad." Does anyone remember if Israeli papers >followed the changed form, because I know that the Orthodox world >did so? To the best of my recollection, in general, outside the Orthodox world, tishdam was not much used and that in spite of the added danger that that year corresponded mostly to 1984! I remember that four years later, 5748, tismah with its implied happiness was the year the intifada started :-(. In my first year in Palestine, 5696, many looked forward to it as it could be read tirtzu, "if you want", reminding one of Herzl's motto at the beginning of Altneuland, "if you want it is no fable". When that year turned out pretty badly, the me'ora'ot starting (the Arabs called it the Arab Revolt) lasting till 1939, this was "explained", that these four letters also stand for tzarot (tzores). One should not try to beat numerologists, they will always win. Michael Shimshoni ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol. 3.140 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