Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ______________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 3.333 April 27, 1994 1) Shor nagah (Yude Rozof) 2) Vegn loshn-koydesh (Moshe Waldoks) 3) Phonetics of Telser (Jules Levin) 4) Choop (Moyshe-Shaye Steinlauf) 5) Choop/forehead curl (Chane Honig) 6) Medical text in Yiddish (Mikhl Herzog) 7) More on Yiddish Movies (Rick Gildemeister) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon Apr 25 12:49:39 1994 From: jrosof@sas.upenn.edu Subject: shor nagah Nokhn shraybn mayn mega-briv hob ikh tsurikgekert fun kompyuter tsimer in mayn eygenem shtub un a zukh geton in Harkavi. Vayzt oys az afile shor gefint zikh in yidishn vort oytser! Me gefint shor nagakh, shor ha bor, un ikh meyn shor aleyn! Ba uriel farshteyt zikh, az me zukht an "ox" gefint men an oks. Iz di shayle vos iz den yidish loshn? Uriel vu an oks iz shtendik an oks un a fus a fus, oder Harkavi, vu an oks ken zayn a shor, un a fus a regl? Tsi iz es beemes miglekh tsu zogn dos iz loshn koydesh mekhuts yidish gufe un yents gilt vi a khoshever teyl funem rov minyen verov binyen? Gut shebegut iz yidish, ober vos iz tov detov fun arameish? Rebeynu shel oylem hobn ale gehert, s'iz kosher. Vos zogn mir ober vegn dem vintsiker banutstn reboyno d'almo kuloy. Efsher iz gringer tsu zogn az in yidish zenen faran farsheydene stadyes (levels?) fun shprakh banits. A mark froy vet zikh mistome opvaykhn fun di lange loshn-koydesh frazes vos zenen tayere eydlshtener inem yidish loshn funem yeshive bokher. Tsi zenen do faran andere shprakhn vu azelkhe problemen fun inventorizirn vayzn zikh? Efsher persish (farsi) vu (kh'ob gehert) a fertl fun vort oytser shtampt op fun arabish? Yude Rozof 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue Apr 26 19:00:36 1994 From: WALDOKS@BINAH.CC.BRANDEIS.EDU Subject: Re: Vegn loshn-koydesh Ikh hob groyser hanoe gehat fun Reb Yude Rozofs vertlech vegn di einflus fun loshn-koydesh oyf teg-teglicher yidishe sprichverter. Ikh vil nor tsugebn az es iz do an andere dimenzia fun einfluss fun yidish oyf di zelbiger Hebraishevertlech, do heyst az es iz faran vos ikh ruf "a yidishe theologie". A "mitzvah" oyf Hebraish is ganz andersh fun a "mitsve" oyf yidish. A Hebraisher "momzer" andersh fun a yidisher "momzer", a hebraisihe "hakham" ganz andersh fun a yis yidisher "khukhem", un azoy veiter. Ikh shtel zich for az di massen kulturbai yibei yidn hobn geenderte di spirituele inhalt fun di loshn-koydesh mokoros. zum sof mir ale vaysen az di yidish "emes" iz a sach mer anivesdik fun di shtrenge Biblisher Hebraisher "emeth". Dos iz di emes. mit kovid Moshe Waldoks 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu Apr 21 14:04:45 1994 From: JFLEVIN%UCRVMS.bitnet@YaleVM.YCC.Yale.Edu Subject: phonetics of Telser Responding to question, why the Telsher spells themselves that way instead of Telzer. I assume they are trying to represent the Lith phoneme 'zh', which in Lith spelling is 'z' with a hachek on it. Lacking the 'zh' convention, which is still mostly learned in English usage, they have to chose between 'z' and 'sh'. Maybe they settle for the palatal fricative rather than showing the voicing because they don't want people to think they belong to the 'sabs-losn' dialect, which was stigmatized and was gradually disappearing after 1900. --Jules Levin 4)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue Apr 26 09:55:46 1994 From: M_STEINLAUF@ACAD.FANDM.EDU Subject: choop Jay Fleisher's memory of Brooklyn rabbinical concern with "choops" growing on the front of yeshiva bokhers' heads is doubtless also of Polish origin, just as the earlier-mentioned "zhibe" from "grzywa." In this case the word is "czupryna" [tshuprina] and now we're really close to what I mentioned some days ago in jest: the 50's Brooklyn "ramalamadingdong" that hung down the forehead of guys known as "rocks," whose allure was that they were about as far from a yeshiva bokher as it was possible to get. So that choop/czupryna tracks the invasion of grease into Brooklyn yeshivas. My own JHS 234 in the late 1950's boasted the perfect example: the notorious Nat Schulman, a rabbi's son who hung with Italian "rocks," and acted like he was Kookie from 77 Sunset Strip. Given how things work nowadays, I wouldn't be that surprised to have him step out of some corner of the Internet... Al dos guts Moyshe-Shaye Steinlauf My memory played me wrong: the rabbi's son was named Nat Schind; his best buddy, in case anyone's interested, was a rock she-be-rockim named Johnny Tutino (the comb never left his hand). 5)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon Apr 25 13:23:39 1994 From: Alice Honig Subject: Choop/forehead curl In response to Jay Fleischer's puzzlement over choop...may I suggest that this is a shrotened version of chupchik.. a Russian word for a forehead curl, and thus related to the Yiddish word for mane. In one rcord of Theorore Bikel he sings a song called CHoopchik, about a handsome young lad with such a forehead curl. Chane (Alice Honig) 6)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue Apr 26 18:53:04 1994 From: ZOGUR@CUVMB.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU Subject: Medical text in Yiddish If there is anyone out there who is familiar with any books/texts, etc. on medicine/folk remedies, etc. IN YIDDISH, from the 18th century onward, the information will be appreciated. Mikhl Herzog 7)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue Apr 26 19:00:23 1994 From: EEGLC%CUNYVM.bitnet@YaleVM.YCC.Yale.Edu Subject: More on Yiddish movies I recently discussed on Mendele my reactions to Mirele Efros, which I enjoyed tremendously. I bought that and The Dybbuk both from Ergo Media. One of the movies they previewed, which I saw years ago was The Light Ahead (Fishke der Krumer) with Helen Beverly and David Opatoshu, filmed on location in Poland in 1939. The juxtaposition of the subject matter of the film with the date and place of its creation disturbed me deeply. The focus is on a very backward shtetl, where two orphans, one lame and one blind, are married off by the shtetl to avert bad luck. In the end the two decide to leave the shtetl, and on their way they are greeted by a wonderful old man who tells them that they are leaving this superstitious, backward shtetl to enter a world based on tolerance, and on rational principles. In the final spectacular scene they look up to a hill flooded with light, and the old man bids them farewell, to go up over the hill toward "the light ahead". The disturbing fact was that 1939 was the year when Jews started getting rounded up for extermination. What tolerance is this? In whose eyes is this a world based on rational principles? That's what struck me like a blow to the head when I saw this movie. The optimism of the movie was beautiful, and who knew just how low the world was about to sink? I know this may sound cliche'd, but it really blew me away at the time, and it did again the other night. Rick Gildemeister ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol. 3.333 A Table of Contents is now available via anonymous ftp, along with weekly updates. Anonymous ftp archives available on: ftp.mendele.trincoll.edu in the directory pub/mendele/files Archives available via gopher on: gopher.cic.net Mendele has 2 rules: 1. Provide a meaningful Subject: line. 2. Sign your article. To subscribe, send SUB MENDELE FIRSTNAME LASTNAME to: LISTSERV@YALEVM.YCC.YALE.EDU Send submissions/responses to: mendele@yalevm.ycc.yale.edu Other business: nmiller@starbase.trincoll.edu