Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ______________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 13.014 Feb 22, 2004 1) oy iz dos a riml (Meyer Zaremba) 2) vi zogt men es oyf yidish? (Izaly Zemtsovsky) 3) kanarik (Bernard Dov Cooperman) 4) Auf/oyf (Noyekh Miller) 5) Translation needed (Chava Respitz) 6) vos heyst 'a mentsh'? (Barney Martin) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Feb 11, 2004 From: greenehcuzineh@aol.com Subject: Re: oy iz dos a riml Don't know for sure but the word, "rim" means "debris" or "rubbish". Perhaps, the person is saying, "Oh, is he a piece of garbage!". Also there is a verb, "rimen" which means to "boast". Could it mean, "Oh is he a braggart!" Meyer Zaremba 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Feb 12, 2004 From: Izaly Zemtsovsky Subject: vi zogt men es oyf yidish? There is an idiom in American English to encourage people in difficult situations: "Keep your chin up". The British rough equivalent talks about "keeping a stiff upper lip." In German it is "Halt die Ohren steif", literally "keep your ears stiff". I know some other equivalents, too. My question is what is it in Yiddish? Izaly Zemtsovsky 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Feb 12, 2004 From: Bernard Cooperman Subject: "kanarik" I am trying to track down the origin, meaning, and usage of the term kanarik, often used as a descriptor after a person's name (e.g., Moishe Kanarik). It seems to me that I've seen it used in a collection of humorous short stories, but I can't put my hands on the book. Can any Mendelyaners help? A groysen dank. Bernard Dov Cooperman 4)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Feb 15, 2004 From: N Miller Subject: Auf/oyf We haven't had a linguistic makhloykes on Mendele for some time now and now is as good a time as any to renew it. Philologus, who writes a language column in Forward, has written an interesting article on the preposition 'oyf' and the verbal complement 'oyf-'. http://www.forward.com/issues/2004/04.02.13/arts6.philologos.html Experience suggests that there's a great deal more to be said on this and related matters. shemt zikh nisht. Noyekh Miller 5)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Feb 16, 2004 From: respitz@sympatico.ca Subject: Translation needed Could someone please forward me the yiddish words to "She'll Be Coming Round The Mountain"? a dank foroys, Chava Respitz 6)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Feb 18, 2004 From: martin@wildplanet.com Subject: re: vos heyst 'a mentsh'? When I was still in grammar school (in The Netherlands, 1966's through 1978), we made a distinction in usage between 'mens' (Dutch) and 'mensj' (Yiddish, Judeo-Dutch, Amsterdam slang). The first was a human. Just a human. And sometimes barely human. The second, as in "wat een mensj!" (voss a mentsh!) was a fine human indeed, an exemplary human, in some cases a heroic human. To describe someone as 'mens' was often disparaging or even downright nasty (dat mens - that piece of work, that specimen, that utter thing!), to describe someone as a 'mensj' was to praise them (mens, dat is toch 'n mensj! - Man, that's some mentsh!). Our teacher was a 'mensj'. And to some, he was a " 'n echte mensj, 'n emmese mensj, 'n toffe mensj" (which did mean, in his case, a really cool guy). But our nextdoorsikeh was ' 'n mens, 'n echt stuk mens, 'n geval' (a human, a real piece of human, a case). The difference seems one of great humanity versus petty humanity. A 'mentsh' is a prinz unter menshen', mer nisht alle mentshen sein mentshen'. Only a subset of 'mensheid' is 'mensjkeit'. To explain 'mentsh' as 'a cool guy', seems so much much more limited than it really is. Barney Martin ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol. 13.014 Address for the postings to Mendele: mendele@lists.yale.edu Address for the list commands: listproc@lists.yale.edu Mendele on the Web: http://www.mendele.net http://ibiblio.org/yiddish/mendele.html