Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ______________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 4.367 March 14, 1995 1) Yiddish greetings (Hershl Hartman) 2) Yiddish song book (Yankel Lantz) 3) Di dame mitn hintl (Simon Rozas) 4) The gender of a "hintl" (Howie Aronson) 5) Alison Bert's bilingual coincidence (Morrie Feller) 6) Bilingual Coincidences? (Norman Rosenblatt) 7) Nokhamol "gay" (Meyshe-Yankl Sweet) 8) Location of Mameloshn 95 () 9) Vider gel/gelb (Rick Gildemeister) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 12 Mar 1995 13:16:23 -0500 From: hershl@aol.com Subject: Yiddish greetings Chane Honig suggests (Volume 4.359) a collection of responses to the pro-forma greeting, "vos makhstu (makht ir)?" Way back when I was a student at the Bronx mitlshul of the JPFO, the officeboy at Camp Kinderland and, later, studying at the kursn far lerer un hekherer yidisher bildung (School for Teachers and Higher Jewish Education), the favorite wise-guy response to vos makhstu? was: "mit di zaytn." (Makhn mit di zaytn=lit., gasping for breath; about to expire due to great exertion.) Hershl Hartman 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 12 Mar 1995 15:13:58 -0500 From: rlantz@globalcom.net Subject: Yiddish song book Can anyone recommend a good Yiddish song book? I have a pretty good collection of klezmer and other Yiddish music, but I have a real problem with the lyrics. To be sure, I have the same problem in all languages. Years ago, for example, my wife of the time and I were watching a Finnish group singing their entry on the EuroVision Grand Prix whatever songfest. "Wow," I remarked, "Finnish sure is a weird language." "Fool," she cogently observed, "they're singing in English." Yankel Lantz 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 12 Mar 1995 21:35:55 -0500 (EST) From: rozas@binah.cc.brandeis.edu Subject: Di dame mitn hintl The poem "Di dame mitn hintl" in Russian by Samuil Marshak is actually a very famous children's poem that most of Russian children know. Simon Rozas 4)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 13 Mar 1995 18:34:52 -0600 From: hia5@midway.uchicago.edu Subject: The gender of a "hintl" In the Forverts of 10 March, Kadye Molodovski's poem "Di dame mitn hintl" is published. I have a problem with the gender of "hintl" in Molodovski's language. Please note the following: Mit a groysn bagazh kumt a dame tsum ban: a kerbl, a kestl,... un a kleyninker hintl. "Hintl" here takes the (nominative?) adjective -kleynink-er-. Di ban git a fayf un a shprung un nemt forn/ un dos hintl-- a bil un a shprung un farlorn. "Hintl" here is neuter. Men git a nem un a yog un a trog afn ban/ .... afn ort fun dem hintl Gib aher mayn bagazh: .... un a kleyniker hintl. Here "kleyninker" appears to be accusative! Can someone please explain what's going on here? Thanks. Howie Aronson 5)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 12 Mar 1995 20:27:23 -0700 (MST) From: feller@pcef.pc.maricopa.edu Subject: Alison Bert's bilingual coincidence The Yiddish word "ariber" means "across" like in the expression "ariber dem yam". THe Yiddish word for "above" is "iber", like in the expression "iber alles" which means "above all". A word of caution with respect to single word bilingual coincidences. We have to be careful not to label cognates as bilingual coincidences. Morrie Feller Phoenix 6)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 12 Mar 95 19:52:17 PST From: nrosenbl@interserv.com Subject: Bilingual Coincidences? Yes. And then there is "tsibele" (Yid.) and "cebolla" (Sp.) Norman Rosenblatt 7)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 12 Mar 95 00:13:00 CST From: msweet@facstaff.wisc.edu Subject: Nokhamol "gay" Regarding Shleyme Axelrod's posting on the "Yugntruf" wordlist--a useless endeavor, obviously compiled without any imput from gays or lesbians. There is a perfectly "gerotener vort" for "gay," i.e., freylekh, which is being used by some gay/lesbian Jews. No self-respecting gay person is going to refer to him/herself as a "homoseksualist," an odious medical term, regardless of the Schaechters' ukase. The list has some terribly klutzy terms, such as "homoseksualisten-bar" for gay bar--once again, a word that's not likely ever to emerge in living speech. In this Esperanto-Yiddish, they don't deign to mention words actually used by living Yiddish-speakers, such as (my hobbyhorse) "feygele," or "tumtum." O well--back to the drawing board. Meyshe-Yankl Sweet 8)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 13 Mar 1995 10:28:52 -0500 From: stdowling@aol.com Subject: Location of MAMELOSHN 95 It has been brought to my attention that I didn't stress strongly enough where MAMELOSHN 95 will be taking place. We are holding it at Circle Lodge, Hopewell Junction, NY. Hopewell Junction is on the east side of the Hudson river on the Taconic parkway. Stephen Dowling Brooklyn, NY 9)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 13 Mar 95 11:29:29 EST From: eeglc%cunyvm.bitnet@yalevm.cis.yale.edu Subject: Vider gel/gelb Dovid et al.: After sending my own rather primitive posting about gel/gelb I decided to check the Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology and post what I found. I was going to post it on Saturday but the place where I was acessing my e-mail closed. I think Anno Siegel covered it very well (as a non-linguist I founditeasier to follow) and Johan Seynnaeve covered it more technically. I did do the work, so I'll just quickly add my two bits. I went to "yellow" knowing that y and g alternate each other in many languages. It gives Old Saxon gelo, Middle Low German geel, Middle Dutch gel(e)u. A proto- West Germanic form gelwa is postulated. This gelw as I mentioned before obeys the exchange in High German for b. Example: Dutch kalf, kalven and German Kalb. So, it's the "farkert" version of what I mentioned earlier. I probably should have left it to the linguists, but I wanted to at least take a stab at it, since I know something about Germanic language history and speak both German and Dutch. I think it came across in my posting that I was guessing, but what I will do from now on is clearly state just that. Rick Gildemeister ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol. 4.367 Mendele has 2 rules: 1. Provide a meaningful Subject: line 2. 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