Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ______________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 6.080 October 15, 1996 1) Introduction (Leah Krikun) 2) Af and oyf (Zellig Bach) 3) Zamenhof's 'dream' language (Ellen Prince) 4) "Computer virus" af yidish (Eliyahu Juni) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 13 Oct 96 22:19:50 PDT From: lejim@netvision.net.il Subject: Introduction Shalom - I am an "old" graduate of the Peretz School in Winnipeg, Manitoba and a recent subscriber to Mendele (which I greatly enjoy). I would love to hear from other Peretz School graduates, and to get some general feedback, and perhaps some optimistic predictions, as to what the fate is and may be of Jewish Schools on an elementary level across America and Canada. I was pleased to read about the program in Boston (Family Yiddish Class); but - Ikh vunder oyb in nit-zeyer-vaytn tsukumft veln shoyn nit zayn shuln velkhe lernen yidish. Ich voyn in Israel iber 30 yor, ober ikh bin gebliben mit mayn yidish, und mayn yidish iz gebliben mit mir. Ikh bin gor tsufriden mit di Mendelniks, alt und yung, und ich leyen vegn yungere grupes velkhe lernen haynt yidish. Ober merstentayl zey ikh az yidish lernt men in universitetn; oder makh ich a to'es? Halevay! Als eyne vos lebt lange yor in Israel, vemens kinder und eyniklekh redn nit yidish, ken ikh nisht hobn taynes vegn lage fun yidish lernen in "Chutz Learetz". Ikh vays az men lernt ivrit, und ikh bin derbay tsufridn; ober mame loshn, hof ikh, vet nit farloren vern. Zogt mir, iz mayn hofenung a kholem tzi iz es virklikhe meglekhkeit? Di "eltere" yidish-redner fun haynt darfn dokh hobn a yungern dor, andersh fun vanen vet der hemshekh kumen? A dank tzu Noyekh, und tzu alle Mendel leyner und shrayber. Leah (Selchen) Krikun 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 13 Oct 1996 16:55:54 -0400 From: zellig@aol.com Subject: Af and oyf Commenting on my post " 'Af' the correct romanization" (6.074,4), a friend from Australia writes: "The standard pronunciation in Melbourne is in fact "oyf". According to David L. Gold, famous Yiddish linguist, the current dialectal pronunciations of "oyf" are /af/, /of/, /auf/, and -- only in a few varieties of Eastern Yiddish -- /oyf/. "Of these [several] pronunciation forms /_af_/ has been selected for standardization in today's Eastern Yiddish" (_Jewish Language Review_, Vol. 3, 1983, p. 371). The "oyf" pronunciation, while not necessarily standard in klal Yiddish, is still standard in some areas, and is by no means substandard. This spelling pronunciation (that is, pronounced as spelled) is quite widespread among non-native speakers, students of Yiddish, and people who aim to speak "correctly." My suggestion was _not_ that speakers of Yiddish change the way they pronounce the preposition "oyf," but that, when _romanizing_ it, it should be spelled /"af"/, as it has been selected for standardization of today's Eastern Yiddish. Zellig Bach Lakehurst, N J 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 13 Oct 1996 22:22:12 EDT From: ellen@central.cis.upenn.edu Subject: zamenhof's 'dream' language the following was posted on the linguist list. i repeat it here for general interest and also ask if anyone has ever heard of this anecdote and, if so, knows what language zamenhof was dreaming in. yiddish, perchance? also, i've always heard that zamenhof was a native yiddish speaker. does anyone have a reference for this? thanks. Ellen Prince Date: 11 Oct 1996 10:48:56 EDT From: 100101.2276@CompuServe.COM (Dan Maxwell) Subject: language in dreams I thought that the recent postings on the topic of language in dreams had pretty much covered the range of phenomena in existence on this topic, but it appears that I was wrong. I was recently browsing through a biography of Zamenhof, the creator of Esperanto, called "L'homme qui a de'fie' Babel"(the man who defied Babel) by Rene' Centassi and Henri Masson, when i came across an account of a dream which Zamenhof had, apparently at the age of about 16. That would have been more than 10 years before 1887, usually considered the birthyear of the language, when his first grammar of Esperanto was published. He at that time was concerned with the question of whether his language should have a definite article, having noticed that his own Polish, and also Russian (presumably the prestige language of that time and place, since Zamenhof lived in Bialystok, then part of the Russian Empire), did not. In the dream he was pondering this question near a forest with his uncle Jozef and his Greek teacher, whose name was Billevitch. Zamenhof suggested that they might find someone in the forest who could help them. Billevitch, on the contrary, warned against going into the forest on the grounds that there were three girls in red who wanted to harm them. Zamenhof then looked toward the forest, saw the girls in question, and cried out, "there are - -the-(author's emphasis) three girls in red." Zamenhof then woke up in a sweat, but decided that his problem had been solved. The definite article had in his view proved its usefulness. And, as every Esperantist knows, there is a definite article, namely the invariable "la". I can't remember having or hearing about a dream with this degree of linguistic specificity. It is also not clear what language the dream occurred in. Probably not Polish or Russian, since these lack the article which played such a prominent role. Zamenhof knew several other languages, most of them with definite articles, so these appear to be better candidates. In any case, postings from others suggest that people can dream in languages that they don't know very well. The last possibility is that the language was some embryonic form of Esperanto itself, since Zamenhof was so intensely concerned with this topic. Dan Maxwell 4)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 14 Oct 1996 17:53:34 -0400 From: e.juni@utoronto.ca Subject: "Computer virus" of yidish (Re: R. Zellig Bach's post in Mendele vol. 6.078) Strictly speaking, a shed is spirit "out there," more in the business of damaging and hurting than taking possession; I propose that we instead call a computer virus a "dibbik"--it takes over a computer, much as a dibbik takes over a person's body. Eliyahu Juni ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol. 6.080