by Sarah Bunin Benor
I announced the launch of my new website, the Jewish English Lexicon, and a frum friend who lives in Monsey sent this fun response:
"Fantastic. Moiredik. It's totally not geshmak for me to bring this up, but it's mamesh a pele to me, certain words that you forgot to include. What's pshat? Well lemaiseh I shouldn't complain; You taineh that we can add to the website, and I hear it, I hear the point, but still. My eitzah is that if you would be by us for Shabbes, you would chap a few more words for your website, plus you could help me make Shabbes - put up the chulent, get the kugel on the blech. (We don't hold by the eruv, you should know.) Don't worry, we're cholov yisroel, although we're not makpid on yoshon.
"So how's the mishpocha? By me, everything is boruch Hashem. I have a new einikel, the mechutanim were by us for the Sholom Zochor and bris, my daughter is supporting her husband in learning, my son in Lakewood is out of the freezer and still in the parsha, and the rest of the kinder are growing up quickly, keineinehora poo poo poo.
"I'm maskim is that it's anyway not shayach for you to include every word and expression. So 'shkoiach on the gevaldige website! We all mamesh love it."
This tongue-in-cheek response is a great example of Orthodox Jewish English, which I discuss in Becoming Frum and Chaim Weiser documents in Frumspeak: The First Dictionary of Yeshivish. Orthodox Jews use many words from Hebrew, Aramaic, and Yiddish in their everyday English speech, as well as grammatical influences from Yiddish. Many of the words in my Monsey friend's response are already listed in the Lexicon, and I'm hoping readers like you will add the rest (it's a Wikipedia-style site).
To what extent do non-Orthodox Jews use this distinctive English? I talk about this a bit in Becoming Frum and in this AJS Perspectives article. In addition, I offer some further thoughts in this article about an Orthodox rabbi's open letter to Sarah Silverman. I'd love to hear your responses.
I announced the launch of my new website, the Jewish English Lexicon, and a frum friend who lives in Monsey sent this fun response:
"Fantastic. Moiredik. It's totally not geshmak for me to bring this up, but it's mamesh a pele to me, certain words that you forgot to include. What's pshat? Well lemaiseh I shouldn't complain; You taineh that we can add to the website, and I hear it, I hear the point, but still. My eitzah is that if you would be by us for Shabbes, you would chap a few more words for your website, plus you could help me make Shabbes - put up the chulent, get the kugel on the blech. (We don't hold by the eruv, you should know.) Don't worry, we're cholov yisroel, although we're not makpid on yoshon.
"So how's the mishpocha? By me, everything is boruch Hashem. I have a new einikel, the mechutanim were by us for the Sholom Zochor and bris, my daughter is supporting her husband in learning, my son in Lakewood is out of the freezer and still in the parsha, and the rest of the kinder are growing up quickly, keineinehora poo poo poo.
"I'm maskim is that it's anyway not shayach for you to include every word and expression. So 'shkoiach on the gevaldige website! We all mamesh love it."
This tongue-in-cheek response is a great example of Orthodox Jewish English, which I discuss in Becoming Frum and Chaim Weiser documents in Frumspeak: The First Dictionary of Yeshivish. Orthodox Jews use many words from Hebrew, Aramaic, and Yiddish in their everyday English speech, as well as grammatical influences from Yiddish. Many of the words in my Monsey friend's response are already listed in the Lexicon, and I'm hoping readers like you will add the rest (it's a Wikipedia-style site).
To what extent do non-Orthodox Jews use this distinctive English? I talk about this a bit in Becoming Frum and in this AJS Perspectives article. In addition, I offer some further thoughts in this article about an Orthodox rabbi's open letter to Sarah Silverman. I'd love to hear your responses.
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