The Meaning of Yiddish [Hardcover]

Benjamin Harshav (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1, 1990 | ISBN-10: 0520059476 | ISBN-13: 978-0520059474

With a combination of erudition and insight, the author investigates the major aspects of Yiddish language and culture, showing where Yiddish came from and what it has to offer, even as it ceases to be a 'living' language.

Editorial Reviews

Review

“I know of no single book in any language which [conveys] such a richly textured profile of the nature and dynamics of both the Yiddish language and its literature. It is a remarkable feat of high popularization, written with great flair and without a hint of pedantry. . . . The book should be read by all who are interested in language.”—Times Literary Supplement

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

From the Inside Flap

With a rare combination of erudition and insight, the author investigates the major aspects of Yiddish language and culture, showing where Yiddish came from and what it has to offer, even as it ceases to be a “living” language.
Reviews
“Harshav’s book is a first-class study of Yiddish as both language and culture, rich with linguistic detail and historical insight, expert in its literary analysis and judgments. I recommend it enthusiastically.”
—Irving Howe,
Graduate School and University Center of the City University of New York
“The Meaning of Yiddish is the most important contribution to the study of Yiddish language and literature in recent times.”
—Chana Kronfeld,
University of California, Berkeley
“The Meaning of Yiddish is explicitly intended for ‘readers who bring to it no previous knowledge, only curiosity.’ . . . ‘My central question,’ Harshav writes in the preface, ‘is: Yiddish: what was it? What kind of world was it? How can we read the intersections of meaning its texts seem to provide? How did it lead in and out of Jewish history, moving between the internal Jewish world and the cultures of Christian Europe and America?’ I know of no other single book in any language which could respond to these questions by conveying to the uninitiated . . . such a richly textured profile of the nature and dynamics of both the Yiddish language and its literature. It is a remarkable feat of high popularization, written with great flair and without a hint of pedantry, its examples always to the point and often memorable in themselves. . . . The book should be read by all who are interested in language, in literature, and in the modern Jewish experience.”
—Times Literary Supplement

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 235 pages
• Publisher: University of California Press (May 1, 1990)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0520059476
• ISBN-13: 978-0520059474
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.6 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,413,956 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #57 in Books > Literature & Fiction > World Literature > Yiddish
  • #99 in Books > Education & Reference > Foreign Languages > Instruction > Yiddish

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Insight into Yiddish language and culture, February 24, 2001

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Meaning of Yiddish (Contraversions: Jews and Other Differenc) (Paperback)

In The Meaning Of Yiddish, Benjamin Harshav (Jacob and Hilda Blaustein Professor of Hebrew and Comparative Literature at Yale University) has written an impressive work of scholar erudition and insight into the major aspects of the Yiddish language and culture. Professor Harshav reveals where Yiddsh came from and what it has to offer contemporary Jewish culture, even as it is starting to die out with the passing of the generations of ghettoized Eastern Europe Jewry. The Meaning Of Yiddish is an outstanding recommendation for any personal, Temple, or academic Yiddish studies collection.

4.0 out of 5 stars The structure of Yiddish, October 24, 2010

By 

Ilya (Redmond, WA) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: The Meaning of Yiddish (Contraversions: Jews and Other Differenc) (Paperback)

Vocabulary of the English language consists of several layers, which are not genre-neutral. Stories about Merrie Olde England, such as the Mother Goose nursery rhymes, are heavily Germanic; more formal English writing, such as the United States Declaration of Independence, is heavily Old French; as for modern French borrowings, I am reminded of the Internet forum tagline, "Pretentious? Moi?". It was similar with Yiddish: the Germanic, Hebrew-Aramaic and Slavic layers each had their own connotations and could be combined to give expressive richness to a text. Harshav illustrates this with both 19th century Yiddish literature and with the Yiddish poetry of American immigrants. I doubt Harshav's assertion that most Yiddish speakers have always been multilingual, though; Mendele the Book Peddler's Benjamin the Third certainly wasn't.