Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2012 April 8

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April 8

Learning Yiddish

I am interested in learning to speak the central (Polish) dialect of Yiddish. Most books for learners focus on "Standard Yiddish," whose pronunciation is based essentially on that of the Lithuanian dialect. In what ways will pronunciation in the central dialect be unpredictable from the standard orthography of the language?

Also, are there any learning materials that give Central Yiddish significant (or exclusive) coverage right from the beginning? They can be in any well-known European language. 96.46.197.161 (talk) 08:05, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

If geolocation is correct: There is a Jewish Community Centre in Huron Street, London, Ontario. One of the staff members may be able to suggest a suitable text book for the relevant Eastern Yiddish dialect. --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 14:57, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

As a native speaker of Polish Yiddish, I can assure you that the pronunciation is almost always predictable. In addition, formal written Yiddish is identical in all dialects, though in informal writing or speech there may be different choices of vocabulary. Ratzd'mishukribo (talk) 17:00, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the information. It's reassuring to know there's basically only one kind of written Yiddish. Since asking the question, I've looked up some more information about pronunciation. My understanding is that, for example, the vowels in the pairs zok/tu:g, betn/beytn, boym/ho:t and git/bi:kh differ in Polish Yiddish but would actually be pronounced identically (as zok/tog, betn/betn, boym/hoyt, gut/bukh) in standard Yiddish. Do you pronounce them the same way or differently? And are the vowels in these pairs spelled differently? 96.46.197.161 (talk) 03:28, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

Gut and Bukh have the same vowel spelling in Weinreich's dictionary (vav without any diacritics: גוט בוך)... AnonMoos (talk) 15:01, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

Thanks. I don't have access to a paper dictionary. Does Weinreich's dictionary indicate the Polish pronunciation of words in some way? If not, do you know of one that does?

Returning to the matter of spelling, this online dictionary spells the words as: זאָק (zok), טאָג (tog/tu:g), בעט (bet), בעטן (betn/beytn), בוים (boym), הויט (hoyt/ho:t), גוט (gut/git), בוך (bukh/bi:kh). At first glance, it would appear difficult to tell which Polish vowel is represented by the vowel letters in these cases. 96.46.197.161 (talk) 18:09, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

English in Bollywood

Resolved

I've seen two recent Indian movies (Dasvidaniya and Om Shanti Om) in which almost a third of the dialogue is in English; I did not detect a pattern in the choice of language for a given sentence. Is this an affectation of show biz, or an accurate portrayal of some stratum of life there?

A couple of times in the latter movie, I heard "Such?" meaning "Is it really true?". Is that the English word such (the semantic drift is not shocking) or a Hindi word that happens to resemble it? —Tamfang (talk) 21:24, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

You can start by looking at Indian English. Alansplodge (talk) 22:42, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

Doesn't answer either question, thanks. —Tamfang (talk) 18:49, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

Tamfang is right. The article could have made a mention of code-switching, but it's not there. It doesn't even have a reference to Hinglish which is what Tamfang might be looking for. sach is a Hindi word pronounced as "such". It is a derivative of the Sanskrit satya (truth). Jay (talk) 17:09, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

Thanks twice! —Tamfang (talk) 15:41, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

I have encountered Indians who, in conversation with family members or close friends, switch between English and some Indian language seemingly at random. 86.181.173.112 (talk) 00:09, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

Thank you. —Tamfang (talk) 18:49, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

It's called code-switching; happens in many polygot communities. --Orange Mike | Talk 01:23, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

I'm aware of the word, and heard bilingual conversations often enough when I lived in a polyglot city, but such switching as I've witnessed in person usually seemed to be governed by subject-matter (the speaker might lack domain vocabulary in one language). —Tamfang (talk) 18:49, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

English is often used in Bollywood movies to make a point. There are certain characters that tend to get more English lines than others, to denote social/economic status or faked social/economic status. Usage of English often gets a sarcastic overtone. The usage of English in movies is not exactly the same as in real life, but often a parody of the code-switching of upper class Indians and/or the young and hip. --Soman (talk) 19:48, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

Thank you. —Tamfang (talk) 15:32, 11 April 2012 (UTC)