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A brief glossary of important and commonly used Yiddish words and phrases. Bissel (bisl)— A little bit, as in “I just want to eat a bissel right now.” Bubbe (bubby) — Grandmother Chutzpah — Nerve, extreme arrogance, brazen presumption, confidence, as in “It took real
In the 1930s, Yiddish was spoken by more than 10 million people, but by 1945, 75% of them were gone. Today, Yiddish is the language of over 100 newspapers, magazines, radio broadcasts, and websites. A good homemaker, a woman who’s in charge of her home and will make sure you remember it.
Examples: type פּלימעניק , not פּלימעניקעס ; type שײן , not שײנע , and העלף , not העלפֿן or אונטערגעהאָלפֿן . Write Yiddish words in YIVO transcription. Use the stem of the word (not the plural, case-marked, or conjugated form) of nouns, adjectives, and verbs.
The Yiddish language is a wonderful source of rich expressions, especially terms of endearment (and of course, complaints and insults). This article is a follow up on Ten Yiddish Expressions You Should Know. Jewish scriptwriters introduced many Yiddish words into popular culture, which often changed the original meanings drastically.
certainly, of course, for surecertainly, of course, for sure (colloquial) בֶּטַח betach.
“Ken” means “Yes” in Hebrew.
what do you hearA common greeting that is also a useful phrase is “what's going on” or “what's new??” in Hebrew: mah koreh (mah kor-EH), literally “what is happening?” Mah nishma (mah nish-MAH) is a good alternative, literally “what do you hear”, the phrase is used to ask “what's new?” If you really want to impress, go for the ...
Method 1 of 2: Say "toh." In Hebrew, the simplest, most common way to say "thank you" is "toda" (תודה). The first syllable is very similar to the English word "TOffee."
Write Yiddish words in YIVO transcription. Use the stem of the word (not the plural, case-marked, or conjugated form) of nouns, adjectives, and verbs. Examples: say plimenik, not plimenikes, sheyn, not sheyne, helf, not helfn or untergeholfn .
If you need a loshn-koydesh derived word, first spell it phonetically . Unaccented vowels often should be spelled with an e, as in borekh, bimkem, and maskem . If you don't know or can't guess the pronunciation, you may use the following letters to spell out loshn-koydesh. aleph.
If the text has an alef with a segol ( אֶ ), try e .
If the text has a word ending in -ig , try -ik .
If the text doesn't distinguish a tsvey-yudn ( ײ) from pasekh-tsvey-yudn ( ײַ ), try both ay and ey .
Yiddish words in Yiddish letters. You may use ligatures or not, and if you leave out nekudes, the program will try to fill them in. Use only the stem of the word (not the plural, case-marked, or conjugated form) of nouns, adjectives, and verbs.