Yiddish

A forum for guides, lessons and sharing of useful information.
Post Reply
User avatar
Shemtov
runic
runic
Posts: 3283
Joined: 29 Apr 2013 04:06

Yiddish

Post by Shemtov »

I'm teaching myself Yiddish, and I thought I'd share what I'm learning here. Note that I am using Yivo Yiddish, which uses the northeast (Lithuanian) pronounciation with Southeast (Ukrainian/Romanian) morphosyntax, I'm also not using the Yiddish alphabet, rather the YIVO transcription system, as posting in multi-directional scripts on this board is hard.

Phonology and transcription:
/m n/ <m n >
/p b t d t͡ʃ d͡ʒ k g/ <p b t d tsh dzh k g>
/f v s z ʃ ʒ x h/ <f v s z sh zh kh h>
/r/ <r>
/l j/ <l y>

/ɪ ʊ ɛ ɔ a/ <i u e o a>
/ɛɪ ɔɪ aɪ/ <ey oy ay>

Personal nominative Pronouns:
1P sing: Ikh
2P informal: du
2P formal: ir
3P masc/. sing: Er
3P Fem sing.: Zi
3P neut. sing: Es
1P Plr: Mir
2P Plr: Ir
3P Plr: Zey

Verbs:
Infitinitives are formed by adding the suffix n/en to the root:
Shlofen "To sleep"
Trinken "To Drink"

The present tense conjugation of regular verb Shlof "sleep":
1P sing: Ikh shlof
2P informal: du shlofst
2P formal: ir Shloft
3P masc. sing: Er Sholft
3P Fem sing.: Zi Shloft
3P neut sing: Sholft
1P Plr: Mir Shlofn
2P Plr: Ir Sholft
3P Plr: Zey Sholfn

Based on the above pattern, you should be able to conjugate any regular verb.

Vocabulary:
Kuk: Look
Ze: See
Red: Speak
Zing: sing
Trakht: Think

Exersizes:
Translate the following into Yiddish:
I Look
You (informal) see
He sings
They think
We sing
She looks
You (formal) speak
Many children make up, or begin to make up, imaginary languages. I have been at it since I could write.
-JRR Tolkien
Post Reply