Skip to Main Content

The Origins of Modern Literary Yiddish

Online ISBN:
9780191672798
Print ISBN:
9780198151661
Publisher:
Oxford University Press
Book

The Origins of Modern Literary Yiddish

Dov-Ber Kerler
Dov-Ber Kerler

Professor of Linguistics and Head of the Department of Linguistics

University of Warsaw
Find on
Published online:
3 October 2011
Published in print:
29 July 1993
Online ISBN:
9780191672798
Print ISBN:
9780198151661
Publisher:
Oxford University Press

Abstract

This book is a systematic attempt to trace the beginnings of modern literary Yiddish, an issue of great significance in the linguistic, literary, and social history of the Yiddish language. The eighteenth century marked the turning point in the history of literary Yiddish, a period of rapid linguistic assimilation to German and Dutch in the West and, by sharp contrast, the increasing cultural autonomy of Eastern European Jewry. Books printed in the West reflected the impact of New High German and contemporary Western Yiddish. Books published in Eastern Europe, the new centre for Yiddish printing, used Eastern Yiddish both for new works and for new editions of old Yiddish works. The author examines hitherto neglected Yiddish books from the period in order to analyse the linguistic changes manifest in both the transition and shift from old to nascent Modern Literary Yiddish within the broader context of genre and literary traditions and in the framework of Yiddish dialectology, grammar, and sociolinguistics. Many of the grammatical norms of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century literary Yiddish are shown to have their origins in the eighteenth century. The book is a contribution to the study of the crystallization process of literary languages, highlighting in the case of Yiddish the dynamics of emergence in the absence of the usual governmental support.

Contents
Close
This Feature Is Available To Subscribers Only

Sign In or Create an Account

Close

This PDF is available to Subscribers Only

View Article Abstract & Purchase Options

For full access to this pdf, sign in to an existing account, or purchase an annual subscription.

Close