![]() It would have been strange if neighbours living cheek by jowl, whether in the UK or the US, hadn't shared – and influenced – one another's words. But all living languages evolve and, as the theory of hybridity argues, no meeting of cultures is one-way. And that whereas we use chutzpah admiringly, for Yiddish speakers it's more negative – the usual example is "a man who kills his parents then throws himself on the mercy of the courts as an orphan". I realise that in English we usually use schlep as an intransitive verb (dragging ourselves) rather than the transitive original (dragging an object). And that brings me to my second point, that it's Yiddish's expressiveness, its compression of complex ideas into such succinct and satisfying sounds (even when we mispronounce them) that makes it irresistible. ![]() ![]() Can you imagine your vocabulary bereft of schmooze, schlep, shtick, klutz or spiel? Or how you'd cope without maven or glitch? I agree alternatives exist (although right now I'm struggling to think of one for schmooze), but they wouldn't feel as right. However, to answer what I hope was a tongue-in-cheek question, I'd suggest we co-opt Yiddishisms because they're so useful. I'm thankful, though, that I'm writing rather than talking about Yiddish after Jason Solomons asked in his Sounds Jewish podcast: "Why is that our non-Jewish friends try to co-opt our Yiddishisms? And why is it that when they do, they mispronounce – or in the worst case misuse – those precious words? Are they all schmendricks?" Which made me feel even more embarrassed that I'd been piling apple-sauce on latkes at my neighbours' Chanukah (sic) parties for several years before I saw the episode of Friends where Ross attempts to interest his son in Hanukah and made the connection.
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