Jewish Student Weekly

Yiddish is a Germanic language which is spoken by about 4 million Jews all around the world. The term ‘Yiddish’ itself means Jewish. The language came about sometime between the 9^th and 12^th centuries as an amalgamation of Middle High German dialects and was also influenced heavily from Hebrew/ Aramaic terms that are found in traditional Jewish literature.

Yiddish after some time split into West and East Yiddish and East Yiddish further split into North and South Yiddish. Modern Yiddish especially East Yiddish also has been influenced greatly by the Slavic languages. Yiddish is written in the Hebrew language although Yiddish is not linguistically related to Hebrew in spite of the fact that it has absorbed many things from Jewish tradition.

The late 19^th and early 20^th centuries are considered the golden age of Yiddish literature and this period also coincides with the revival of Hebrew as a language and also as literature. At the beginning of the 20^th century Yiddish began emerging as a major European language and Yiddish theatre and films also became popular. In the middle of the 20^th century however, the Holocaust led to the sudden decline of Yiddish as the Jewish community that used Yiddish extensively was largely destroyed.

In the United States Yiddish initially bound together Jews from different countries but eventually there came an end to that. In the United States most people did not pass on the language to the coming generations as they preferred them to learn English and assimilate to the present culture. In Israel Modern Hebrew began to be the language of use as there were increasing conflicts between the cultural and secular forces in the country.A large number phases in the English language are also inspired from Yiddish to such an extent that they are now part of the language.