Language of the Ashkenazim: The Sound System of Yiddish

Introduction

Yiddish is historically spoken by the Jews in Central and Eastern Europe from the tenth century onwards, also known as Ashkenazim (Weinreich, 1980). With around eleven million speakers worldwide right before the Holocaust, it was the most widely spoken Jewish language. The number has ever since declined significantly to fewer than two million, of which most are non-L1 speakers. However, there has been a rise in Yiddish learners in recent decades due to the Orthodox community, promotion in academia, and outsized presence on the Internet (Perlin, 2014). Topologically speaking, Yiddish belongs to the West Germanic family and is one of the High German dialects (Jacobs, 2005). The notable Yiddish scholar Max Weinreich (1980) also considered it to be a ‘fusion language’ with main components from Germanic, Slavic, and Semitic origins. Its syntax and grammar are similar to German, with numerous loanwords from Slavic (Polish, Ukrainian) and Semitic (Hebrew, Aramaic). The present paper will demonstrate with examples the sound system of Yiddish in terms of consonants and vowels. The Modern Standard Yiddish developed in the twentieth century would be the variety to be studied, predominantly established from the Northeastern pronunciation spoken in Lithuania, Latvia, and Belorussia (Kleine, 2003). Latin characters will be used instead of the standard orthographical form of Hebrew alphabets to allow effortless comprehension.

Consonants

The sound inventory of Yiddish is typically considered to be parallel to other members of the West Germanic family. Although scholars have established various views on the consonants in Yiddish based on phonetic analyses from speakers of different geographical backgrounds (Bin-Nun, 1973; Jacobs, 2005; Kleine, 2003; Peilutski, 1940), it could be agreed that the places of articulation include bilabial, labiodental, alveolar, postalveolar, palatal, velar, uvular and glottal (see Table 1). The manners of articulation consist of plosives, nasals, trill, tap or flap, fricatives, affricates, approximants and lateral approximants.

Table 1 Consonants in Yiddish (Jacobs, 2005; Kleine, 2003)

Note: Language examples are provided in the following format:

/Phonetic transcription/ ‘Latin transcription’ (English translation)

Plosives are consonants produced with complete oral closure and velic closure. Unlike English and German, the voiceless plosives in Yiddish /p, t, k/ are unaspirated in most cases. For example, the voiceless bilabial plosive [p] in /pʊχ / ‘pukh’ (fluff) is unaspirated, while in English, [͡pʰ] in /pʰʊt/ ‘put’ is aspirated. The voiced plosives /b, d, g/ are always fully voiced, including final positions (Kleine, 1998). For instance, the voiced bilabial plosive [b] in /ʃtʊb/ ‘shtub’ (house) is fully voiced, but [b̥] in /næb̥/ ‘nab’ in English can be optionally devoiced or unreleased. The glottal stop [ʔ] only serves as an intervocalic separator (Kleine, 2003).

Nasals are articulated with oral closure and velic opening. Yiddish has three nasal phonemes: /m, n, nʲ/. The velar nasal [ŋ] could occur as an allophone of /n/ when proceeding with the velar plosives /k, g/. Examples include /ˈzɔkŋ/ ‘zokn’ (old man) and /ˈzɔgŋ/ ‘zogn’ (say). However, the palatalized nasal [nʲ] does not assimilate to the place of articulation, as shown in /banʲkɜs/ ‘bankes’ (cupping glasses). Also, the syllabic alveolar nasal [n̩] occasionally acts as an allophone of /n/ like in /ˈkɔɾn̩/ ‘korn’ (corn).

Although the trill and tap or flap are divided into two rows in Table 1, /r, ʀ, ɾ/ are in free variation. They are commonly regarded as permissible variants of the phoneme /r/ owing to the individual or dialectal variations, usually having a single place of articulation. The voiced apical trill [r̺] is the most common and produced with the tongue tip in contact with the back of the upper front teeth. The voiced uvular trill [ʀ] is also typical among Central Yiddish speakers. The alveolar tap or flap [ɾ] produced with a quick contact between the tongue tip and the alveolar ridge is observable but less common, habitually interchangeable with the apical trill [r̺] like in /ˈm ͡ɔɜr̺ɜd/ or /ˈm ͡ɔɜɾɜd/ ‘mridh’ (rebellion).

Fricatives in Yiddish include the voiceless /f, s, ʃ, χ, h/ and the voiced /v, z, ʒ, ɣ /, as well as the palatalized variants of alveolar fricatives [s] and [z]: /sʲ, zʲ/. When these consonants are produced, the air is forced to pass through a narrow gap in the mouth cavity, creating a turbulent airflow plus friction noise. Some scholars place the uvular [χ] into the velar column and the uvular trill [ʀ] into the glottal or velar column, as their places of articulation varies between speakers of different geographical backgrounds (Jacobs, 2009). Fricatives can occur in all initial, medial and final positions. For instance, the voiceless alveolar fricative [s] could be in /saχ/ ‘sakh’ (much), in /χosɜr/ ‘khoser’ (go to waste) and finally in /bɪs/ ‘bis’ (bite). The voiceless uvular fricative [χ] can occur initially in /χɜt/ ‘zind’ (sin), medially in /ʃtɛχn/ ‘shtekhn’ (to prick) and finally in /zaχ/ ‘zakh’ (thing). However, glottal fricative [h] could only be found in initial and medial positions, as in /hɔjχ/ ‘hoykh’ (high) and /ˈ ͡aɛngɜˌhɪʎt/ ‘anthalt’ (contain).

͡The discussion on the phonemic status of Yiddish affricates has no definitive conclusion until today (Jacobs, 2005). The majority tend to the inventory of /͡ts, ͡dz, ͡tʃ, ͡dʒ/ formed by the alveolar plosives and fricatives, as well as their palatalized counterparts / ͡tsʲ, ͡dzʲ, ͡tʃʲ, ͡dʒʲ/. These affricates are frequently founded proceeding voiced alveolar nasal [n] and voiced alveolar lateral approximant [l]. Examples include: /hal ͡dz / ‘haldz’ (neck), /hal ͡ts/ ‘halt es’ (hold it), /mɛn ͡tʃ/ ‘mentsh’ (person) and /gan ͡dz/ ‘gandz’ (goose). Jacobs (2005) suggested that it involves a historical process of inserting a plosive between the voiced alveolar sound, i.e. [n] and [l] and the fricative. The purpose was to increase the perceiving variation between words with a nasalized vowel and a nasal stop, as differentiating in /mɛ̃ʃ/ ‘mesh’ (deed) and /mɛn ͡tʃ/ ‘mentsh’ (person). It is also reported that the voiced alveolar affricate [͡dz] does not occur in the initial position (Jacobs, 2005).

The differentiation between voiced alveolar lateral approximant [l] and voiced palatal lateral approximant [ʎ] has declined in modern days (Kleine, 2003) and tends to be a feature of speakers’ preference, dialectal variation (Jacobs, 2009; Weinreich, 1958) or even sociolinguistic marking (Weinreich, 1958). Historically, the two are minimal pairs in contrastive distribution, as observed from the following examples: /ˈkalɜ/ ‘kale’ (bride) and /ˈkaʎɜ/ ‘kalye’ (spoiled). The voiced alveolar lateral approximant [l] would be velarized ([ɫ]) when occurring in the word-initial position. A typical example is /ɫɪd/ ‘lid’ (song).

Apart from the voiced palatal approximant [j] and the voiced palatal lateral approximant [ʎ], the above description has included palatalized consonants: palatalized alveolar plosives /tʲ, dʲ/, palatalized nasal /nʲ/, palatalized alveolar fricatives /sʲ, zʲ/ and palatalized affricates / ͡tsʲ, ͡dzʲ, ͡tʃʲ, ͡dʒʲ/. They reflect the language contact of Yiddish with Slavic languages, as the opposition of palatalized and non-palatalized consonants is typical among them (Svetozarova et al., 1999). These consonants should be analyzed as distinct phonemes, but they were given less attention (Bratkowsky, 1974; Jacobs, 2005). Some of them occur in restricted environments, but all of them happen before vowels. The voiced and voiceless palatalized alveolar plosives /tʲ, dʲ/ do not occur in final positions (Initial: /tʲɔχkɜn/ ‘toxken’ (throb) and /dʲɛgɜχ ͡ts/ ‘degexts’ (tar); Medial: /mɔtʲɜ/ ‘mote’ (man’s name) and /gɔdʲɜ/ ‘gode’ (man’s name)). The voiceless palatalized alveolar fricative [sʲ] only occurs in initial positions, as in /sʲɛrp/ ‘serp’ (scythe).

Voice assimilation exists in Yiddish. Devoicing assimilation could be found in plosives preceding voiceless fricatives, for example, in /ʃr ͡aɛbst/~/ʃr ͡aɛb̥st/ (you write) and /vɔgʃɔl/~/vɔɠ̊ʃɔl/ (scales). Voicing assimilation could be found in fricatives and affricates preceding vowels such as in /zɪsvarg/~/zɪs̬varg/ (candies) and /ʃvɪ ͡tsbɔd/~/ʃvɪ ͡t͜s̬bɔd/ (steam bath). (See Appendix for more language examples)

Vowels

Vowels in Yiddish behave distinctly in stressed and unstressed positions and are significant sources of dialectal variations (Bin-Nun, 1973; Jacobs, 2005; Kleine, 2003; Peilutski, 1940). They include the low front unrounded vowel [a], the low-mid front unrounded vowel [ɛ], the low-mid central unrounded vowel [ɜ], the lax high front unrounded vowel [ɪ], the low-mid back rounded vowel [ɔ] and the lax high back rounded vowel [ʊ] (see Table 2). There is no differentiation between short vowels and long vowels in Yiddish (Bratkowsky, 1974; Kleine, 2003). The five monophthongs /a, ɛ, ɪ, ɔ, ʊ/ are in very similar lengths when occurring in stressed syllables. Their uniqueness can be illustrated by the following words: /nas/ ‘nas’ (wet), /nɛs/ ‘ns’ (miracle), /nɪs/ ‘nis’ (sneeze as imperative verb), /nɔs/ ‘nos’ (sneeze as noun) and /nʊs/ ‘nus’ (nut). However, the low-mid central unrounded vowel [ɜ], which could only occur in unstressed syllables, can be articulated as ‘non-distinctive’ variants around its position (Kleine, 2003). Thus, the mid central vowel [ə] is sometimes used to represent a variant in analyses by other scholars (Jacobs, 2005). Examples include /gɜˈnɜjvɜ/ or /gəˈnɜjvə/ ‘gnibh’ (theft) and /ˈvaɾɜmɜn/ or /ˈvaɾəmən/ ‘verem’ (worm). The lax high front unrounded vowel [ɪ] could also occur in two undistinguishable states with slightly different openness/closedness. Some scholars would use the high front unrounded vowel [i] to represent the variant in tense form and higher tongue height (Jacobs, 2005). For instance, the tongue height of the initial vowel is higher in /indʊstrijɜ/ ‘industrye’ (industry) than in /ɪn/ ‘in’ (in).

Table 2 Vowels in Yiddish (Jacobs, 2005; Kleine, 2003)

Front               Central                        Back

            Similar to English, front rounded vowels are lacking in Yiddish, whereas they play a role in other West Germanic languages, i.e., German. Hence, the German loanwords in Yiddish differ a lot in vowel pronunciation, such as /ʃ ͡ɛɪn/ ‘sheyn’ (beautiful) cf. /ʃøːn/ ‘schön’ in German and /brɪdɜ/ ‘brider’ (brothers) cf. /bryːdɐ/ ‘Brüder’ in German.

            In Yiddish, vowels are habitually nasalized when preceded by nasal consonants or a consonant cluster of nasal plus fricative. In some varieties, the nasal consonants could be dropped such that the oral and nasal vowels are in free variation (Jacobs, 2005). For instance, /kamf/~/kãf/ ‘kamf’ (battle), /fɪnf/~/fɪ̃f/ ‘finf’ (five), / ͡ɛɪns/~/ɛ̃ɪs/ ‘ejns’ (one) and /dɪnstɪk/~/dɪ̃stɪk/ ‘dinstik’ (Tuesday) all demonstrate this phenomenon.

            The sonorant consonants, i.e., the voiced alveolar lateral approximant [l] and the voiced alveolar nasal [n], could be syllabic in word-final positions and unstressed syllables ([l̩] and [n̩], respectively). This phenomenon can be owing to the reduced central vowel. Examples include /ˈtɔvl̩/ ‘toyl’ (blackboard), /ˈt ͡aɛvl̩/ ‘tayvl’ (devil), /ˈɔfn̩/ ‘ofn’ (open) and /ˈ ͡ɔɜfn̩/ ‘oyfn’ (way). (See Appendix for more language examples)

Diphthongs and triphthongs

            There are three decrescendo/falling diphthongs in Yiddish: / ͡aɛ, ͡ɛɪ, ͡ɔɜ/ (see Table 3), indicating that the first vowel is more prominent than the second one. Scholars have different realizations of them, i.e., Jacobs (2005) clung to the interpretation of rising diphthongs with vowel plus palatal approximant [j] /aj͡, ej͡, oj͡/ as evidence of German influence, while Svetozarova et al. (1999) tended to use the high front rounded vowel [y] for the less prominent element / ͡ay, ͡ey, ͡oy/ as evidence of Slavic/Russian influence. As there has not been a unified classification of diphthongs in Standard Yiddish due to the massive influence of dialectal/geographical variation, Kleine’s (2003) categorization would be incorporated for clarity.

Table 3 Diphthongs in Yiddish (Kleine, 2003)

Front               Central                        Back

            Due to the assimilation effect, the diphthongs / ͡aɛ, ͡ɛɪ, ͡ɔɜ/ could be palatalized / ͡aɛʲ, ͡ɛɪʲ, ͡ɔɜʲ/ when occurring after uvular consonants /ʀ, χ/ or voiced plosives, but the latter environment tends to be subject to the speaker’s preference. Also, these diphthongs are found in the stressed syllables. For example, /ˈʀ ͡aɛʲɜ/ ‘raye’ (piece of evidence) and /ˈχ ͡aɛʲɜ/ ‘khaye’ (animal) contain the palatalized diphthong [ ͡aɛʲ] after the voiced uvular trill [ʀ] and the voiceless uvular fricative [χ] respectively. The palatalized [ ͡ɛɪʲ] could be found following the voiced velar plosive [g] in /dʊɾɣˈg ͡ɛɪʲɜɾ/ ‘durkhgeyer’ (passer-by), while [ ͡ɔɜʲ] could occur after the voiced alveolar plosive [d] in /nɪʃ ͡t̚gɜˈd ͡ɔɜ̘ʲɜɾt/ ‘nisht gedoyert’ (did not last/take [time]).

Triphthongs do not occur typically in Standard Yiddish, though occasionally. Some dialects like South-eastern Yiddish and some regional varieties of Central Yiddish might have more triphthongs due to the breaking and drawl process of ‘inserting a schwa-like vowel between a vocalic nucleus and a tautosyllabic consonant’, also known as vocalic overlength (Jacobs, 2005). The two triphthongs shown in Table 3 /ɛɪɜ, ɔɜə/ are observable in Standard Yiddish, possibly influenced by the regional dialects. Both of them are formed by a diphthong and a central vowel. Many of the occurrences are related to and are part of the derivational suffix ‘-er’ (equivalent to ‘-er’ in English, implying ‘the person who VERB’), such as the [ɛɪʲɜ] in /dʊɾɣˈg ͡ɛɪʲɜɾ/ ‘durkhgeyer’ (passer-by). The triphthong [ɔɜə] in /zɔɜər/ ‘zoyer’ (sour) is a demonstration of it not occurring as a suffix.

When looking at other dialectal varieties, the inventory of triphthongs seems to be more abundant. In Central Yiddish, the triphthongs /ojə, ijə, uwə/ are expected. In addition to the vocalic overlength by schwa, Jacobs (2005) regarded that the voiced velar approximant/glide [j] or the voiced labial-velar approximant/glide [w] is inserted instead of the schwa. The evidence is in the following words: /biəχ/~/bijəχ/ (book), /buət/~/buwət/ (bath). There are variants of the words without [j] or [w], while the diphthongs [iə] and [uə] are essential, respectively. In South-eastern Yiddish, another triphthong /ajə/ could be found, such as in /χajə/~/χaiə/ (animal).

Table 3 Triphthongs in Yiddish (Jacobs, 2005)

Front               Central                        Back

Conclusion

As shown from this brief analysis, the sound inventory of Yiddish is not identical to German. It has demonstrated the language change and the development of dialectal variation, proving the status of Yiddish as a language but not ‘broken German’. The phonological traces from Germanic, Slavic and Semitic origins have made it unique and displayed its phonetic richness. Nevertheless, a limited number of resources and studies are dedicated to reaching a standard phonetic classification of Yiddish. Also, more research should be done on investigating the most recently spoken Yiddish, especially the varieties of diasporic Ashkenazim in North America and Eastern/Western Europe. The phonetic deviations could contribute much to understanding language shift longitudinally and the historical study of the Jewish diaspora.

References

Bin-Nun, J. (1973). Jiddisch und die deutschen Mundarten [Yiddish and the German dialects]. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer Verlag.

Bratkowsky, J. (1974). Sharpness in Yiddish: A fifth riddle in bilingual dialectology. Indiana University doctoral dissertation. Ann Arbor: University Microfilms International.

Harkavy, A. (1901). Yidish-Englishes verterbukh: A dictionary of the Yiddish language. New York: J. L. Werbelowsky.

Jacobs, N. G. (2005). Yiddish: A linguistic introduction. UK: Cambridge University Press.

Kleine, A. (1998). Toward A ‘standard Yiddish’ pronunciation. In M. S. Schmid, J. R. Austin & D. Stein (Eds.), Historical Linguistics, 1997: Selected Papers from the 13th International Conference on Historical Linguistics, Düsseldorf, 10-17 August 1997 (Vol. 164, p. 201-212). Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing.

Kleine, A. (2003). Standard Yiddish. Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 33(2), 261-265.

Perlin, R. (February 27, 2014). Blitspostn, Vebzaytlekh, Veblogs: The Rise of Yiddish Online. Slate. Retrieved from https://slate.com/human-interest/2014/02/yiddish-language-the-mame-loshen-has-network-of-adherents-on-the-internet-from-bloggers-to-translators-to-cultural-preservationists.html

Prilutski, N. (1940). Yidische fonetik: Elementarer kurs far lerer un aleynlerner [Yiddish Phonetics: Elementary courses for teachers and students]. Vilne: Aroysgegebn fun di firvokhn-kursn far yidishe lerer (derloybt durkhn bildungs-ministerium).

Svetozarova, N., Kleiner, Y., De Graaf, T., & Nieuweboer, R. (1999). Russian-Yiddish: Phonetic aspects of language interference. In Proc. of the XIV International Congress of Phonetic Sciences. San-Francisco.

Weinreich, M. (1980). History of the Yiddish Language (translated by S. Noble & J. A. Fishman). Chicago & London: The University of Chicago Press.

Weinreich, U. (1958). Yiddish and colonial German in Eastern Europe: The differential impact of Slavic. In American Contributions to the Fourth International Congress of Slavicists, Moscow 1958, 369-421. The Hague: Mouton.

Appendix

Table 1 List of Yiddish words