Please be patient! YCD needs time to load, so you can then enjoy rapid searching all day and night (needs a computer with good RAM). It is not fully loaded until you can scroll down easily to the end of the alphabet at “Z”. Once loaded, the Search functions (on top or using your own system, via Ctrl. + F) should work in good time. Feel free to download the latest version (via Right Click > Save As > ‘HTML Only’ or, if you prefer: Print as > PDF or on paper with your printer), to have YCD on your desktop (remembering to frequently download anew, during the author’s lifetime, to have the latest version). Author’s rights are asserted “in the spirit of Israel Steinberg (Yisroel Shteynberg)“.
In the event of mechanical failure, please consult the internet archive’s latest available version of YCD (which, in addition to preservation into the future is hopefully a safeguard against any future attempt to monetize the project).
Students of modern Yiddish literature are directed to Yiddish-English dictionaries, in the first instance Beinfeld and Bochner’s masterly Comprehensive Yiddish-English Dictionary (CYED).
When searching YCD, and for that matter when keying in Yiddish anywhere, it is recommended that one gets used to using the universal Unicode “Hebrew alphabet” that is (a) free and (b) appears correctly through time and space, and (c) preserves the classic keyboard layout. You simply add Yiddish diacritics via right-alt + desired diacritic. On grounds of both universality of correct output and non-monetization, this is generally superior to the various “Yiddish keyboards” which are in any case often subtly (or not so subtly) designed to limit use to just one subsystem. It is useful to perceive Yiddish orthography as a truly international system with its more-diacriticized and less-diacriticized subsystems being equally correct (just like Hebrew).
The usage label לומדיש (‘learned’), denotes usage in more formal, educated, academic, intellectual, and analytic styles and voices. That these entries hail almost entirely from Hebrew and Aramaic sources does not by any means limit their use to religious contexts. That results from the historic origins of much of the educated speaker’s vocabulary in the civilization concerned. It does mean that many of them sound out of place in an intimate cafe setting.
The usage label חסידיש (‘Hasidic’) denotes occurrence in contemporary Hasidic Yiddish; it does not necessarily indicate anything about origin, or exclusivity. The subcategory חסידיש, אויך (Hasidic, also…) generally attaches to items deriving from 19th and 20th century secular Yiddish which came to be excluded by that sector’s stylists, academics, educators, and many authors (while fulsomely retained in the press), but continued to thrive unimpeded in Hasidic Yiddish, undergoing further modification and nuancing determined by extant sets of (near) synonyms.
The unstressed, reduced vowel marked [ə] (shewa) in YCD has variant realizations. Please note that in most positions it approximates unstressed IPA [ɪ] (“i as in: install”). Before [r] it is closer to reduced [ε]. It can approach [a] in the ending עך, particularly diminutive plurals (e.g. tíshləkh/tíshlakh ‘little tables’) and via Yiddish vowel harmony in the preceding syllable of 2nd diminutive plurals (e.g. tíshələkh/tíshalakh ‘tiny tables’, ‘coffee tables’ etc); also before final [kh] more generally (e.g. péysəkh/péysakh ‘Passover’).
In the author’s view, spoken Yiddish has long been shifting from a three to a two to a (largely) one gender (/ungendered) system. Moreover, classic Yiddish literature itself exhibits much variation. In YCD, variation is embraced. Note that wherever the neutral gender article דאָס is given first, it is the standard classic form, with further variants reflecting (a) the Northern two gender system and/or (b) the current further shifting underway toward two and one.
For the author’s recommendations on Standard Yiddish usage, please note the first cited variant (in definite articles, forms of words and the pronunciations provided).
Squigly (curly) brackets { } mark author’s opinions and comments.
Frequent abbreviations and markers:¨
ל″ר: לשון רבים (plural); ל″י: לשון יחיד (singular); ל″נ: לשון נקבה (feminine); ל″ז: לשון זכר (masculine); ל″ע: לשון עבר (past tense);
דרומדיק: Southern dialects (“Polish-Hungarian”)
צפונדיק: Northern dialects (“Lithuanian-Belarusian”)
ד″מ: דרום⸗מזרח Southeastern dialects (“Ukrainian-Bessarabian-Romanian”)
YCD’s spelling generally follows the 1992 Oxford Code of Yiddish Spelling, digital here), developed during the launch of a 1990s publishing project), based on the norms of most great Yiddish writers and representing a midpoint between the more radical systems (Soviet and Yivo) and the more conservative Hasidic publications. YCD hopes to make at least a modest contribution toward the Reunification of Yiddish. As noted in point 4, remaining differences are often systematic, reflecting the old Hebraic dualism of full spelling with minimum diacritics vs. deleting letters in favor of more diacritical marks. These and other variations (and the impassioned devotees of each) are part and parcel of the vibrant dynamic of twenty-first century Yiddish, and do not cause the modern (tolerant) reader any difficulty. The author’s own views are put forward in writings over the years on Yiddish stylistics.
Please send in corrections as well as missing words you would like to see in YCD (at: info@yiddishculturaldictionary.org). Note that some irksome issues of duplication and inconsistency will be addressed at a much later stage, hopefully with the cumulative benefit of continuing user input.