Re: Derogatory terms

[Andy Rubin <andyrubin...>]

I always thought the term "yekke" referred to the (short) length of coats
used by German Jews (as opposed to the thigh or knee-length caftans used in
Eastern Europe). Now I'm finding this is completely incorrect?

-Andy Rubin

>In a message dated 2/26/98 1:15:38 pm, Wolf Krakowski wrote:
>
>:To the list:
>:The words "yekke" and "yekkishe" to denote "German" (n) and "German" (adj)
>are :derogatory.  Their equivalents would be "wop" or "dago" for "Italian",
>for   example.  If use :of the Yiddish is necessary or desirable,  the word
>"daytsh" would be appropriate.
>
>The origin of this word, I am told, is a Hebrew acronym: YKH (the letters yud-
>kuf-hey, which read as "yekke"), standing for "yehudi k'she havana" (=  dim-
>witted (lit. "hard-of-understanding") Jew).  The phrase per se has nothing to
>do with German Jews, yet they were branded as "yekkes" anyway.  In Israel,
>it's probably not as bad as "wop" or "dago," unless you call a German Jew a
>"yekke putz," which adds salt to the wound.  I'm sure that in the 50's,
>Israelis, upon hearing various calls of "yoo-hoo!" in the streets before
>dinnertime, knew that it was a German call and would remark to their friends,
>"ah, yekkes," without it always being derogatory.  Probably, it was an
>inevitability of a multicultural society, where each group distinguished
>itself from the other in different ways as a means of preserving their
>identity.  Unfortunately, the Germans got slapped with "yekke."
>
>Calling a German Jew a "yekke" is probably like referring to a brute as a
>"yoven" (a Greek) in Yiddish, as in the Yiddish phrase "Alle yevonim hobn eyn
>punim" = All brutes have the same face (lit. "All Greeks [i.e. brutes] have
>one face").
>
>-Barak