Re: Yiddish on List

[BandGodess <BandGodess...>]

In a message dated 98-03-01 10:25:03 EST, you write:

<< B"H Munich
 
 Ladies and Gentlemen,
 
 Regarding the use (or non-use) of Yiddish by subscribers to this Jewish
 music list, 
 I think both points of view have their own merits. However, it seems to me
 that there 
 *is a major distinction, and that this distinction settles the issue
 decidedly -- for the 
 Yiddishist side, for lack of a better word.
 
 There's an expression in Judaism - "The bashful don't learn."
 
 This principle -  that one must invest one's own curiosity in any subject,
 to
 learn the vocabulary, to ask the necessary questions, to overcome shyness
 and 
 fear of ridicule - extends to music as well. If a potential student doesn't
 want
 to invest him/herself, then that's their choice - but to fault the teacher
 (or writer)
 is less than responsible, and to my thinking smacks of political
 correctness. 
 
 IMO, threatening to send transliterated Russian sounds to me more like a
 childish 
 act of revenge than a desire to REALLY learn the subject matter - in this
 case Yiddish
 as it relates to Jewish music. When we write about Hatikva, must we *always
 translate it?
 And freilach? Hora? Words are building blocks of ideas. If you don't have
 enough
 blocks, then get some more, but please don't take them away from your
 neighbor!
 
 Let the writer write as he or she likes! It's *our job as interested
 readers to understand *them.
 And, if  translations are necessary, then they can be *privately requested,
 either from this 
 membership list or some other place. Let's learn - and teach - together!
 
 If Yiddish - or transliterated Russian - is the language in which anyone
 feels comfortable
 expressing him or herself, gesunterhait!
 
 Alex Jacobowitz>>

You couldn't have stated it more perfectly.  

_______________
Meghan Oglesby
UTChattanooga Student
Music Theory/Composition and Clarinet Performance