Re: Sephardic accent

[Ari Davidow <ari...>]

I think the accent has been documented for several decades--it isn't Ashkenazic 
vs. Sephardic (as I've seen it written about) but Ashkenazic vs. Modern Israeli 
(which is sort of a muddle between older Sephardic and Ashkenazic, but more 
Sephardic than not, and usually described as Sephardic). Benjamin Harshav had 
great fun dissecting the modern Hebrew accent in "Language in Time of 
Revolution" (a stunning account of the revival of Hebrew and its place in 
Jewish culture in the last century, including the culture wars with Yiddish and 
European languages as languages of critical Jewish expression). He also 
mentions the contrast with European, Ashkenazic Hebrew pronunciation as 
modernists saw it:

"... Hebrew as opposed to Diaspora Yiddish; the Sephardi accent" as a "pioneer" 
and "masculine" language as opposed to the "moaning" and religious Ashkenazi 
Hebrew;..."

The accent has also been mentioned in some of the recent books on changes in 
the American Jewish community and the return of Hebrew prayer to the Reform 
movement. Jack Wertheimer, in "A People Divided" (1993), on p. 104:

"The renewed interest in traditionalism manifests itself in a vareity of ways 
within Reform temples, which over the past two to three decades have introduced 
the following: an increased number of readings in Hebrew (which are now spoken 
with an Israeli, Sephardic pronunciation)...."

Anyway, there's a lot there, but the short answer is that it appears that the 
change is based on Israeli Hebrew, not directly on Sephardic pronunciation 
(except insofar as Sephardic pronunciation reflected a change from "Yiddish and 
the ghetto mentality" to the halutzim, or, more likely, represented to local 
accent and the "cool," just as lots of us white kids learned to talk black 
during the Sixties and Seventies.

Needless to say, not everyone likes the change. A friend of mine in Oakland 
used to get quite offended at Israeli pronunciation of his old world Ashkenazic 
prayers. "It's a ='tal-is, not a tal-'it", he'd say.

ari

At 06:01 PM 4/11/2002 -0700, you wrote:
>The following was posted on the H-Judaica List.  As a Yiddishist whose 
>limited knowledge of Hebrew prayers comes with an Ashkenazic accent, I found 
>this interesting.  Any comments?
>
>Shira Lerner
>
>>From H-Judaica:
>There has been a recent trend in the Reform movement (and perhaps 
>others?) to edit liturgical music so as to be consonant with the stress 
>patterns of Sephardic Hebrew. For example, in the Barekhu, the tune and 
>word placement are slightly altered so that one sings ha-ve-vo-RAKH, 
>rather than ha-me-VO-rakh.
>Does anyone know of any published discussions of this trend? I 
>have not been able to find more than a few passing references.
>Jacob Adler 
>University of Arkansas
>
>

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