Preservation of the English Language

[phkrause]

There may be those among you who support including Spanish in our national language. I for one am 110% against this! We must preserve the exclusivity and above all, the purity of the English language.

To all the shlemiels, shlemazels, nebbishes, nudniks, klutzes, shlubs, shmoes, nogoodniks, and momzers that are out there pushing Spanish, I just want to say that I, for one, believe that English and only English deserves linguistic prominence in our American culture. To tell the truth, it makes me so farklempt, I'm fit to plotz. This whole Spanish schmeer gets me broyges, specially when I hear these erstwhile mavens and luftmenschen kvetching about needing to learn Spanish. What chutzpah!

These shmegeges can tout their shlock about the cultural and linguistic diversity of our country, but I, for one, am not buying their shtick. It's all so much dreck, as far as I'm concerned. I exhort you all to be menshen about this and stand up to their fardrayte arguments and meshugganah, farshtunkene assertions. It wouldn't be kosher to do anything else. Remember, when all is said and done, we have English and they've got bubkes!

pk

[Planey]

Well, God did promise Abraham that his seed would be like the stars, that his descendants would spread around the world...

[Amelia]

I use so many of those words every day

[phkrause]

Amelia do you know what some of those words mean.

pk

[rudywoofs (Pam)]

I know what most of those words mean. My grandmother was Jewish and German so we grew up knowing quite a bit of Yiddish. But to the common person the words can mean something entirely different in the vernacular language used every day without knowing the Yiddish meaning.

[Amelia]

meshugganah: correct spelling is meshuge = crazy or meshugener for crazy person

menshen: correct spelling is mensch = adult

chutzpah = gall etc

farklemt = emotional, teary, choked uo, depressed etc

schmeer: correct spelling is shmir = cream (often used when asking for cream cheese at the deli. But cream cheese is shmirkrez.

plotz: correct spelling is platsn = split, crack, explode or burst.

shlemiel = fool

shlimazl = unlucky

nebbish = loser, sad sack

kvetsh = a person who complains

maven = expert

luftmenschen (german yiddish) = air head

shtick = piece or routine

Shmegegi = idiot

broyges = angry

dreck = garbage

bubkes/bopkes (American Jewish) = extremely trivial or of litle value

kosher = dietary laws

[phkrause]

Thanks Amelia, I do know what they mean, being that all my fathers relatives were and are Jewish, I heard them all the time. And all the spellings that are there are from a jewish website from jewish comedians.

And me too rudywoofs. My father was born a Polish Jewish, and my Mom a german (not Jewish). So I too knew much Yiddish, which is a combination of Jewish and German. I wish I'd taken the time to really learn Yiddish from my Jewish relatives and German from my mom's family. My grandparents on my mom's side lived with us for about 10 years or so, and I spoke good german. Than my grandparents moved back to germany. And I stop speaking the langauge for few years. Than I got drafted and was sent to germany instead of vietnam and went and visited with my mom's relatives, my uncle's, aunts, cousins, and grandparents and relearned the langauge a little. Than came home and never spoke it again, and lost most of what I knew, but have retained a few things in Yiddish. Haven't really visited with any of my Jewish cousins or family in the past 20 years or so.

pk

[Stan]

ever notice that any new word an aussie says is just so cool?