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"Archeology supports this part of Weinreich’s argument." Really? How? [proof by handwaving] "One misguided explanation" - misguided how? Guess what, the current

"Archeology supports this part of Weinreich’s argument." Really? How? [proof by handwaving] "One misguided explanation" - misguided how? Guess what, the current Prague Jewish Quarter looks all pretty, but it is practically brand-new (1900+); what was there was the poorest part of town, a slum, if you will ("ghetto" is, ironically, too ambiguous in this context). This was razed to the ground with the exception of about 10 historical buildings; no wonder it's a "central and prime location" - now. In all - interesting, provocative, but not persuasive (wonder why you didn't choose to quote this sentence as well, hmmm: "Yet the historical, demographic, and geographical evidence does not support this entirely logical and neat story line—a fact to which Weinreich himself gives evidence in his notes.") Oh, and btw: since you chose to mention Prague, the historical Josefov was one of two ghettos. Still typical? In other words, my remark on "alternate reality" seems to have been spot-on.

thaumasiotes 10y ago
> (wonder why you didn't choose to quote this sentence as well, hmmm: "Yet the historical, demographic, and geographical evidence does not support this entirely logical and neat story line—a fact to which Weinreich himself gives evidence in his notes.") Because that sentence is from a separate part of the article and refers to an entirely different point. I'll outline the structure for you: > Weinreich’s first innovation in the History was to argue, against apparent common sense and abundant personal experience, that Yiddish was formed not through isolation but through constant interaction combined with a chosen separateness. > Archeology supports this part of Weinreich’s argument. > Weinreich’s second argument is equally counterintuitive. Though in some places Yiddish and German were mutually understandable, he assiduously argued that they are different languages. But Weinreich deployed his formidable linguistic artillery to argue, contrariwise, that despite significant variations in spoken and written Yiddish across the expanse of Europe (western Yiddish, more purely German; eastern Yiddish, heavily Slavic; southern Yiddish, with influence from Hungary and the Balkans), Yiddish forms one language and shares one cultural sphere and worldview, quite distinct from the surrounding culture. In short, Yiddish and German are different, but all Yiddish is one. > Once he demonstrated that Yiddish is an independent language, Weinreich explained how it came to be, first as an altered language formed among medieval Jewish trading settlements in the French–German borderland along the Rhine valley. Weinreich deduced from traces left in early Yiddish that these first Jewish immigrants to the heart of Europe spoke a Romance language, having left Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek behind when they left the eastern Mediterranean, although Hebrew and Aramaic were still languages of study. But early on (in the 10th or 11th century) these Jews from Rhineland France, presumably through contact with Jewish settlements in southern Germany, converted from old Judeo-French to western Yiddish, which was more purely German with some elements of Latin or early French. In subsequent centuries—when, exactly, is a source of considerable debate—this language moved east with Jewish emigrants, settlers, and refugees, either in the 12th century (after the Crusades and persecutions) or in the 14th or 15th. There it picked up a significant cargo of Slavic vocabulary and expressions and became the Yiddish more familiar today: eastern Yiddish. > Yet the historical, demographic, and geographical evidence does not support this entirely logical and neat story line—a fact to which Weinreich himself gives evidence in his notes. Yiddish blossomed in printed books from the 16th century onward, but Weinreich argues that Yiddish began in the 10th century in the Rhineland—though there are little more than a dozen extant texts in Yiddish from before 1400. Many of these early traces of Yiddish are only a few lines long and, aside from the marginal glosses of the Talmudic scholar Rashi (c. 1100) from the Champagne region, the early texts do not congregate in the “right” geographic area. The claim that the historical evidence does not support the idea that Yiddish originated in tenth-century France is quite different from the claim that the historical evidence does not support the idea that segregation was a privilege given to eleventh-century Jews at their own request. You want the sentence you quoted to mean the latter of those, but an honest reader would have to admit that it means the former.
- Piskvorrr 10y ago
  Aha, I thought that referred to both; thanks for the clarification. I have reread the article, I see that I have misunderstood that claim and I apologize. I'm definitely not trying to read the article in bad faith; this just seems an overreaction (which is not even supported by the original author IMNSHO): "common wisdom says Jews were fenced in 100% from outside; invert and claim they were fencing themselves in". I do not presume to understand liguistics sufficiently to discuss the second claim beyond "sounds interesting, logical even." (Still curious about the archeological sources supporting the first.) I don't dispute that living in a separated community has its advantages, I don't claim that ghettoes were prisons; in fact, distancing themselves from other, um, "tribes" is even supported by the Law. I'm just deeply incredulous at the claim "we don't want to live outside at all, make it a law of the land:" there are plenty of exceptions in the town statutes saying "want a house outside of the ghetto? Pay up!"; that doesn't quite look as inside influence. Phrased as "chosen separatenes", this is still a far cry from "separate Jewish areas due to Jewish demand, not gentile demand" - to the first part I could mostly agree, to the second, not at all (and there's plenty of textual sources spanning the entire medieval and early modern period for that). I would agree that in a situation of "live in a ghetto or not here at all" (a threat which manifested itself pretty often), the mutual support in a separated community would be welcome.
  - thaumasiotes 10y ago
    I wouldn't dream of claiming that gentiles didn't like it that the Jews lived separately, or would have preferred integration. I phrase it as "due to Jewish demand, not gentile demand" because as I read things the gentiles weren't in a position to be making demands, but the Jews were. (Look at that comment from Rüdiger.) Had it been important to the Jews to live mixed in among the gentiles, they could have forced the issue. In this view, legislation saying that the Jews must live in the Jewish quarter is basically analogous to legislation prohibiting incest -- it's not passed because people would be violating it otherwise, but because people feel that it reflects the proper order of the world, and it passes easily because there is no group that feels threatened by its passage. Maybe they should have felt threatened, since the situation often persisted long after the point where it was a net benefit to the Jews, but it's hard to blame the communities of 1040 for not anticipating the problems of 1940.

thaumasiotes 10y ago

> (wonder why you didn't choose to quote this sentence as well, hmmm: "Yet the historical, demographic, and geographical evidence does not support this entirely logical and neat story line—a fact to which Weinreich himself gives evidence in his notes.") Because that sentence is from a separate part of the article and refers to an entirely different point. I'll outline the structure for you: > Weinreich’s first innovation in the History was to argue, against apparent common sense and abundant personal experience, that Yiddish was formed not through isolation but through constant interaction combined with a chosen separateness. > Archeology supports this part of Weinreich’s argument. > Weinreich’s second argument is equally counterintuitive. Though in some places Yiddish and German were mutually understandable, he assiduously argued that they are different languages. But Weinreich deployed his formidable linguistic artillery to argue, contrariwise, that despite significant variations in spoken and written Yiddish across the expanse of Europe (western Yiddish, more purely German; eastern Yiddish, heavily Slavic; southern Yiddish, with influence from Hungary and the Balkans), Yiddish forms one language and shares one cultural sphere and worldview, quite distinct from the surrounding culture. In short, Yiddish and German are different, but all Yiddish is one. > Once he demonstrated that Yiddish is an independent language, Weinreich explained how it came to be, first as an altered language formed among medieval Jewish trading settlements in the French–German borderland along the Rhine valley. Weinreich deduced from traces left in early Yiddish that these first Jewish immigrants to the heart of Europe spoke a Romance language, having left Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek behind when they left the eastern Mediterranean, although Hebrew and Aramaic were still languages of study. But early on (in the 10th or 11th century) these Jews from Rhineland France, presumably through contact with Jewish settlements in southern Germany, converted from old Judeo-French to western Yiddish, which was more purely German with some elements of Latin or early French. In subsequent centuries—when, exactly, is a source of considerable debate—this language moved east with Jewish emigrants, settlers, and refugees, either in the 12th century (after the Crusades and persecutions) or in the 14th or 15th. There it picked up a significant cargo of Slavic vocabulary and expressions and became the Yiddish more familiar today: eastern Yiddish. > Yet the historical, demographic, and geographical evidence does not support this entirely logical and neat story line—a fact to which Weinreich himself gives evidence in his notes. Yiddish blossomed in printed books from the 16th century onward, but Weinreich argues that Yiddish began in the 10th century in the Rhineland—though there are little more than a dozen extant texts in Yiddish from before 1400. Many of these early traces of Yiddish are only a few lines long and, aside from the marginal glosses of the Talmudic scholar Rashi (c. 1100) from the Champagne region, the early texts do not congregate in the “right” geographic area. The claim that the historical evidence does not support the idea that Yiddish originated in tenth-century France is quite different from the claim that the historical evidence does not support the idea that segregation was a privilege given to eleventh-century Jews at their own request. You want the sentence you quoted to mean the latter of those, but an honest reader would have to admit that it means the former.

Piskvorrr 10y ago
Aha, I thought that referred to both; thanks for the clarification. I have reread the article, I see that I have misunderstood that claim and I apologize. I'm definitely not trying to read the article in bad faith; this just seems an overreaction (which is not even supported by the original author IMNSHO): "common wisdom says Jews were fenced in 100% from outside; invert and claim they were fencing themselves in". I do not presume to understand liguistics sufficiently to discuss the second claim beyond "sounds interesting, logical even." (Still curious about the archeological sources supporting the first.) I don't dispute that living in a separated community has its advantages, I don't claim that ghettoes were prisons; in fact, distancing themselves from other, um, "tribes" is even supported by the Law. I'm just deeply incredulous at the claim "we don't want to live outside at all, make it a law of the land:" there are plenty of exceptions in the town statutes saying "want a house outside of the ghetto? Pay up!"; that doesn't quite look as inside influence. Phrased as "chosen separatenes", this is still a far cry from "separate Jewish areas due to Jewish demand, not gentile demand" - to the first part I could mostly agree, to the second, not at all (and there's plenty of textual sources spanning the entire medieval and early modern period for that). I would agree that in a situation of "live in a ghetto or not here at all" (a threat which manifested itself pretty often), the mutual support in a separated community would be welcome.
- thaumasiotes 10y ago
  I wouldn't dream of claiming that gentiles didn't like it that the Jews lived separately, or would have preferred integration. I phrase it as "due to Jewish demand, not gentile demand" because as I read things the gentiles weren't in a position to be making demands, but the Jews were. (Look at that comment from Rüdiger.) Had it been important to the Jews to live mixed in among the gentiles, they could have forced the issue. In this view, legislation saying that the Jews must live in the Jewish quarter is basically analogous to legislation prohibiting incest -- it's not passed because people would be violating it otherwise, but because people feel that it reflects the proper order of the world, and it passes easily because there is no group that feels threatened by its passage. Maybe they should have felt threatened, since the situation often persisted long after the point where it was a net benefit to the Jews, but it's hard to blame the communities of 1040 for not anticipating the problems of 1940.