Interview with Marvin Zuckerman

eYiddish.org interviews Marvin Zuckerman, co-author with Marion Herbst of the book Learning Yiddish in Easy Stages, about "Learning and Teaching Yiddish in 2009".

eYiddish.org: We are assisting for some time to a renewal of interest for Yiddish culture and witness a large demand for learning Yiddish. How do you explain this?

Marvin Zuckerman: Somebody once said that the interest in Yiddish is in inverse proportion to the number of its speakers. In other words, the fewer people speaking Yiddish, the more people become interested in it. But, although this seems true, it is just a joke. I think there are several things that account for it:

(1) 2nd or 3rd generation Jews whose parents or grandparents spoke Yiddish but who themselves never really learned to speak it or read it, or perhaps only learned a few words or phrases or sayings--these Jews have a nostalgia, a feeling that they have missed something, are missing something. Something their parents or grandparents had is not in their possession, and they feel the loss or the lack of it; they want to know about it, or learn more about it--What was it, actually? What did this word or phrase or snatch of song really mean? What is actually the right way to say it? What is the name of that song? How does it go? This folk saying they vaguely remember or half remember, how did it go? What does it mean? They want it back. They feel something of their past, their childhood, something of their earlier generation has slipped away without their ever getting to know it or fully understand it. They want to have some of it back. That's one explanation, I think. You can see this by the sorts of questions that come to Mendele.

(2) There are also goyim who have become interested in learning Yiddish and about Yiddish and Yiddish culture, literature, etc. That is only natural. You don’t have to be French, for example, to decide you want to study French and French literature, culture, etc.

(3) There are young people who hear talk about Yiddish jokes, sayings, swearing, etc., and they become curious; they feel left out; they want to be in on the joke, the saying, the shelting.

(4) Yiddish has achieved a certain status in the world that it never had before. Very few people ask any more whether Yiddish is really a language or whether it has a grammar or a literature. College courses in Yiddish, a Nobel Prize winner in literature who wrote in Yiddish, textbooks teaching Yiddish, dictionaries in Yiddish, the National Yiddish Book Center, the YIVO, all these things, and more, have given Yiddish the status it never had say, 50 years ago. This draws young Jewish people who are looking for a subject to study that will be close to their hearts in a way that Yiddish could not in earlier times.

(5) Also, as some famous sociologist once put it (I cannot retrieve his name at the moment) in speaking about the immigrants to America: “What the son wants to forget [of the old, immigrant culture], the grandson wants to remember.” This is also an explanation.

eYiddish.org: According to a survey we run at eYiddish, we found out that approximately half of our students are looking for an academic/linguistic approach of learning, while the other are interested mainly in conversational Yiddish. In your book Learning Yiddish in Easy Stages, what is your focus?

Marvin Zuckerman: My book tries to appeal to both. It does so by providing folksongs, including a CD where the songs are sung and where the lessons are pronounced; by providing folk sayings; some basic cultural and historical and linguistic information (about Yiddish); and some conversational material. That part is for those who are just interested in the conversational part. The book also includes the alphabet, introduced slowly, so that a person could teach him/herself to read; introduces a basic vocabulary; teaches some basic grammar. That part is for those that want a more academic approach. The CD pronounces the letters, the words, the proverbs, and sings the songs.

eYiddish.org: In what differs your book from the other Yiddish learning books?

Marvin Zuckerman: It differs from Uriel Weinreich’s book, for example, by teaching the alphabet (Weinreich expects you to know that before you do Lessson 1)—in a sense, my book can be seen as preparatory to Weinreich’s book; it is more conversational; and it is less detailed in its approach to grammar, but provides essential information for speaking correctly.

eYiddish.org: What do you think about learning Yiddish over the internet with online teachers?

Marvin Zuckerman: I think it’s a great idea.

eYiddish.org: When starting learning Yiddish, how do you suggest to practice it?

Marvin Zuckerman: Try to find a native speaker or someone whose Yiddish is like a native speaker’s, and practice with them. Also, I think learning to read Yiddish is a great help, because reading Yiddish gives you a great deal of exposure to the language. Learning Yiddish folksongs is a great help; listen to recordings by native speakers (Isa Kremer; Lebedeff, etc.). Listen to tapes of native speakers reading Yiddish stories (IB Singer, etc.) Watch Yiddish movies; these are obtainable from Brandeis University. Practice the conversations in my Yiddish book with someone.

eYiddish.org: Many of the Yiddish specialists have reached the Golden Age. What do you think should be done to create a new generation of Yiddishists?

Marvin Zuckerman: Give stipends to students who want to study Yiddish; support departments in academic institutions where Yiddish is taught; support interns at the National Yiddish Book Center; create essay or creative writing prizes for young writers of Yiddish; have more Yiddish courses introduced at all levels of education, both in Jewish institutions and at general educational institutions.