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Ethnologue > Web version > Country index > Asia > Israel > Yiddish, Eastern

Yiddish, Eastern

A language of Israel

ISO 639-3: ydd

Population 215,000 in Israel (1986). Population total all countries: 3,142,560.
Region Southeastern dialect in Ukraine and Romania, Mideastern dialect in Poland and Hungary, Northeastern dialect in Lithuania and Belarus. Also spoken in Argentina, Australia, Belarus, Belgium, Canada, Costa Rica, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Panama, Poland, Puerto Rico, Romania, Russia (Europe), South Africa, Ukraine, Uruguay, USA.
Alternate names   Judeo-German, Yiddish
Dialects Southeastern Yiddish, Mideastern Yiddish, Northeastern Yiddish. Has many loans from Hebrew and local languages where spoken. Eastern Yiddish originated east of the Oder River through Poland, extending into Belarus, Russia (to Smolensk), Lithuania, Latvia, Hungary, Rumania, Ukraine, and pre-state British-Mandate Palestine (Jerusalem and Safed). Western Yiddish originated in Germany, Holland, Switzerland, Alsace (France), Czechoslovakia, western Hungary, and is nearing extinction. It branched off medieval High German (mainly Rhenish dialects) and received Modern German influences during the 19th and early 20th centuries. Eastern and Western Yiddish have difficult inherent intelligibility because of differing histories and influences from other languages. There are some Western Yiddish speakers in Israel (M. Herzog 1977).
Classification Indo-European, Germanic, West, High German, Yiddish
Language use The vast majority speak Eastern Yiddish.
Language development Hebrew script. Magazines. Radio programs. Bible: 1821–1936.
Comments SVO. Jewish.

Also spoken in:

Latvia

Language name   Yiddish, Eastern
Population 40,000 in Latvia (1991).
Alternate names   Judeo-German
Language use There may be no Yiddish speakers in Latvia now (1995). Of the 1,811,000 Jewish people listed in the 1979 USSR census, the majority spoke Russian as their first language and virtually all others spoke Russian as their second language. About 50,000 Jews spoke Georgian, Tat, or Tajiki as their first language.
Comments Had literary status, but very little literature. Jewish.
 

Entries from the SIL Bibliography about this language:

Academic Publications

Cahill, Michael. 2005. Review of: Spoken here: travels among threatened languages, by Mark Abley.