In the decades before the Holocaust, national identity and Yiddish spelling were deeply intertwined. When I read Yiddish literature printed before World War II, I can often guess the writers’ political milieu through their spelling alone. In 19th-century Europe, religious writers spelled Yiddish words by imitating Hebrew, using vowel markings where none were necessary so their new writing would resemble ancient Hebrew texts. Meanwhile, Jews who wanted to assimilate into European life wrote in a Yiddish spelling that openly imitated German. This brand of spelling — it used Hebrew letters to represent even silent German characters in shared cognates — subtly announced, as leaders of the German Jewish Reform movement once proclaimed, that “Berlin is our Jerusalem.”

Spelling in the early Soviet Union was even more perverse. There, government control over Yiddish schools and presses led to the invention and enforcement of a literally anti-Semitic Yiddish orthography by spelling the language’s many Semitic-origin words phonetically instead of in Hebrew. (Imagine spelling “naïve” as “nigh-eve” in order to look less French.) It was an attempt to erase Jewish culture’s biblical roots, letter by letter. —

Dara Horn, “Jewish Identity, Spelled in Yiddish“ (The New York Times)

(via lazersilberstein)

The part about the Soviet spellings is interesting because I am wondering if it was part of or related to their big old socialist literacy project. They rationalized Russian too. Cyrillic went from being wayyyyy complicated orthography to being almost completely phonetic

So while it was obviously a colonizing, anti-Semitic thing, I don’t know whether it was an open “Crush out Jewish culture! Soviet Communism is the new anti-Semitism!” thing?

Or a “Rationalize your language so people can learn to read and write faster. *cough*alsowehateyoupleasedie*cough*” thing?

I took a LOT of Russian history, but SURPRISE! it was mostly about Russian Orthodox people’s history. We spent more time on the Raskolniki than on the Jewish communities of Russia. But anti-Semitism isn’t real, nope, of course not. Also, tooth fairy.

 

Also, Marx was super-anti-Semitic. I mean, I WANT to read Das Kapital just to be educated, but it’s sickening.

(via beautytruthandstrangeness)

This might answer some of those questions. Highly recommend Anna Shternshis, highly recommend her book Soviet and Kosher: Jewish Popular Culture in the Soviet Union, 1923-1939, and highly recommend the excerpts tumbled here.

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(via andimprouvaire)

boobsbirdsbotany:

figurants:

Altering your vocabulary to exclude harmful terms makes the world a more enjoyable and safe place for you and the people around you and also it is not very hard trust me I did it and I don’t do much.

!!!

(via dendroica)

Pyrrhic Comedy: michaonthemoon: yaoibutts: I love how potato in French is pomme de...

crazyhamlet:

handsomesharks:

michaonthemoon:

yaoibutts:

I love how potato in French is pomme de terre, which pretty much means “earth apple.”

like what stupid frenchman saw this:

image

and said “zis petite légume looks like a, how you say, APPLE! hmmm… but it grows in ze earth… HON HON HON! MAIS OUI! C’EST UNE POMME DE TERRE!”

j’adore comment ananas se dit pineapple en anglais, ce qui veut littéralement dire “pomme de pin”, genre quel type anglais a vu ça:
image

et s’est dit : “ow cette étrange big fruit ressemble à une, how do you say, POMME! hmmm… mais plutôt une pomme qui pousse dans les pins… HU HU HU! OH YES, IT’S A PINEAPPLE!”

(z’avez vu, on peut le faire aussi… hon hon hon!)

(via joouheika)

You don’t even know how perfect this is.

(via alasmypetticoats)

callmekitto:

callingoutbigotry:

alphabonesoup:

Here it is! I’m not 100% sure if I like how it came out… it almost seems a bit too cutesy for the subject. Maybe I just like drawing cute clothes and bright colours too much! 

This is for a contest with the Canadian Human Rights Agencies for their conference in May. All the Advanced Illustration students and Design students had to enter as part of their final. Kinda pissed that they required us to print it off at 24 x 36…. which I think is way too big and expensive ($50!!) for most students and their budget. We don’t even get to keep the posters. And the top prize is only $200. I feel kinda ripped off. :/

EDIT: A couple of people have sent me notes saying that “Transgendered” is incorrect terminology. I apologize, I kind of added the text last minute, and should have known better. I’ve uploaded a fixed version. :)

This poster is a good reminder that pronouns aren’t “preferred”. They’re NECESSARY. 

If it’s okay, I’d like to put in my two cents re: the color scheme being “too cutesy—” I… kinda like that. For one, she’s a femme woman and the color scheme reflects that. She’s not muted or neutralized even when the wrong words surround her. I like that she’s strong and cute and bright and herself. Even when it’s hard.

(via albinwonderland)

I kind of want to start using ‘merestial’ as the oceanic equivalent for ‘terrestrial’ and ‘celestial’. Undecided on ‘-trial’ or ‘-tial’.

waltdisneyconfessions:

“I love listening to Disney songs in other languages. Especially in their respective languages. E.g. Mulan in Chinese”.

Solresol

As I am creating music languages for my novel, my research has lead me to this little gem. Solresol (Do, Re, Mi, Fa, Sol, La, Si), an immensely confusing but nonetheless interesting little conlang. You can read through the sources on the Wikipedia page for more information, but as you might have guessed, the entire language is composed of Do, Re, Mi, Fa, Sol, La, and Si. Apparently there was a Hungarian fantasy book in the 1910s that used a similar language. The things you learn when you spend too much time on Wikipedia.

Tumblr! Writing a fantasy story set in a quasi-Russian setting. My big roadblock right now is the Russian language, so if you know any Russian bands (female vocalists are always loved, as is any sort of metal) or handy, quick guides to Russian pronunciation, please send me a link!

Oh, and if you rec some music, I’d prefer if they had a few songs at least in Russian. Doesn’t help me much if they sing in English. And yes, I do know t.A.T.u., who doesn’t?

I don’t understand why we make foreign words harder on ourselves by using the oddest symbols and letters for their Roman Alphabet transliteration.

Specifically to the people who chose which letters should represent the sounds for the Squamish Nation, why on Earth did you think Sḵwx̱wú7mesh was sensible? I could forgive the underlines in place of more standard accents, I’m fine with that. The ‘x’ seems needlessly confusing, but this wouldn’t be the first transliteration to do it. But why, why of all the symbols we have available to us, did you think the best thing to represent a stop was a 7?