THE VARIATIONS OF ORTHOGRAPHICAL SYSTEMS IN THE PRESENT HASIDIC NEWSPAPERS*

Satoko Kamoshida

1. Background

1.1. YIVO and the Previous Studies

The Yiddish standard orthography of the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research (introduced in 1936)1 is not followed by all writers, and there are variations in the systems. For example in 1992, Dovid Katz introduced another .2 Aronson3 clarifi ed the writing system and showed some of the common spelling varia- tions in comparison with YIVO orthography4 whereas Schaechter discussed the history of the YIVO standard.5 These studies focus on YIVO orthography and do not investigate the varieties. These studies focus on YIVO orthography and do not thoroughly discuss the varieties which exist outside the major academic society. My paper looks in depth at the variations of spelling systems which are not based on YIVO orthography.

* Acknowledgement I am very grateful to Dr. Tsuguya Sasaki and Dr. Paul Glaser for their comments on this paper. I would also like to thank Ms. Zofi a Anna Stankiewicz and Mr. Tom Yuval for their very kind help on my English and comments on my research as well as Ms. Sylvia Jacobson and Mr. Alec Eliezer Burko for their advice on my research. 1 Hereafter called YIVO orthography. 2 Dovid Katz, Klal-takones fun yidishn oysleyg (Oxford: Oxford Yiddish Press, 1992). 3 Howard I. Aronson, “Yiddish,” in The World’s Writing Systems, eds. Peter T. Daniels and William Bright (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996), 735–742. 4 Aronson, “Yiddish”, 735–742. 5 Mordkhe Schaechter, The Standardized . Rules of Yiddish Spelling and The History of the Standardized Yiddish Spelling (New York: YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, 1999). © Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2009 EJJS 2.2 Also available online – brill.nl/ejjs DOI: 10.1163/187247109X454477 300 satoko kamoshida

1.2. Variations of in Different Times and Different Newspapers

The spelling systems vary depending on times and communities. In New York, fi ve Yiddish newspapers are published. , Di Tsaytung and are mainly for Hasidic people, whereas The is for Hasidic people and others, and Forverts is mainly for a non-Hasidic readership. Comparing a Forverts article on June 16, 2006 (Figure 1) and a Forverts article on January 1, 1960 (Figure 2), the spellings of Yiddish in 2006 ,אידיש are different. In 1960, for instance, yidish was written The Forverts is known as the newspaper which follows YIVO .יִידיש orthography but it did so only after the offi cial change of its ortho- graphical system (see fi gure 3).6

Figure 1: “Gesheenishn in bilder” in Forverts, (June 16, 2006; New York), 24.

Figure 2: “Yidisher shnayder in Pariz tseshlogen fun 8 polislayt” in Forverts (January 1, 1960; New York), 1.

6 Figure 3 is the announcement of the offi cial change to YIVO orthography in the Forverts from 1997; see Schaechter, The Standardized Yiddish Orthography, 109.