(American) English of Yiddish origin

1800S, 1900S, EXPRESSION, GERMAN, YIDDISH

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With the economic boom of the late-1800s came a marked increase in immigrants coming to America, the majority of whom came from Europe. Among them, a great many from Germany.

The term German-American appeared in 1824, while German-Lutheran appeared in 1799. The waves of German immigrants resulted in many German words entering the English language in the late-1800s. Although the evidence is not clear, it is believed that hoodlum (1871) comes from a Bavarian dialectal word, hodalump or huddellump, which has the same meaning as in English. The slang word came into being in San Francisco or so and soon applied locally to young street criminals.The first printed example was in the Cincinnati Commercial, which described “the bullying of the San Francisco ‘hoodlums'”. The popularity of hoodlum spread across the US – reaching Boston by 1877 – along with several tall tales about its origins.

Another American German loan word is scram (1870), ‘to make a quick exit’, is believed to have transferred from schrammen, also of the same meaning. It could, however, also come from scramble, which of course means ‘gather things quickly’. This particular word received strong reactions in the United Kingdom when it turned up in the talkies of the 1930s.

One American word of definite German origin is spiel. Coming from German speilen, ‘game’ or as a verb ‘to play’ and instrument, it was first slang for ‘gamble’ (1859) and a few decades later gained the meaning to ‘play music’ (1870). This would later become American slang for to ‘talk insincerely’ (1870), which ultimately led to spiel becoming a noun by the late 1890s and meaning ‘deceptive or persuasive talk’ (1894) that we know today.

But it is worth remembering that many Yiddish words are at the same time originally German. One example is Yiddish spiel, the general German term for ‘game’, which is attested in American English in 1896. This came via the Yiddish form of the word.

Yiddish words come to America

One subset of the Germans arriving in America were the German-Jewish immigrants, particularly those who settled in New York in the late 1800s. This would see the introduction of the word Yiddish (1875), for the form of German spoken by Jews in Germany, Central and Eastern Europe that combined Hebrew and Slavic languages but was written with Hebrew characters.

In Germany they were so-called jüdisch deutsch, meaning ‘Jewish-Germans’. This German form was Anglicised to simply jüdisch or yidish , resulting in the Yiddish we know today.The term German Jew dates from 1865.

The German-Jewish immigrants eventually succeeded in spreading across America and becoming a new source of loanwords. Their language became one of the most influential in the New York area during the 1870s and onwards, even though the word Yiddish itself didn’t exist until 1875. The year 1875 was, for instance, also the start of immigration from Norway and Sweden, a wave that would last for a good three decades and see more than 1 million Scandinavians leave for America, which was equivalent to 20% of the nations’ combined populations.

Although eventually having more influence on the language in America than even the Irish, the influence of Yiddish words on English was slow to begin with. What is surprising is that the influence of Yiddish words in America actually preceded large-scale flows of migrants to places such as New York. German immigrants introduced several Yiddish terms in the US early on.

Just two words came from it into English in the 1870s and only six took hold in the 1880s. Included in these are kosher as an adjective (1889), even though it had existed in English generally since the 1850s. In the closing decade of the 1800s, no fewer than 39 words of Yiddish origin are attested. This period includes chutzpah (1892) and the word schmooze (1897).

Yiddish would grow to become one of the principal languages of New York by the end of the century. A fuller list of Yiddish words from the 1890s includes:

schmuck (1892)
chutzpah (1892)
shiksa, schikse (1892)
kosher ‘genuine’ (1896)
spiel (1896)
golem (1897)
schmooze (1897)

The majority of American English words from Yiddish that we know today entered the language in the 1900s. The majority of American English words from Yiddish that we know today entered the language in the 1900s, particularly from the 1930s onwards. Early 20th-century examples of Yiddish load words are nosh (1917) and schlep (1922), which is attested in James Joyce’s book ‘Ulysses’.

Putz (1902)
Pogrom (1905)
Schlock (1915)
Nosh (1917)
Schlep, shlep (1922)

It was not until the mid-1920s that the word yiddishism (1926) was attested. This word was associated with areas where Yiddish was an influence on language and culture, including many sayings.

One word from this era that often goes overlooked is the word gazump (1928), from Yiddish gesumph, for ‘overcharge’. Today it is most used in the house-buying process, usually when a prospective buyer is suddenly outbid by another buyer in a cheating fashion.

With the rise of Hitler, the Nazis not only targeted Jewish people but also were quick to set about cleansing even the German language of the many, many words of Yiddish origin. As more and more German Jews arrived in the US, the influence of these Yiddishisms on US English increased further. Many Yiddish words in English from this period were connected with the commercial – and even underworld – slang. These include:

schnozzle (1930)
futz (1932)
Bagel (1932)
schlepper (1934)
schmaltz (1935)
Schmaltzy (1935)
Bris (1938)
pastrami (1940)
Schnozz (1942)

One thing to point out here is the propensity for sch-/sh- words. To this day this category of words in English still feature varied orthography. Some people prefer sch- spellings and others sh-forms.

It was in the following decade that the word Yinglish (1951), akin to other words such as Spanglish, Hinglish, Chinglish, etc. Also from the 1950s are:

pirog (1854)
shtoom (1958) * schtum < German stumm

As you can see, some spell it sch- and some sh-, while even the English spelling of  -oom/-um(m) varies from writer to writer. Each dictionary seems to vary.

Influence of Yiddish sayings

The Yiddish influence on (American) English also extends to many sayings and expressions, often literal translation. The saying hole in the head (1951), such as “needing it like a …” comes from Yiddish ich darf es vi a loch in kop. The expression basically deems something as useless or thoroughly unwanted.

Other Yiddish loan expressions include:

I should live so long
If you’ll excuse the expression
Get lost

Not all Yiddish words, however, came from Germany. Others came from Polish and Russian, too. Take, for example, the word beatnik, which is frequently credited as a Yiddish contribution to English. This is true, but its ultimate source is Russian – specifically the -nik part. This suffix in Russian denotes a person or personification of the preceding noun.

An early example of this in English dates from 1945, in the form of stuck-upnik. It was Russian Jews in America who via Yiddish introduced it and other derogatory words such as kibbutznik(1949), sputnik (1957). This latter word then influenced many similarly pejorative or humourous words, including beatnik(1958), flopnik (1959), draftnik (1965), computernik (1966), refusenik (1975), peacenik (1965), stay-putnik (1968) and no-goodnik.

Further Yiddish words appeared in English during the 1960s and 1970s, many of them to do with showbiz and the entertainment sphere. These include:

Shtik (1961)
Glitch (1962)
Tush, tuche (1962) < tochus (1914) Yiddish tokhes
Maven (1965)
Klutz (1965)
Glitzy (1966)
Schlong (1969)

There are a few Yiddish words that may come as a surprise. One is:

hacker (1976)

This word related to a similar Yiddish word referring to doing a “bad, hatchet” job of something by taking shortcuts.

Another one is slapper (1988), which is a particularly British word for a promiscuous or “loose” woman. The term actually comes from Yiddish schlepper, meaning ‘unkempt, scruffy; gossipy, dowdy woman’, according to the Oxford English Dictionary.

And there we have it, a nice exploration of (American) English words of Yiddish origin. Mazel tov! (actually a Jewish and not Yiddish expression).

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