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since Wed, 26 Dec 2007 20:04:17.
Worth knowing because Zionist kvetch level is rising
by Joachim Martillo (ThorsProvoni@aol.com)
In Yiddish kvetshn means crush, press, or squeeze like the German word quetschen. In Yiddishized English (Yinglish) kvetch means complain, complaint, or complainer.
The English word kvetch is probably unrelated to the German word quetschen. Here is a thought.
Polish has the following two words.
- Kwęczeć (the first e, e-cedilla, is nazalized; last c is a soft ch-sound) means grumble, groan, complain, bitch (sl), be ailing.
- Kwękała (the first e is e-cedilla pronounced with nasalization; the crossed l is pronounced like l in the English word ball, an old-fashioned stage pronunciation, or like English w) means grumbler, complainer, hypochondriac.
Kwęczeć and kwękała seem to correspond more closely to the Yinglish meanings of kvetch than the Yiddish dictionary meaning of kvetshn.
E-cedilla is nasalized in Standard Polish, but the (semi-etymological) orthography of Polish is a concession to the loss of nasalization in some dialects and in other Slavic languages or to the development of nasalization, where it did not exist historically.
A pronunciation of kwęczeć without nasalizing the first e is quite probable in some places or in the past. In any case because Yiddish does not have nasalization, loss of nasalization in a borrowing from Polish or a related Slavic language is quite probable.
The Yinglish meaning of kvetshn is hardly likely to have passed back to Polish in Poland. Possibly the Yinglish meaning of kvetch was generated in a place like Chicago or NY where Polish and Yiddish speakers were in close proximately and both groups were learning English,§ but it probably existed dialectically in Eastern Europe among Yiddish speakers (either as a borrowing from some Slavic language or dialect other than Polish or perhaps as an inheritance from Judeoslavic) and just never made it into the dictionaries as an acceptable usage.
E-cedilla is nasalized in Standard Polish, but the (semi-etymological) orthography of Polish is a concession to the loss of nasalization in some dialects and in other Slavic languages or to the development of nasalization, where it did not exist historically.
A pronunciation of kwęczeć without nasalizing the first e is quite probable in some places or in the past. In any case because Yiddish does not have nasalization, loss of nasalization in a borrowing from Polish or a related Slavic language is quite probable.
The Yinglish meaning of kvetshn is hardly likely to have passed back to Polish in Poland. Possibly the Yinglish meaning of kvetch was generated in a place like Chicago or NY where Polish and Yiddish speakers were in close proximately and both groups were learning English,§ but it probably existed dialectically in Eastern Europe among Yiddish speakers (either as a borrowing from some Slavic language or dialect other than Polish or perhaps as an inheritance from Judeoslavic) and just never made it into the dictionaries as an acceptable usage.
Note
§The English language slang use of nuts for no or nothing doing may be a similar example – it was common among American Jews where I grew up, but it probably comes from Polish nic z tego, nothing doing.
§The English language slang use of nuts for no or nothing doing may be a similar example – it was common among American Jews where I grew up, but it probably comes from Polish nic z tego, nothing doing.
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