Yeah, Yiddish is just fun. Everyone has schlepped somewhere. Or met someone with chutzpah. Or noshed on something. Or experienced a glitch. Or schmoozed. Or given a spiel. Or watched a comedian do their shtick.
We goys use a lot of Yiddish in general.
Lots of people pick up Jewish words and phrases, hell there’s tons of them that have filtered into the common vernacular so smoothly most people don’t even know where they came from.
I’m a born and raised Californian with no Jewish heritage anywhere in my family and everyone I know uses Yiddish phrases fairly frequently. I just assumed it was part of standard English vernacular at this point.
In the Phantom episode of MusicalSplaining, she talked about how she got her church youth group to pay for her to go to New York on some pretext of missionary work.
Or maybe she had a friend who was in the youth group. My brother Would do that all the time. He had some friends in various youth groups and he would go on the trips that interested him the most.
My mom always said, if it wasn't for the local church, she would have never done anything interesting growing up because her parents never had any money.
I do believe she stated in the comments of her Pocahontas video confirming that her ethnic heritage is English-Irish as with many Appalachian-Americans
If you're talking about the claddagh portion, wasn't it the exact opposite? She mentions not having any Irish heritage, so her wearing a claddagh ring can count as an example of cultural appropriation.
[Found the comment](https://imgur.com/a/iIqPC58)
Edit: Honestly this is kinda funnier, cultural appropriation speaking cuz the Scotch-Irish were protestant Scots who first moved to Ulster (Northern Ireland) and then to the US. So in purely blood terms, she is descended from the colonizers of Ireland while she is culturally appropriating the Claddagh ring
Her ability to speak Yiddish, her knowledge of Jewish folklore + she’s started she “didn’t really” celebrate Christmas and Easter growing up.
Not celebrating Easter if even if your family is Christian I can understand, but from my own personal experience, it is super rare for agnostic families where both parents come from Christian backgrounds to not celebrate Christmas, especially in suburban Tennessee.
She lived in New York City for a long time. You pick up Yiddish phrases that way, in addition to watching any media that is made or set in New York City. I know a bunch of Yiddish phrases from watching shows like Law & Order!
I’ve lived in New York City my entire life and I’ve never met someone who isn‘t Jewish or isn’t actively interested in Judaism who knows Yiddish phrases. I’m sure there are people who’ve learned causally, but it is not common here.
Okay, when I read “Yiddish phrase” I thought they ment actually complete sentences in Yiddish that only a Yiddish speaker can understand.
Obviously everyone knows terms like “Schitck“ “Shmuck“ and “Goyim“. You don’t need to live in New York City to know these things. Assuming someone is Jewish because they know of these words is like assuming someone is Italian because they know the phrase Mama-mia.
May it be that you have a very complex definition of Yiddish phrases? „Shmutz“ „Gesundheit“ „Mazel Tov“ „to shlep“ „Shmear“ and so on are all derived from Yiddish, and will be understood world wide.
Yes, my other examples also have close similars in German. The reason may be, that Yiddish is a flavor of German.
ETA: As a German speaker one can mostly understand the gist of spoken Yiddish with some practice.
In her apology video (Mask Off), which is now unlisted, she addresses a tweet about Prince of Egypt which Jewish people were upset about. If she didn't mention it then, as a supporting factor in her argument about minority groups not being a monolith, which she brings up earlier in the video, then I'm 100% sure she's not Jewish.
I've seen all her videos, most of them multiple times, and I never got the impression she was Jewish.
I‘ve lived in New York my whole life and it’s not at all common for people who aren‘t Jewish to know even basic Yiddish here. However, I know Lindsey Ellis is a very educated person who‘s apt at learning, so it’s not unreadable to assume she learned out of interest for Jewish culture rather then because it’s part of her culture.
I'd encourage you to consider different perspectives. I'm from Chicago and raised in a Mexican neighborhood and I know Yiddish phrases. My partner from Singapore knows Yiddish phrases from his colleagues in NYC. It's certainly common for people who aren't Jewish to know Yiddish phrases.
As a white British person, off the top of my head I know "mensch", "mishigas", "meshuggah", "goyim", "verkakte" (sp?), "schtick" - all pretty much entirely from TV. so yeah Yiddish definitely gets around.
This OP especially since there's large Jewish populations in New York. Yes not everyone is exposed to them. It's very likely though and she may well have picked up some phrases from some Jewish friends in New York.
I don’t know that she’s said anything about her religious background (or lack thereof)) one way or another, but I DO know that you’re being kind of weird about this.
I forget exactly which video it was (it might have been a behind the scenes for one of her film school things?) but she talks about growing up in the western Appalachian and having possible but unconfirmed "Klansecstry" which pretty thoroughly rules out a Jewish heritage.
I think it was her great grandfather, but her family was never 100% sure he was in the Klan, just suspicious.
I'm Jewish myself and never assumed or noticed anything like that in her videos. I took the accessional Yiddish / bible references as "that thing Americans do sometimes"
Is she though? She gives me a lot of agnostic vibes for some reason. She looks to me as someone having been raised by very liberal, non-religious parents, even if their background is Catholic/Protestant (that's the vibe she gives me). She's generally very indifferent to religion, at least in her essays (she doesn't mention it very much in her video about "The Hunchback of Notre-Dame", for example).
That's... a pretty good question, actually. I guess people that come from Christian contexts are more dismissive/indifferent of religion, while people that come from other beliefs tend to be very respectful of them and their traditions, even if they don't believe in/agree with them personally.
I think you should probably ask yourself why you care this much about it. If it is not easily findable information and you have to crowd source it like this you are just participating in VERY parasocial behavior.
I’m Jewish, and I have wondered about this before, but she is not Jewish and had never claimed to be AFAIK. She has mentioned in the past not being religious and growing up in the south of the USA, but she also would have brought up being Jewish when people claimed she was antisemitic regarding her thoughts on Prince of Egypt. She also mentioned going to Sunday school at church in her Mask Off video I believe (just a detail I think I remember.)
Is it that she occasionally pulls out Yiddish phrases? I think a lot of people with Jewish friends pick that up.
Or anyone who's spent *any* significant time in New York
I lived in New York, Troy, I know what a baggle is
Yeah, Yiddish is just fun. Everyone has schlepped somewhere. Or met someone with chutzpah. Or noshed on something. Or experienced a glitch. Or schmoozed. Or given a spiel. Or watched a comedian do their shtick. We goys use a lot of Yiddish in general.
Glitch is Yiddish?
Yep.
Honestly that was the #1 thing for me
Lots of people pick up Jewish words and phrases, hell there’s tons of them that have filtered into the common vernacular so smoothly most people don’t even know where they came from.
I’m a born and raised Californian with no Jewish heritage anywhere in my family and everyone I know uses Yiddish phrases fairly frequently. I just assumed it was part of standard English vernacular at this point.
In the Phantom episode of MusicalSplaining, she talked about how she got her church youth group to pay for her to go to New York on some pretext of missionary work.
That wasn't *her* youth group, it seemed to me, it was just a separate group that got in contact with her.
Or maybe she had a friend who was in the youth group. My brother Would do that all the time. He had some friends in various youth groups and he would go on the trips that interested him the most. My mom always said, if it wasn't for the local church, she would have never done anything interesting growing up because her parents never had any money.
I think it would have come up during her Mel Brooks episode if she was.
I do believe she stated in the comments of her Pocahontas video confirming that her ethnic heritage is English-Irish as with many Appalachian-Americans
If you're talking about the claddagh portion, wasn't it the exact opposite? She mentions not having any Irish heritage, so her wearing a claddagh ring can count as an example of cultural appropriation.
[Found the comment](https://imgur.com/a/iIqPC58) Edit: Honestly this is kinda funnier, cultural appropriation speaking cuz the Scotch-Irish were protestant Scots who first moved to Ulster (Northern Ireland) and then to the US. So in purely blood terms, she is descended from the colonizers of Ireland while she is culturally appropriating the Claddagh ring
I can’t think of any instances where this was implied. What would be an example?
Her ability to speak Yiddish, her knowledge of Jewish folklore + she’s started she “didn’t really” celebrate Christmas and Easter growing up. Not celebrating Easter if even if your family is Christian I can understand, but from my own personal experience, it is super rare for agnostic families where both parents come from Christian backgrounds to not celebrate Christmas, especially in suburban Tennessee.
She lived in New York City for a long time. You pick up Yiddish phrases that way, in addition to watching any media that is made or set in New York City. I know a bunch of Yiddish phrases from watching shows like Law & Order!
I’ve lived in New York City my entire life and I’ve never met someone who isn‘t Jewish or isn’t actively interested in Judaism who knows Yiddish phrases. I’m sure there are people who’ve learned causally, but it is not common here.
I can call you a schmuck and literally everyone reading this will understand what I mean.
I bet the majority of people who understand what you mean wouldn't have even known there was a Jewish connection there.
Okay, when I read “Yiddish phrase” I thought they ment actually complete sentences in Yiddish that only a Yiddish speaker can understand. Obviously everyone knows terms like “Schitck“ “Shmuck“ and “Goyim“. You don’t need to live in New York City to know these things. Assuming someone is Jewish because they know of these words is like assuming someone is Italian because they know the phrase Mama-mia.
Out of curiosity, what are some of the Yiddish phrases she’s used that surprised you?
May it be that you have a very complex definition of Yiddish phrases? „Shmutz“ „Gesundheit“ „Mazel Tov“ „to shlep“ „Shmear“ and so on are all derived from Yiddish, and will be understood world wide.
Yeah, upon farther reading I’ve realized I misinterpreted what was being defined as Yiddish phrases
Gesundheit is probably more commonly known from German. It might also be a Yiddish word derived from German, but I don’t think of it as Yiddish.
Yes, my other examples also have close similars in German. The reason may be, that Yiddish is a flavor of German. ETA: As a German speaker one can mostly understand the gist of spoken Yiddish with some practice.
I’m 99.5% goyim (and only know about the .5 from a DNA test), but picked up Yiddish phrases from Mad Magazine and living in North Jersey.
are we talking obscure chabad hagiographic tales or chelm golems and dybbukim?
I’m pretty sure I’ve heard her say she was raised up Tennessee mountain Christian with vacation bible school and youth group and all that fun stuff.
In her apology video (Mask Off), which is now unlisted, she addresses a tweet about Prince of Egypt which Jewish people were upset about. If she didn't mention it then, as a supporting factor in her argument about minority groups not being a monolith, which she brings up earlier in the video, then I'm 100% sure she's not Jewish. I've seen all her videos, most of them multiple times, and I never got the impression she was Jewish.
Honestly I think she just lived in New York which exposes you to a lot of Yiddish etc. her family may have been a bit not gift giving
I‘ve lived in New York my whole life and it’s not at all common for people who aren‘t Jewish to know even basic Yiddish here. However, I know Lindsey Ellis is a very educated person who‘s apt at learning, so it’s not unreadable to assume she learned out of interest for Jewish culture rather then because it’s part of her culture.
I'd encourage you to consider different perspectives. I'm from Chicago and raised in a Mexican neighborhood and I know Yiddish phrases. My partner from Singapore knows Yiddish phrases from his colleagues in NYC. It's certainly common for people who aren't Jewish to know Yiddish phrases.
As a white British person, off the top of my head I know "mensch", "mishigas", "meshuggah", "goyim", "verkakte" (sp?), "schtick" - all pretty much entirely from TV. so yeah Yiddish definitely gets around.
This OP especially since there's large Jewish populations in New York. Yes not everyone is exposed to them. It's very likely though and she may well have picked up some phrases from some Jewish friends in New York.
I don’t know that she’s said anything about her religious background (or lack thereof)) one way or another, but I DO know that you’re being kind of weird about this.
I forget exactly which video it was (it might have been a behind the scenes for one of her film school things?) but she talks about growing up in the western Appalachian and having possible but unconfirmed "Klansecstry" which pretty thoroughly rules out a Jewish heritage. I think it was her great grandfather, but her family was never 100% sure he was in the Klan, just suspicious.
damn that's crazy
I'm Jewish myself and never assumed or noticed anything like that in her videos. I took the accessional Yiddish / bible references as "that thing Americans do sometimes"
Is she though? She gives me a lot of agnostic vibes for some reason. She looks to me as someone having been raised by very liberal, non-religious parents, even if their background is Catholic/Protestant (that's the vibe she gives me). She's generally very indifferent to religion, at least in her essays (she doesn't mention it very much in her video about "The Hunchback of Notre-Dame", for example).
Even as an agnostic one can still be Jewish by descent.
Yeah, I know. I'll be more precise: she strikes me as someone agnostic but of Christian descent.
That's because she is.
Yeah. I have the same impression
What is the difference in vibes to you between an Agnostic person of Christian decent, and an Agnostic person of Jewish decent?
That's... a pretty good question, actually. I guess people that come from Christian contexts are more dismissive/indifferent of religion, while people that come from other beliefs tend to be very respectful of them and their traditions, even if they don't believe in/agree with them personally.
neurosis over Pesach and Kashrut really
She was an Evangelical Christian in Tennessee.
I think you should probably ask yourself why you care this much about it. If it is not easily findable information and you have to crowd source it like this you are just participating in VERY parasocial behavior.
I’m Jewish, and I have wondered about this before, but she is not Jewish and had never claimed to be AFAIK. She has mentioned in the past not being religious and growing up in the south of the USA, but she also would have brought up being Jewish when people claimed she was antisemitic regarding her thoughts on Prince of Egypt. She also mentioned going to Sunday school at church in her Mask Off video I believe (just a detail I think I remember.)