"Sholem aleykhem" (Hello!) from a father-to-be
Nov 12, 2014 1:04:56 GMT 9
Post by Sam on Nov 12, 2014 1:04:56 GMT 9
Hello,
What a terrific website this is! I'm very grateful for all of the blogposts -- some of which I've been sharing on Facebook -- and now that I've spent the last hour reading other members' introductions on the forum (who have the same questions I do!), I'm very excited to have a community to go through this journey with, and to learn from others.
My wife and I are expecting our first child this spring, and we've been talking for a long time about raising it (and future siblings) bilingually, with English and Yiddish. Here's the biggest obstacle so far: both of us were raised monolingually in English. I have been learning Yiddish as an adult and am very passionate about it, while my wife does not know very much Yiddish and struggles to find the time to learn (though she's very supportive, wants to learn, and doesn't want her kids to have a "secret language that mommy doesn't understand...")
I am both concerned and not concerned about my own Yiddish fluency, since it's not my native language. On one hand, thinking about raising my kids in Yiddish has made me realize just how absolutely huge not only Yiddish is, but also my own native language, English -- there are so many domestic words (roll up your sleeves, tuck in your pants, tweezers, zippers...), all those millions of colors (fuchsia, magenta, sky blue, peach, chartreuse...), so many plants, so many animals, geographic features, chemicals, body parts (cuticle, esophagus, tendon, hair follicle...), not to mention stock phrases and expressions that I just don't know in Yiddish, but that I've always taken for granted in English. I don't take that English vocabulary for granted anymore! On the other hand, I know that not all these words are essential right when the baby pops out, and a lot of these words they wouldn't even learn until middle school or high school anyway. Plus, I have made a huge amount of progress with my Yiddish -- I've gone on week-long immersive retreats, read novels, written my own songs in Yiddish, and I even taught a workshop on translating Disney songs into Yiddish. So, on one hand, I'm confident that I can do this -- yet, at the same time, I know that I still have such a long way to go.
As some others have mentioned in their own introductions, I'm a bit weirded out by the idea that: (1) I'm planning not to speak my native language with my kids, and (2) I'm planning instead to speak a "foreign" language with my kids (not so foreign anymore, I guess...) It's somewhat scary, and uncomfortable, and feels very strange to imagine. The good news, of course, is that there are always translations -- in fact, just last night I finished reading a Yiddish translation of "Treasure Island" ("Oytser Indsl") which was awesome. (And now I know how to say important words like "matey", "walk the plank", "shiver me timbers"...) Our home Yiddish library also includes some other translations of English books I grew up with -- Curious George, Dr. Seuss, The Hobbit, Sherlock Holmes... but it's not quite the same in a different language. And since I didn't grow up in Yiddish, all of the original-Yiddish children's books that I've been collecting over time are all new to me.
I've already spoken with other parents who are raising their kids bilingually with Yiddish and English and have gotten lots of encouragement and support -- there's also a list-serve specifically for parents who raise their kids bilingually with Yiddish, and I've been getting lots of ideas for how to find both online and in-person communities/groups/activities for my kids. It's all very encouraging, and yet, at the same time, all very daunting.
Anyway, that's probably enough (if not too much) for now... I have a million questions, so I'm sure I'll be spending a bit of time here!
Sam
What a terrific website this is! I'm very grateful for all of the blogposts -- some of which I've been sharing on Facebook -- and now that I've spent the last hour reading other members' introductions on the forum (who have the same questions I do!), I'm very excited to have a community to go through this journey with, and to learn from others.
My wife and I are expecting our first child this spring, and we've been talking for a long time about raising it (and future siblings) bilingually, with English and Yiddish. Here's the biggest obstacle so far: both of us were raised monolingually in English. I have been learning Yiddish as an adult and am very passionate about it, while my wife does not know very much Yiddish and struggles to find the time to learn (though she's very supportive, wants to learn, and doesn't want her kids to have a "secret language that mommy doesn't understand...")
I am both concerned and not concerned about my own Yiddish fluency, since it's not my native language. On one hand, thinking about raising my kids in Yiddish has made me realize just how absolutely huge not only Yiddish is, but also my own native language, English -- there are so many domestic words (roll up your sleeves, tuck in your pants, tweezers, zippers...), all those millions of colors (fuchsia, magenta, sky blue, peach, chartreuse...), so many plants, so many animals, geographic features, chemicals, body parts (cuticle, esophagus, tendon, hair follicle...), not to mention stock phrases and expressions that I just don't know in Yiddish, but that I've always taken for granted in English. I don't take that English vocabulary for granted anymore! On the other hand, I know that not all these words are essential right when the baby pops out, and a lot of these words they wouldn't even learn until middle school or high school anyway. Plus, I have made a huge amount of progress with my Yiddish -- I've gone on week-long immersive retreats, read novels, written my own songs in Yiddish, and I even taught a workshop on translating Disney songs into Yiddish. So, on one hand, I'm confident that I can do this -- yet, at the same time, I know that I still have such a long way to go.
As some others have mentioned in their own introductions, I'm a bit weirded out by the idea that: (1) I'm planning not to speak my native language with my kids, and (2) I'm planning instead to speak a "foreign" language with my kids (not so foreign anymore, I guess...) It's somewhat scary, and uncomfortable, and feels very strange to imagine. The good news, of course, is that there are always translations -- in fact, just last night I finished reading a Yiddish translation of "Treasure Island" ("Oytser Indsl") which was awesome. (And now I know how to say important words like "matey", "walk the plank", "shiver me timbers"...) Our home Yiddish library also includes some other translations of English books I grew up with -- Curious George, Dr. Seuss, The Hobbit, Sherlock Holmes... but it's not quite the same in a different language. And since I didn't grow up in Yiddish, all of the original-Yiddish children's books that I've been collecting over time are all new to me.
I've already spoken with other parents who are raising their kids bilingually with Yiddish and English and have gotten lots of encouragement and support -- there's also a list-serve specifically for parents who raise their kids bilingually with Yiddish, and I've been getting lots of ideas for how to find both online and in-person communities/groups/activities for my kids. It's all very encouraging, and yet, at the same time, all very daunting.
Anyway, that's probably enough (if not too much) for now... I have a million questions, so I'm sure I'll be spending a bit of time here!
Sam
