Hello, welcome to Shmues !

The aim of this mailing list is to provide Yiddish learners from all over the world with a forum where they can try out and improve their linguistic skills by interacting with one another or with other fluent Yiddish speakers over the Internet.

As list-members you are encouraged to use whatever Yiddish you know to start and participate in informal chats on any topic you like.

For practical reasons, romanised Yiddish in the YIVO transcription system, or something close to it, should be used. You may find it useful to spell the words of Hebrew origin at the end of the message, so that those who have seen them for the first time would know how to write them in the Yiddish (Hebrew) script, e.g.

khaver (khes, veyz, reysh) - a friend
khoydesh (khes, vov, daled, shin) - a month

Apart from chatting in Yiddish, learners are invited to post questions about linguistic issues they find difficult and obscure. These may include grammar questions, word usage problems and, to a certain extent, pronunciation inquiries. Perhaps some of the more advanced participants (or native speakers) will offer their help by sending an explanation to the list, for the benefit of all members.

I wish you would enjoy participating in the discussions and have fun using the Yiddish language.

Best wishes,

Przemek <przemio@poczta.onet.pl>