I started this "bekakte" topic, and the various responders were all spot-on in their comments as to its meaning/interpretation, and as to the existence of similar words elsewhere. ;-) Barbara, I sent you a message in Dutch but it must have been censored! ;-) The spelling, pronunciation, usage, and such of many Yiddish words may be a function of whether one hung around mostly with Litvaks or Galitsyaner. I just can't remember which one (if either) predominated in my neighborhood. As one of the few goyim in my apartment building in Flushing, I heard/saw a lot of Yiddish. Being somewhat fluent in Dutch & German, I could make pretty good sense out of the FORWARD (?) when it still printed in Yiddish, and there was at least one full-time Yiddish AM radio station (WHOM? WADO? Can't recall now...any help from 1950s-60s New Yorkers??) in NYC. Now all a distant blur as I sit here in Hoosierland, ;-( so some details may be "approximate." I never thought that an innocent word would provoke such a flood of responses, but I'm glad it did...a pleasant reminder of a misspent youth... Jim
________________________________ From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of John T Sylvanis Sent: Wed 11-Oct-06 18:05 To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [Finale] Bekakt For your information, most of the Central European languages have one form or another of 'bekakte'. It comes from kaka which means (sorry for the coming expletive) shit. In Hungarian it's kaka (the 'a' pronounced like the English 'u' in hut, in Rumanian it's cacat (the first 'a' being pronounced like a pectoral French 'u'), etc. John. On Wed, 11 Oct 2006 21:58:03 +0200 Daniel Wolf <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > Will Denayer wrote: > > Hi all, Just for what it is worth, the most precise translation of > > > bekakt(e) is 'full of shit', but it actually means pretentious, > noisy > > without content, little bourgeois-like (which has always been an > > insult in Yiddish). Still trying to figure out Finale, but doing > well > > in languages ... Best, Will > > Well, actually, "f**ked up" conveys the phrase as well, but -- as is > > typical for German and Jiddisch -- instead of a sexual context, it's > > placed into a fecal context (if you want to preserve that context, > then > "shitty" would be better than "full of.."). The relationship > between > High German and Jiddisch is an intimate one, and this is a good > example. > Although the adjective is not current in German, any German speaker > will > understand it immediately as an adjective formed from a word that is > > familiar , if used mostly by small children. > > > > _______________________________________________ > Finale mailing list > [email protected] > http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale > > _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [email protected] http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
I started this "bekakte" topic, and the various responders were all spot-on in their comments as to its meaning/interpretation, and as to the existence of similar words elsewhere. ;-) Barbara, I sent you a message in Dutch but it must have been censored! ;-) The spelling, pronunciation, usage, and such of many Yiddish words may be a function of whether one hung around mostly with Litvaks or Galitsyaner. I just can't remember which one (if either) predominated in my neighborhood. As one of the few goyim in my apartment building in Flushing, I heard/saw a lot of Yiddish. Being somewhat fluent in Dutch & German, I could make pretty good sense out of the FORWARD (?) when it still printed in Yiddish, and there was at least one full-time Yiddish AM radio station (WHOM? WADO? Can't recall now...any help from 1950s-60s New Yorkers??) in NYC. Now all a distant blur as I sit here in Hoosierland, ;-( so some details may be "approximate." I never thought that an innocent word would provoke such a flood of responses, but I'm glad it did...a pleasant reminder of a misspent youth... Jim ________________________________ From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of John T Sylvanis Sent: Wed 11-Oct-06 18:05 To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [Finale] Bekakt For your information, most of the Central European languages have one form or another of 'bekakte'. It comes from kaka which means (sorry for the coming expletive) shit. In Hungarian it's kaka (the 'a' pronounced like the English 'u' in hut, in Rumanian it's cacat (the first 'a' being pronounced like a pectoral French 'u'), etc. John. On Wed, 11 Oct 2006 21:58:03 +0200 Daniel Wolf <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > Will Denayer wrote: > > Hi all, Just for what it is worth, the most precise translation of > > > bekakt(e) is 'full of shit', but it actually means pretentious, > noisy > > without content, little bourgeois-like (which has always been an > > insult in Yiddish). Still trying to figure out Finale, but doing > well > > in languages ... Best, Will > > Well, actually, "f**ked up" conveys the phrase as well, but -- as is > > typical for German and Jiddisch -- instead of a sexual context, it's > > placed into a fecal context (if you want to preserve that context, > then > "shitty" would be better than "full of.."). The relationship > between > High German and Jiddisch is an intimate one, and this is a good > example. > Although the adjective is not current in German, any German speaker > will > understand it immediately as an adjective formed from a word that is > > familiar , if used mostly by small children. > > > > _______________________________________________ > Finale mailing list > [email protected] > http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale > > _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [email protected] http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
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