Reply To: How can I learn Yiddish?

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#1330682
LerntminTayrah
Participant

Like any language, you need to both listen to it and read it to learn. As was mentioned above, there are many dialects of Yiddish, from the fake yivo yiddish (shik mir a blitz breev” instead of “shik mir a email” to modern yiddish. You need to start from the bottom up. Once you got the basics you can worry about nuance. So by all means, first learn proper yiddish, then you can tzu leyg (add on) modern yiddish.
Sheva Zucker has 2 books on college yiddish. Eichler’s sometimes has a book called der yiddish lehrer, a good beginner’s book. Lily Kahn has a book called Colloquial yiddish.
Then, you need to listen to spoken yiddish. Even if you get nothing, it’s helpful. It trains your brain in Yiddish phenomes, the same way you learned as a baby. So listen to Rabbi Avraham Karp’s daf yomi, or shiurim from kol halshon or torah anytime in yiddish.
Once you got some basics, a great way to expand your vocabulary, if not so yeshivish, is the back2 basics sichas, which are translated sichas of the Lubavitcher Rebbe with hard words and loose translation every other page. Google it and you can find a page with 10 free ones. Otherwise they sell books. Not for everyone of course but great tool.