Monday, January 29, 2007

Shvartze

A good article by Shmuley Boteach on "Shvartze", a Yiddish term referring to African-Americans. Literally, "Shvartze" is just the Yiddish word for "Black," but over the years it has acquired a negative and condescending connotation that makes it inappropriate for a people who should always be at the fore of the fight against racism. Boteach says that it is time to stamp out its usage in the Jewish community. Needless to say, I concur entirely.

My exposure to Yiddish is actually surprisingly limited (my very secular Jewish friend--you may have heard of her--has a far deeper Yiddish vocabulary than I do), so with the exception of a passing reference in Maus, I had never heard the term Shvartze. But to the extent that it is prevelant in some Jewish circles, it needs to be jettisoned. There is no reason to keep it, and plenty of reasons to abandon it.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

There's nothing wrong with the word "shvartze." I use it all the time, and - now that I see how humorless, self-hating leftist Jews react to it - I'll redouble my efforts to keep it as part of Jewish expression. Maggots like Jesse Jackass and Bowtie Louie preach hatred toward Jews, and you're worried about offending the sensitive shvartzes? I think "shvartze" (as well as "farshtinkeneh goyim", "alter kocker" and other Yiddishims - are great, especially when they offend people like you! I'm tired of hearing all of that misguided "civil rights" narishkeit.
Let's hear some thanks from the shvartzes for a change. And, speaking of the shvartze chaleria - what the hell have they ever done for us? (Just for the record, I also enjoy pissing off conservative, moralistic Jews - usually fat, ugly broads or hyper-sensitive, academic mental masturbators - who object to words like "shmuck", "putz" et al.)

Anonymous said...

"shvartze" is much better than "n*****" in two ways, as far as i can tell:

1. shvartze, simply means "black" in yiddish right? yet "n*****" came from the mangling of "negro" which means "black" in more language than one (latin?, spanish at least).

2. the jews have never really hated on black people. why would we? its "never again" right? the jewish people vote largely for the left across country borders.

one hair i'm willing to split is to actually go into what words we actually use, cuz nobody is literally the actual color black or white, we're brownish/pinkish/reddish. are there yiddish for those?


also, can jews learn from the african-americans and possibly take back the word "k***," turn it into a tounge-in-cheek term of endearment, "our word"?

Anonymous said...

shvartze- I just learend about this word from the news toady and I reasarched it. All it means is black. I think if shvartzes can call us "crasker" and get away with it then shvartzes should be call just that.

Anonymous said...

Because everybody is hep to the word "shvartze," we should avoid using it and use "reuter," instead.

Anonymous said...

I do not think the word shvartze is used with the same negative connotations as the "n" word.
I agree with the person who said the "n" word comes from a mangling of the word negro being mispronounced by illiterates who couldn't speak english correctly.
I just don't often hear the word shvartze being used in the same hateful way.

Unknown said...

Boy o boy, and people have the nerve to think because Barack's in the White House racism is over. Well get a load of these above post. Crazy...

Way of Life said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ok said...

lol people who talk about barack obama and being politically correct saying "african-americans" are almost going out of there way to not be racist and makes it almost more racist than us that use "shvartze", as if you must be politically correct and stick up for blacks as if they aren't equals. Kind of like sticking up for someone being bullied by someone bigger than them. all of you should pull the sticks out of your asses.

Shvartze is a harmless word and part of our culture so let go of the antiracist drek