January 22, 2026

Han gjorde allt för att rädda ett språk från utplåning.

[machine translation]

He Did Everything He Could To Save a Language From Extinction

For many years, Yiddish faced the threat of complete extinction—and Swedish–born Salomon Schulman was one of those who worked hard to ensure its survival. Now there are increasing signs that the language has a bright future ahead of it, writes Hynek Pallas.

Among all the sadness of never having gotten to know my grandmother is the loss of a language. In my grandmother's childhood home near Old Town Square in Prague, Yiddish was spoken alongside German and Czech during the first decades of the 20th century.

It is likely that this unique mixture of German, Hebrew, Aramaic, and Slavic languages was already in decline in the neighborhood. Certainly, it was spoken by up to 13 million Jews until World War II. But under pressure to assimilate, Yiddish came to be seen as ghetto jargon. On the other side of the square, neighbors such as Franz Kafka's parents distanced themselves from the language; it was part of the culture that one was supposed to abandon when moving to the city.

The counterattack was led by the Yiddishism movement, spearheaded by writers such as Sholem Aleichem. But—der mentsh trakht un got lakht (man plans and God laughs).

God may not have laughed at the Nazis' plans. But since the majority of those murdered in the Holocaust, like my grandmother's siblings, were Yiddish speakers, a whole world disappeared with them.

When Israel then adopted Hebrew as its official language, the fate of Yiddish seemed sealed: to be relegated to a corner of the museum of languages. Writers who insisted on writing in the language had to resign themselves to being read with a nostalgic gaze.

For me personally, the turning point came when I returned to Prague. Post-war anti-Zionism had not exactly made it easier for survivors to dare to keep the culture alive, even for nostalgic reasons.

But one autumn day in 1997, the inimitable force of nature that was Salomon Schulman walked into Café Ariman in Lund and sat down at my table. The pediatrician, known as Schloyme, had just published his vibrant cultural portrait, Yiddishland: Among Rabbis and Revolutionaries.

With his translations and public education efforts, Schloyme did more for Yiddish in Sweden on his own than when it was designated an official minority language in 2000. So much so that when he passed away in 2024, there were fears that the preservation of the language here in Sweden had come to an end.

But, zog nisht keyn mol az du geyst dem letstn veg—never say you are on your last journey.

Yiddish was about to make a comeback. As the comprehensive American anthology How Yiddish Changed America and How America Changed Yiddish (2020) shows, interest lived on. And when people had time to cultivate hobbies during the pandemic, the range of online Yiddish courses exploded.

In the US, scholarships are now awarded to those who settle near other Yiddish speakers. And through novels such as Chaim Grade's Sons and Daughters, which was published in English for the first time last year (GP 2/12 2025), readers can explore the rich literature that exists. Those who want to laugh at brilliant comedians who carry on the cultural heritage can read Shalom Ausländer's Feh (2024).

What about Sweden? Will Yiddish fade away here while the public absentmindedly applauds some klezmer band–in the same way that they have always condescendingly patted "other" cultures on the head? I understand Danny Gordon's concern when, in the recent anthology Jiddisch i Sverige (Yiddish in Sweden), he comes out with his JPD diagnosis (Yiddish Polarized Disorder): obsessed with the culture, but appalled by shtetl romanticism.

But also, as in Karin Brygger's contribution, signs that we are moving away from fetishization—toward the possibilities that exist in a language that lives on in people and cannot be tied to a specific place.

Is it that the third generation of survivors-those of us who, to a greater extent than our parents, have turned our gaze toward the lost world—are tired of carrying something associated with death? That new generations, instead of kvetching, will breathe new life into Yiddish?

Ver es lebt vet zen.

Source:  GöteborgsPosten, Hynek Pallas

Yiddish:  Ashkenazi Jewish German (Yidish–Taitsh)

————————       •       ————————

Reflection

Synthetic, or organic, most words are interesting.

Jiddrish, for instance, is not a word—anywhere, not even in Sweden—jiddrish is more of a sound (if you can hear it).

♪  ♫   With some words, the melody is very beautiful!   ♫  ♪

While others just sound like gibberish.

And not so much jiddrish—if you know what I mean.   😎👍

Note:  Jidder is one of many Swedish words for Bullshit.

              •  jidder  (noun)

              •  jiddrar  (verb)

             Hence:  He who bullshits, will see.