The "...old man was filed away like a worthless tchotchke." In Water for Elephants by Gruen.
Variously spelled, chachka, tschotchke, chatchke. Yiddish for 1) a mistress or 2) an inexpensive, showy trinket.
Defined in Wikipedia (which we all hate to love) as "a little piece of crap." It wasn't clear if that last word was a technical term.
The Wikipedia author said it now is used to refer to all the trade show c___ you get for free: mouse pads, pens, etc.
cf. www.phobe.com/tp/l.
Does anyone know how to pronounce it?

/tʃɑtʃkə/

it now is used to refer to all the trade show c___ you get for free

We in the business also refer to these stuff collectively as swag.

Besides goofy's IPA transcription you can listen to it being pronounced at the A-H site.

Don't trust mainstream dictionaries for the proper pronuniciation of Yiddish terms! Wordcrafter gave the authentic pronunciation here, courtesy of Leo Rosten: pronounced to rhyme with "pots the". Diminutive form tsatskeleh.

By the way, "a mistress" isn't a very good definition. A mistress is usually kept hidden, and she can be a high-class lady or a slut. A tsatske is cheap brainless "arm candy", a bauble to show. She is neither high-class nor slut, and she is displayed, not hidden away.

quote:

Originally posted by shufitz:
Don't trust mainstream dictionaries for the proper pronuniciation of Yiddish terms!

The pronunication I gave is the standard English pronunciation, not the Yiddish one.

goofy, this is the way I heard the word growing up, from family who were native speakers of Yiddish. I'm ignorant of how common the word has become in the oral usage of those without a Yiddish background. So I can't comment on whether there's a "standard English pronunciation" that differs from the Yiddish one.

I learned "tchotchkes" from Christopher Lowell. My Kentucky family called them "whatnots."

quote:

Originally posted by shufitz:
goofy, this is the way I heard the word growing up, from family who were native speakers of Yiddish. I'm ignorant of how common the word has become in the oral usage of those without a Yiddish background. So I can't comment on whether there's a "standard English pronunciation" that differs from the Yiddish one.

The standard English pronuncation is the one that's listed in English dictionaries, like M-W and AHD. I don't know how it is different from the Yiddish pronunciation, since I know no Yiddish.

quote:

The standard English pronuncation is the one that's listed in English dictionaries, like M-W and AHD.

I would have thought that was the standard American pronunciation...

Shu knows a whole lot more about the word than I do as I did not grow up Jewish so my perspective is a little different. Hoewever, I did hear the word occasionally when I was an undergraduate student at the University of Wisconsin (I hadn't even heard the word before that), and surely after I moved to Chicago, and I have only heard it pronounced the way Shu indicates. On the other hand, I have mostly heard it from people who were Jewish and, as Shu, had parents or grandparents who spoke Yiddish, so who knows. Maybe in non-Jewish areas there are other pronunciations.

Also, I have always thought the meaning to be very cheap baubles, not "whatnots" or mouse pads, and the like, that are given out at trade shows or conferences. But again, perhaps the definition has evolved.

The pronunciation /tʃɑtʃkə/ as given in M-W and AHD does seem to be the same as the pronunciation that Shu indicates.

quote:

The standard English pronuncation is the one that's listed in English dictionaries, like M-W and AHD.

I understand what "standard English pronunciation" means. I am questioning whether these dictionaries, when they state what they believe to be the standard English pronunciation, are accurate in their belief.

quote:

The pronunciation /tʃɑtʃkə/ as given in M-W and AHD does seem to be the same as the pronunciation that Shu indicates.

I can't read the symbols. AHD gives tsäts'kə but says this is but a variant, the principal version being spelled chachka and pronounced chŏch-kə. [Note: ə = schwa.] I cannot find M-W's spelling.

OED has no version beginning with a ch. It gives the spelling as tsatske or tchotchke, and its quotations add two more varients: tsatskeh and tsatski. For pronunciations it gives the consonent sound as either ts or ch, and initial vowel as in cloth.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: shufitz,

"tsatskeleh" sounds somewhat like "Schatzle" -- diminutive sweetheart -- in Bayerisch dialect.

quote:

Originally posted by shufitz:
I can't read the symbols.

OK. In SAMPA , AHD has /tSQtSk@/ and /tsAtsk@/. MW also has /tSAtSk@/. (My dialect doesn't have /Q/, only /A/, so I was conflating them.)

Anyway, this pronuncation sounds like what is being described by "pots the", ignoring the vowel difference. The vowel in "pots" is /A/.

The pronunciation /tʃɑtʃkə/ as given in M-W and AHD does seem to be the same as the pronunciation that Shu indicates.

Well, I could read the IPA symbols, and I have studied Yiddish, and that seems a far representation of how טשאטשקע (YIVO transliteration: tshatshke) is pronounced. Uriel Weinreich glosses it 'bauble, trinket', but Alexander Harkavy has a cross-reference to the main entry under צאצקע (tsatske) which he glosses 'toy, plaything', and there is another cross-reference just above this as צאצע (tsatse). Before we descend into a fury of Yiddish linguistics, I'd like to point out that Weinreich's dictionary is for Standard Yiddish, which is a composite of two or more East Yiddish dialects (the Polish and the Lithuanian) for literary purposes. Many Yiddish books printed before the Second World War, tend to be written in the author's dialect, and some printed after the war tend to be in standard Yiddish. The Polish word given in the etymology would've been pronounced with the tsh as in church. I'm trying to find my Yiddish thesaurus to see if there is more pertinent information in it. I must admit, I've never heard the tsatske ponounciation, but then I know few native Yiddish speakers. It might help to know what part of the Pale your grandparents were from, shu?

This gets more interesting. There's two words here: tshatshke, possibly from Polish, and tsatske, from Aramaic. Mendele 4.237, 5.310, 5.311, 5.315, and 6.003

I have no idea when I first heard the word, but my East Coast roomie in college, who is of Italian heritage used it all the time for sure. She pronounced it to sound like "chochkee" or "chochka". I generally go for a mix of the two, using the "schwa" sound at the end.

Another term that would describe what we call them is "knick-knacks". All those little things that may have meaning and value of a sentimental kind but have very little monetary worth. Little smurf dolls, souvenirs carved from cedar wood, figurines - all that crap you have to dust when your mother-in-law visits.

I've not heard the term applied to swag you get at conferences. We used to call those things "gifties" or "goodies" but then the cool kids joined us and now we call it swag or "schwag", usually collected in your swagbag.

I suppose, CW, though I always think of tschotchke as being even cheaper than that.

Having grown up Jewish, I only know the term in the original sense. I also use swag to refer to trade show items.

But that's one of the interesting fun/aggravating things about language. When people find a useful word, they adopt it - and presto! it's just evolved. Whether we like it or not.

As for the pronunciation, there IS a leading T, similar in spirit I suppose to the Ts as in Tzar (in Czar, the C is silent - in America anyway), only pronounced "Tsh". I dare say most Americans (I'll allow Richard to speak for his side of the pond) would drop the leading "T". But as to meaning, it originally referred to low cost, gaudy or showy decorative things. "Decorative" being defined by the owner of said object.

Bob

("He spelled it H-E-N-3-R-Y. The '3' was silent" - Tom Lehrer)

quote: It might help to know what part of the Pale your grandparents were from, shu?

Good point, z. From the Ukraine, near Kiev. My father was born there, and came over at age 4, so Yiddish was his mama loshen. His elder sibs had far thicker accents.

My mother's side was from Bavaria but had been here a few generations longer, and spoke no Yiddish. Interestingly, when my parents traveled in Europe in the 60s, they found that my father's Yiddish was far more useful than my mother's college French.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: shufitz,

The Yiddish (adapted from the Hebrew, or Aramaic) alphabet has no single glyph for the /tʃ/ sound as in the initial affricate sound of church or cheese. They use טש (usually transcribed as tsh as in מענטש (mentsh) 'human'). There is nothing unusal for the anglophone about this sound, just its representation in letters. OTOH, the /ts/ (צ) of צאצקע tsotske is represented by a single glyph in Yiddish, but a digraph in transcription.

The main differentiation in pronunciation which I have heard amongst English speakers in the States is whether the final vowel of tshotshke is a schwa or an /i/ (i.e., final syllable rhyming with English key). I see no evidence for a similar Yiddishpronunciation, and have always personally associated it with speakers from New York.

The reason I brought up shu's grand-parents' country of origin is because there is not just one Yiddish language, but a continuum of dialects stretching from the Atlantic (called West Yiddish in France, Netherlands, and Germany) to the Russian Empire in the east (East Yiddish in the Baltic states, Poland, and the Ukraine (with parts of the Austrian Empire thrown in, i.e., Bukovina, Romania, Hungary, Galizia, Vienna). The sound that I find variable, which nobody has mentioned, is that vowel represented by an aleph in the Yiddish alphabet. It is either an a or an o. And this is probably determined by location within the East Yiddish dialect continuum.

I don't speak Yiddish, but I had heard that much of it was derived from German. Is this true?

According to this tree, Yiddish's closest living relative is German.

I had heard that much of it was derived from German. Is this true?

Yes, modern High German and Yiddish both descend from Old High German. Yiddish has a substrate of Romance, as the Ashkenazic Jews moved through the Latin=speaking parts of the Roman empire towards the Rhineland, before moving on to the east. There is also a substantial vocabulary derived from Hebrew and Aramaic (mainly religious in nature), and some Slavic, too.

Having read all the above, I am comfortable with a simple "chack-ka," although I don't know when I would have occasion to use it. I have the "feel" of the word. The various explanations of Yiddish are compatible with what I had thought. That brings my total Yiddish vocabulary to two, the other word being "schlep." There is no English equivalent for either word. The context in which I read tchotchke, in "Water for Elephants," fits with a tawdry, glitzy mistress.
By the way, it is a good book. A little different. Interesting characters. Especially the elephant.

chatch-ka

quote:

"chochkee" or "chochka".

I first heard the word "tchotchke" many years ago from Carla, a Jewish woman who works where I do, used in this sentence: "Why are we giving away all these [makes scornful face] tchotchkes? They're so chintzy." Our development office had been giving "premium" gifts for donations to the college. I hear the word pronounced as CW does, but can also slightly detect that initial "t." Strangely, I never heard my Jewish relatives use the word, but maybe they thought their Protestant niece/cousin wouldn't understand. Someday, Z, I'll learn to read the IPA. For now, I'm just happy to know I know what a "schwa" is.

WM

quote:

although I don't know when I would have occasion to use it.

I hear it used a fair amount. There isn't really an equivalent word in English, is there? I like wordmatic's "chintzy," though that's an adjective. Perhaps "chintzy trinkets?"

Schlock comes to mind. I guess that's not a very polite word, but I think it carries more of the chintzy feeling than trinket or knickknack, possibly.

From a 20+ year old memory...April Fool's seems like a perfect time to post this. Thanks for the idea wordmatic...

"Dieser Platz wurde absichlich leer gelassen"

"Esta espacio intencionalmente blanco" (missing word)


Bob