Talk:ז׳רגון

@Wikitiki89: Not from English, I'm sure... from German and Yiddish, presumably. Can it be used to refer to Yiddish derogatorily? —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 05:14, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

@Wikitiki89: Reping, assuming you just forgot. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 03:10, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

Like most internationalisms it's hard to pin down the exact source, but I think Yiddish is the best guess. But German, Russian, and French are all also possibilities. English is less likely. As for the second part of your question, yes, Even-Shoshan gives that as the second definition, calling it a כינוי זילזול ללשון יידיש. --WikiTiki89 03:22, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

Thanks. That sense, at least, had to be borrowed from Yiddish, so I hope the etymology is now mostly okay. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 03:26, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

Note also that the first definition is "mixed language from various sources" and the third and fourth are respectively the second and first we currently have for English jargon. --WikiTiki89 03:28, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

@Metaknowledge: And hold on, does Yiddish really have a derogatory term for itself? That seems a bit strange. --WikiTiki89 03:32, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

Of course! Simon Dubnow's magisterial account of the history of Yiddish is called פון זשארגאן צו יידיש, which recognises the shift from the disgust Jewish intellectuals once felt for the language to the Yiddishism of the Bund. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 04:01, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

But you'd think such intellectuals would have expressed their disgust in a "proper" language. --WikiTiki89 11:10, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

Jews are special that way. We're all intellectuals, even if we can only intellectualise in Yiddish. ;) My grandparents are certainly familiar with this term, in any case, but they have too much respect for Yiddish to use it themselves, so I guess I've never heard it from someone who really felt that way. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 21:30, 15 March 2017 (UTC)