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Hebrew and Yiddish in Canada: a Linguistic Transition Completed

Summary

Davids asks whether Canada's two main Jewish languages, Yiddish and Hebrew (Ivrit), still live as community languages or are disappearing. He uses census counts from Statistics Canada, mostly from the last generation, together with some ethnographic material. The census has three separate language measures: mother tongue, the language usually spoken at home, and any language a person can hold a conversation in. Davids breaks these down by city of residence and age group to profile today's speakers and to forecast the next decade or two. Because recent immigration could keep a language visible without any local transmission, he also looks at Israeli and Yiddish-speaking arrivals. The title states his conclusion: the move to English is essentially complete, and Canadian Jewish communal life now runs in English. Hebrew survives in synagogue and school settings, and pockets of Yiddish remain, with Hasidic communities featuring prominently in the cited sources. The study matters because it treats language retention as a rough proxy for group continuity. It also sets out the methodological limits of census data, especially breaks in comparability over time.

Key points

  • The census runs every five years. Most language and ethnicity items come from a 20% "long form" sample. Religion was asked only every other census (1971, 1981, 1991, 2001).
  • Since 1991, three distinct questions track non-official languages: mother tongue, home language, and conversational knowledge. Since 1986, answers can be single (SR) or multiple (MR), which complicates comparisons with earlier censuses.
  • The 2011 long form became voluntary under the Harper government, putting future time-series comparability in doubt.
  • Israeli-born immigrants rose from about 16,000 (2001) to 21,320 (2006), roughly 1,000 net arrivals per year.
  • Jewish day schools enrol about 7,000 students in Montreal and about 12,000 in Toronto. These are the contexts where Hebrew is taught.

Interesting ideas

  • I1. Measuring one phenomenon through several distinct indicators (first learned, habitually used, merely known) shows whether something is alive or only remembered; a single "speaks X" count would hide this.
  • I2. A vitality signal can be read from ratios rather than raw counts: what share of people who know a language actually use it at home, and how its users are spread across age groups.
  • I3. Before trusting a trend, check whether definitions changed (single to multiple responses) or collection rules changed (compulsory to voluntary), since either can create a fake shift.
  • I4. Separate a capability that survives through local transmission from one that persists only through constant import, as with immigrant speakers versus native-born ones.

For Mova

How these ideas could serve Mova, our small open language model — its files, stages and tests:

  • I1 (world): Store a person's relation to a skill or object as separate states (acquired, actively used, capable of), so readers can answer questions about competence versus habit without merging them.
  • I2 (learn): Track ratio-style health metrics for learned rules, such as how often a rule is known versus actually firing correctly on fresh text, broken down by corpus "age" or source.
  • I3 (tree): When comparing parser scores across UD releases or after dialect conversion, log annotation-scheme changes as explicit breakpoints so LAS differences are not misread as model progress.
  • I4 (learn): Distinguish competence the system has induced and retained on its own from behaviour that holds only while an LLM teacher keeps supplying labels, for example by evaluating with the teacher removed.

Our summary of the paper, in our own words — not its text. The work belongs to its authors; read it at the links above.

Fields: Linguistics & languages

Topics Hebrew & Aramaic Semitic languages

Cite

Cite as Leo Davids. 2012. Hebrew and Yiddish in Canada: a Linguistic Transition Completed. Canadian Jewish Studies 19.

The paper itself, not this page. BibTeX from the library's record of the work. DOI 10.25071/1916-0925.36138

@article{davids2012hebrew,
  title = {{Hebrew and Yiddish in Canada: a Linguistic Transition Completed}},
  author = {Leo Davids},
  journal = {Canadian Jewish Studies 19},
  year = {2012},
  doi = {10.25071/1916-0925.36138},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.25071/1916-0925.36138}
}

References

9 references, 0 of them with a card of ours. ↗ leads to the work, «find» searches for one we have no id for yet.

  1. Joshua Fishman, In Praise of the Beloved Language (Berlin: Mouton DeGruyter, 1997), esp. Chapter 2; ed. Joshua A. Fishman, Handbook of Language and Ethnic Identity (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999); Brook S. Pigott and Madeline Kalbach, “Language Effects on Ethnic Identity in Canada,” Canadian Ethnic Studies 37 (2005): 3-18; Martin Turcotte, “Passing on the Ancestral Language,” Canadian Social Trends 80 find
  2. (Spring 2006): 20-26. 2 John Myhill, Language in Jewish Society (Clevedon, UK: Multilingual Matters, 2004), 23-27, 42-53. See also Janet Hadda, “Yiddish in Contemporary American Culture” in Yiddish in the Contemporary World ed. find
  3. Gennady Estraikh and Mikhail Krutikov (Oxford, UK: Legenda — European Humanities Research Centre, 1999), 93-105. 3 See John DeVries, “Ethnic Language Maintenance and Shift,” in Ethnic Demography ed. Shiva Halli et al (Ottawa: Carleton University Press, 1990), 163-177; Ronald Wardhaugh, Languages in Competition (Oxford: Blackwell, 1987); E.S. Goldsmith, Modern Yiddish Culture (New York: Fordham University Press, 1997); Janet Holmes, An Introduction to Sociolinguistics (London/New York: Longman, 1992), Chapters 2,3. find
  4. Robert J. Brym, “The Rise and Decline of Canadian Jewry? A Socio-Demographic Profile” in The Jews In Canada ed. Robert J. Brym, William Shaffir, Morton Weinfeld (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1993), 22-38; Dovid Katz, Words on Fire: The Unfinished Story of Yiddish (New York: Basic Books, 2004), 225-228. 5 John DeVries & Frank G. Vallee, Language Use In Canada (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, 1980) [Cat. No. 99-762E], Chapter 5; Brian Harrison and Rejean Lachapelle, Measures of Mother Tongue Vitality for Non-Official Languages in Canada (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, 1990). 6 Jay Brodbar-Nemzer, et al. “An Overview of the Canadian Jewish Community” in The Jews in Canada ed. Robert J. Brym, William Shaffir, Morton Weinfeld (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1993), 39-71; Louise Mullany, “Speech Communities,” in The Routledge Companion to Sociolinguistics ed. Carmen Llamas, Louise Mullany, Peter Stockwell (London/ NewYork: Routledge, 2007), 84-91. In a recent book on Jewish peoplehood, Yiddish is barely mentioned and has no entry in the index, but Hebrew is touched on frequently. Jewish Peoplehood ed. Menachem Revivi and Ezra Kopelowitz (Boston: Academic Studies Press, 2008). 7 Charles Shahar, Survey of Jewish Life in Montreal Part I (Montreal: CJA Federation, 1996), 6-7. See also Charles Shahar and Howard Magonet The Jewish Community of Canada—Part V: Immigration and Language (Toronto: UIA Federations Canada, 2005), 24-29. 8 Sylvia B. Fishman, The Way Into the Varieties of Jewishness (Woodstock, Vermont: Jewish Lights Publishing, 2007), 211-216; John Myhill, Language in Jewish Society, 210-212. 9 Brodbar-Nemzer et al. “Overview of the Canadian Jewish Community,“ 46-47, 68-70; Leo Davids, “Yiddish in Canada: Picture and Prospects” in The Jews in Canada ed. Robert J. Brym, William Shaffir, Morton Weinfeld (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1993), 153-165; Goldsmith, Modern Yiddish Culture, Chap. 11. 10 Leo Davids, “The Jewish Population of Canada, 1991” in Papers in Jewish Demography 1993 ed. Sergio Della Pergola and Judith Even (Jerusalem: Harman Institute of Contemporary Jewry—Hebrew University, 1997), 311-323; Leo Davids, “Ethnic Jewishness in Canada and our 2001 find
  5. Census Data,” Canadian Ethnic Studies 35 (2003): 116-122; Charles Shahar, The Jewish Community of Canada Part VI: Issues of Jewish Identity (Toronto: UIA Federations Canada, 2006); James S. Torczyner and Shari Brotman, “The Jews of Canada: A Profile from the Census,” American Jewish Year Book 95 (New York: American Jewish Committee, 1995), 227-260. 11 Statistics Canada, 2001 Census Dictionary (Ottawa: Canada - Minister of Industry, 2002) [Cat. No. 92-378 XPE], 77-81, 112, 269-270. 12 John DeVries, “Ethnic Language Maintenance and Shift”; Statistics Canada 1996 Census Dictionary (Ottawa: Canada—Minister of Industry, 1997) [Cat. no. 92-351], 68-72. 13 DeVries and Vallee, Language Use In Canada; Holmes, Introduction to Sociolinguistics; Myhill, Language in Jewish Society; Wardhaugh, Languages in Competition. find
  6. Statistics Canada, 2001 Census Dictionary, 15-17, 112. See Morton Weinfeld, Like Everyone Else …but Different (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 2001), 53-56, 367-370. 15 See Sylvia B. Fishman The Way…, 187-191; Leo Davids, “Jewish Ethnicity in Canada: Measurement and Meanings” (Paper presented at the Association for Canadian Jewish Studies, Ottawa, Canada, May 25, 2009); Jack Jedwab “The Rise of the Unmeltable Canadians? Ethnic and National Belonging in Canada’s Second Generation,” Canadian Diversity 6 (2008): 25-34; Shahar, Jewish Community …Issues of Jewish Identity. In regard to the fading/obsolescence of ethnic origins in later generations, see also M. Boyd, “Who are the ‘Canadians’? Changing Census Responses, 1986-1996,” Canadian Ethnic Studies 33 (2001): 1-24; M.A. Kalbach and Warren E. Kalbach, “Becoming Canadian: Problems of an Emerging Identity,” Canadian Ethnic Studies 31 (1991): 1-16. 16 Leo Davids, “Yiddish in Canada: Picture and Prospects”; Leo Davids, “Yiddish and Hebrew in Canada: The Current Situation,” Canadian Ethnic Studies 32 (2000): 95-104. 17 Louis Rosenberg, Canada’s Jews, ed. Morton Weinfeld (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1993), 256-257. 18 J. Biehl, “Problems of Status and Status Change of Yiddish” in Status Change of Languages, ed. Ulrich Ammon and Marlis Hellinger (Berlin: DeGruyter, 1992), 332-354; Goldsmith, Modern Yiddish Culture, 152-154, 253; Benjamin Harshav, The Meaning of Yiddish (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990), 84-87, 127-133; Mark Tolts, “Yiddish in the Former Soviet Union Since 1989: A Statistical-Demographic Analysis” in Yiddish in the Contemporary World (Papers of the First Mendel Friedman International Conference on Yiddish) ed. Gennady Estraikh and Mikhail Krutikov (Oxford, UK: Legenda—European Humanities Research Centre, 1999), 133-146. 19 Goldsmith, Modern Yiddish Culture, Chapter 10. See the invaluable comments on this by Dovid Katz in Words on Fire, 339-342, 352-354. 20 Montreal Jewish Day Schools (at all levels) have a population total of some 7,000 students, while Toronto totals are around the 12,000 mark. See Leo Davids, “Enrolment Trends in Canadian Jewish Day Schools: What and Why?” Journal of Jewish Education 69 (2003): 63-68. find
  7. Statistics Canada, 1981 Census Dictionary (Ottawa: Canada— Minister of Supply and Services, 1982) [Cat. no. 99-901], 114. 22 Leo Davids, “Yiddish in Canada: Picture and Prospects”, Table 2, 155-157. 23 All these Statistics Canada reports, from each census, are published on the web — not in printed volumes, as was done through 1991. For data on “Immigrant Status and Period of Immigration and Place of Birth …” in 2001, see http://www12.statcan.ca/english/census01/products (table97F0009X-CCB2001002). Israeli-born immigrants to Canada numbered just 16,000 people in 2001. In 2006, however, that count rose to 21,320; this means that about 1,000 Israeli-born immigrants (net) arrived per year, in that 2001-2006 period. See “http://www12.statcom.ca/census-recensement/2006/dp-pd…” for our 2006 source, cross-tabulating Place of Birth by Period of Immigration. 24 Citizenship and Immigration Canada, “Facts and Figures 2008— Immigration Overview: Permanent and Temporary Residents”, http://www. cic.gc.ca/english/resources/statistics/facts2008/. 25 Brian Harrison and Louise Marmen, Languages in Canada (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, 1994) [Cat. no. 96-313E], 58-61; Holmes, Introduction to Sociolinguistics, 61-70; Wardhaugh, Languages in Competition, 19-20, 28-30. 26 See Joseph Telushkin, Jewish Literacy (New York: Harper Collins, 2008), 478, 686-687. 27 Mark Abley, Spoken Here: Travels Among Threatened Languages (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2003), 222-228; Biehl, “Status”, 350, 352; Myhill, Language in Jewish Society, 141-143; William Shaffir, “Still Separated from the Mainstream: A Hassidic Community Revisited” Jewish Journal of Sociology 39 (1997): 46-62. 28 Charles Shahar, Morton Weinfeld and Randal F. Schnoor, Survey of the Hassidic and Ultra-Orthodox Communities in Outremont and Surrounding Areas (Montreal: Coalition of Outremont Hassidic Organizations, 1997), 10-12. 29 Shahar et al. Hassidic and Ultra Orthodox Communities, 11. 30 Ibid., 12. 31 The Ultra-Orthodox place for Torah study and prayer—women rarely enter. Usually, each Hasidic sect has its own “Bes Medresh”, wherever their numbers and financial support allow this. ↗
  8. Holmes, Introduction to Sociolinguistics; Mullany, “Speech Communities.” 33 Shahar et al. Hassidic and Ultra-Orthodox Communities, 11. 34 Dovid Katz, Words on Fire, 381-384. 35 Randal F. Schnoor and Leo Davids “The 2001 Jewish Population of Canada: A First Look” (Paper presented at the Association of Canadian Jewish Studies, Halifax, N.S., Canada, June 1, 2003), Table II; Leo Davids, “Taking a Closer Look at Canada’s Jewish Seniors” in Centre for Jewish Studies Annual 7 (Toronto: Centre for Jewish Studies—York University, 2005), 31-38, at Table II (b). 36 Charles Shahar, A Comprehensive Study of the Frum Community of Greater Montreal (Montreal: Federation CJA & Ahavas Chesed, 2003), 11-20; Shahar et al., Hassidic and Ultra-Orthodox Communities, 7-10; Leo Davids, “Marital Status and Fertility among Sub-groups of Canadian Jews” in The Jews of Canada, ed. Robert J. Brym, William Shaffir and Morton Weinfeld (Toronto: Oxford U. Press, 1993), 315-327, at 319-321; Dovid Katz, Words on Fire, 375-388. 37 Charles Shahar, A Survey of Jewish Life in Montreal Part I (Montreal: Federation CJA, 1996), 6-7; Charles Shahar and Randal F. find
  9. Schnoor, Part II Ibid. (Montreal: Federation CJA, 1997), 26-33. 38 Randal F. Schnoor and Leo Davids, “The 2001 Jewish Population …”; Leo Davids “Ethnic Jewishness …”; Charles Shahar and Susan Karpman The Jewish Community of Canada Part VII: The Jewish Family (Toronto: UIA Federations Canada, 2006), 1-3, 23-25. 39 Charles Shahar, Morton Weinfeld, Randal F. Schnoor “Hassidic and Ultra-Orthodox …”, 9, 15-16; Charles Shahar, Survey of Jewish Life in Montreal Part I, 38-40. 40 http://www.derbay.org/calendars/Toronto lists relevant events and activities from The Friends of Yiddish, Vancouver Jewish Folk Choir, Toronto Jewish Folk Choir, Jewish Public Library of Montreal, etc.; also see http://klezmershack.com (Winnipeg), http://www.yiddishtheatre.org ↗

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