Schaechter, Mordkhe
SCHAECHTER, MORDKHE
SCHAECHTER, MORDKHE (1927– ), Yiddish linguist, author, editor, and educator. Born in Cernauti, Romania (now Chernivtsy, Ukraine), Schaechter, who went to the U.S. in 1951, was a leading Yiddishist, both in promoting the maintenance of the language and in adapting it through language planning to modern life and technology. Coeditor of the Territorialist bimonthly Oyfn Shvel, published by the Freeland League, he contributed to various other Yiddish publications, and collaborated with M. *Weinreich in the writing of Yidisher Ortografisher Vegvayzer (1961). Chief interviewer of The Language and Culture Atlas of Ashkenazic Jewry (1992–2000), he also wrote books and articles on Yiddish dialectology, toponymy, terminology, style, and grammar. His Elyokem Zunzer's Verk (published by the *yivo Institute in 1964) has been acclaimed as the best critical edition of a Yiddish writer and his works. Schaechter participated in various institutions and foundations promoting the Yiddish language, and was instrumental in organizing some: he was a prime mover in the creation of the youth movement, Yugntruf – Youth for Yiddish (1963). From 1962 he taught Yiddish at the Jewish Teachers' Seminary and, from 1968, at both Yeshiva University and Columbia University in New York.
bibliography:
lnyl, vol. 8.
[Leybl Kahn]