You say lat-kee, I say lat-kuh...

December 22, 2008 12:16 AM

A chanukah question: Why do some people pronounce the seasonal delight "lat-kuh" and others "lat-kee"?

Digesting a delicious dinner of brisket and latkes this evening, I got to thinking; back in college I had a heated discussion with my then-girlfriend about how you pronounce "latke." She told me she'd never heard "lat-kuh," and that everybody in her family pronounced it "lat-kee." I, on the other hand, had the exact opposite experience.

I've tried googling around for an answer, but the best I can find is that some people say it's a regional or dialect-based distinction. Is this so? If so, along what lines does the split fall, exactly? Are other words with ayin similarly affected?

posted by Bromius to Food & Drink (17 answers total)

Best answer: Vowels - especially those at the end of a word, are often affected this way. "Latke" is a word with a Ukrainian origin; its root word would be something like "oladka" in English. Obviously, the "o" at the start of the word was dropped. The "-a" at the end became, for many people, a long "e" sound.

To put it another way, the "lat-kuh" pronunciation is closer to the root, and from that I'd venture that "lat-kee" is more of an Americanism*. I'm from Eastern Europe and have travelled all through Ukraine and neighboring places. I don't hear the word "latke" often, but I've heard similar words ending in an "-uh" sound sometimes getting a little tweaked into something not terribly far from a long "e" sound. So it's possible that both versions of "latke" have roots in the Old World.

* Many German names ending in "-e" (pronounced "-uh") fall prey to the same change, though I suspect this mostly occurs when a name is Anglicized. Think of the muffler chain "Meineke." They pronounce it with a long "e," but it's a German name which would have been pronounced "Meinekuh" back in Germany. Just yesterday I posted something on languagehat's blog about Juliane Köpcke, a girl who survived falling from an exploded plane and landing in her seat in the middle of the Amazon. In Germany, that name would be pronounced like "Kerpkuh" (very, very roughly). By chance, I know an American girl whose name is "Koepcke," which is how that name would be transcribed into English, a language without umlauts. She laughed when I first said her name with a German pronunciation. "It's KEPKEY," she corrected me.

In my native language and several others I know, it's not rare for words to end in a "-kuh" sound - for one reason, it's a common way of forming a diminutive of a word. Aside from recently borrowed words, I can't think of any English words which end this way. But there are LOADS of words that end in the "-kee" sound . . . monkey, Yankee, flaky, jockey, junky, yucky, bucky, and so on. So it's not hard for me to imagine that "-kuh" -> "-kee" is a sort of obvious change.
posted by Dee Xtrovert at 1:04 AM on December 22, 2008

I have very little knowledge of the grammar and etymology of Yiddish. But in my general experience, I've found that the more Yeshivish a person, the weirder the pronunciations to my Israeli-influenced ear.

For example, I say "Yom-key-pour" whereas my Yeshivish friends say "Yom Kip-per." They also say "lat-key."

As they say, four Jews, five opinions. Happy Chanukah!
posted by charmcityblues at 1:17 AM on December 22, 2008

It's a matter of dialect.

FWIW - the Hebrew is Levivah which has its root in the word Lev which means heart. The heart here is round which is whole - complete circle - all embracing. The miracle of Chanukah is that there was enough oil for eight days. The miracle of the heart is that there is enough love to go around. May this Chanukah manifest enough love to go around, enough food to feed all and enough happiness to fill all hearts.
posted by watercarrier at 3:02 AM on December 22, 2008 [1 favorite]

I've only ever heard lat-kuh, in the UK. My first experience with the lat-kee pronunciation was a song on South Park. It took me a while to be sure it was even the same word, given that the stress and length had also been changed to fit the music.
posted by the latin mouse at 5:15 AM on December 22, 2008

I think Dee Xtrovert is correct.
I have never heard lotkee in any Yiddish dialect (not that I know many (any?)).
It seems to be an Americanization.
posted by hexatron at 5:37 AM on December 22, 2008

I've never heard any Americans say lat-kee.
posted by electroboy at 6:54 AM on December 22, 2008

I hear lat-kee a lot; I've always put it down to anglicisation of the original word. Many Hebrew and Yiddish words get modified in translation.

For instance, a yarmulke is known as a כיפה (key-PAH) in Hebrew. I usually hear "kipper" from a non-Hebrew speaker. Never fails to amuse me.
posted by katrielalex at 7:00 AM on December 22, 2008

Never heard "lat-kee" ever ever ever, East Coast, West Coast, never.
posted by Echidna882003 at 7:48 AM on December 22, 2008

It's listed as LAT-kuh in both the OED and Merriam-Webster. I've always pronounced it LAT-kee.
posted by grouse at 9:08 AM on December 22, 2008

Oooh, grouse, you rebel! ^^

Ukrainian/Hungarian families here - LAT-kuh without exception. East and West coasts.
posted by Aquaman at 9:15 AM on December 22, 2008

When I hear lat-kee, I think Americanization. (Same with the horrible distortion of "challah" into "challee," which is less common.) I grew up on the East Coast among a lot of Yeshivish people, most of whom say lat-kuh.
posted by needs more cowbell at 10:40 AM on December 22, 2008

I grew up, born and raised 3rd generation L.A. of Rumanian and Hungarian Jewish families. Lat-kuh. Only lat-kuh. NEVER have I heard of lat-kee. Chag sameach!!!
posted by Sophie1 at 11:42 AM on December 22, 2008

Mideastern American gentile here. My family says "LAHT-kee". I don't discuss latkes often enough to know how other people around here say it.

Almost certainly a matter of local dialects (where "local" could apply to either geographical or cultural space). Even calling it an Americanization probably isn't quite right; there are lots of dialects of American English, each with its own host of quirks which sound scandalous and unintelligible to speakers of other dialects.
posted by greenie2600 at 12:01 PM on December 22, 2008

Chiming in from the Midwest, where we butcher pronunciation like nobody's business. I've only ever heard laht-kuh up until this post.
posted by piedmont at 4:31 PM on December 22, 2008

Interestingly, this was on Yahoo! news today, complete with pronunciations included:

Man eats 7 pounds of latkes to win NY contest

Mon Dec 22, 12:14 am ET
LAKE GROVE, N.Y. – That's a lot of latkes. A 23-year-old mechanical engineering student has downed 46 of the potato pancakes in eight minutes to win a contest at a Long Island deli.
Pete Czerwinski (sir-WIN'-skee) says he'd never eaten a latke (lot-kuh) before consuming about seven pounds of them Sunday at Zan's in Lake Grove. The Toronto bodybuilder says he's just "a power eater" whose brain never signals that he's full.
Association of Independent Competitive Eaters Chairman Arnie Chapman says Czerwinski demolished the contest's previous record of 31 latkes, set in 2006.
Brooklyn college student Will Millender took second place Sunday with 29 latkes.
The pancakes are a traditional treat for Hanukkah, the eight-day Jewish Festival of Lights. It started Sunday evening.
posted by Dee Xtrovert at 6:43 PM on December 22, 2008

I grew up in northern NJ saying lat-kuh and challee. Go figure.

Happy Hannukah, all.
posted by natalie b at 7:14 PM on December 22, 2008

Response by poster: This thread is turning into Latke Confessional, which is utterly fascinating.

Anyway, happy Chanukah and chag sameach to all. May your latkes, however pronounced, be crisp, hot and delicious.
posted by Bromius at 9:22 PM on December 22, 2008