Tchotchke
I used this word in conversation the other day, and my friend wasn’t familiar with it. I said it is something maybe sparkly, that catches the eye, but isn’t necessarily valuable, like the way Ravens go after a piece of tinfoil. Here is the official version, from Wikipedia.
Tchotchke (originally from Yiddish tshatshke (often spelled in a variety of other ways because there is no standardized transliteration) (trinket), ultimately from a Slavic word for “toys” — Polish: cacka, Russian: цацки) are trinkets, small toys, knickknacks, baubles, or kitsch. The term has a connotation of worthlessness or disposability, as well as tackiness. For example, an overly ostentatious piece of jewelry, valuable or not, might be referred to as a tchotchke.
The word may also refer to swag, in the sense of the logo pens, keychains and other promotional freebies dispensed at trade shows, conventions and similar large events. Also, stores that sell cheap souvenirs in tourist areas like Times Square and Venice Beach are sometimes called tchotchke shops.
The term was long used in the Jewish-American community and in the regional speech of New York City. It achieved more notoriety in mainstream culture during the Monica Lewinsky scandal. In addition, the 1999 movie Office Space features a tacky restaurant called “Chotchkies.”
Leo Rosten, author of The Joys of Yiddish, gives an alternate sense of tchotchke as meaning a desirable young girl, a “pretty young thing”. Less flatteringly, the term could be construed as a more dismissive synonym for “bimbo” or an attractive, but not very intelligent, female. Some consider this usage sexist and it is not widely used outside Jewish circles. The term (in the form tzatzke) is sometimes used in modern Hebrew as a slang word equivalent to “slut.”
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I use tchotchke all the time :-).
Rosten’s definition sounds to me like another word I remember hearing from German – schatzie (sp?). Our family friends had a cat named Schatzie, and my impression was that the word meant something like “hot stuff” :-).
Does this word ring a bell for you? Have I gone totally off the deep end in my attempts to connect the two?
Little Diamond – What a cute name for a cat! Schatzie is about as close to Habeebti as you can get. It is a very affectionate term. Maybe Sweetie in English. And tchotchke has an implication of not quite right, not quite the real thing, but pretty in a short term way. I can’t imagine the two words are related.