By Hook or by Crook is a 2001 queer buddy film by writers/directors/actors Harry Dodge and Silas Howard and produced by Steakhaus Productions. Stanya Kahn was a contributing writer; the film premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. By Hook or by Crook chronicles the tale of two unlikely friends who commit petty crimes as they search for a path to understanding themselves and the outside world. Silas Howard plays Shy, who leaves his small town after the death of his father, heads to the big city to live a life of crime. Along the way, he encounters a quirky adoptee, in search of his birth mother. An immediate kinship is sparked between these men and they become partners in crime. Suffering money troubles, emotional problems, physical confrontations, the duo face their issues head on and learn to trust each other and support each other in pursuit of their goals. Silas Howard Harry Dodge Stanya Kahn Carina Gia James Cotner Joan Jett Kris Kovic Maia Lorian Aldo Pisano Nancy Stone Carla Bozulich of the Geraldine Fibbers wrote the score for the film.

The soundtrack features a song that Carla Bozulich co-wrote with the Geraldine Fibbers, "Lilybelle", covered by Kiki and Herb. 2001 LA Outfest: Audience Award: Outstanding Narrative Feature, Harriet Dodge and Grand Jury Award: Outstanding Screenwriting, Silace Howard and Harriet Dodge 2001:Seattle Lesbian & Gay Film Festival,Award for Excellence: Best Female Director, Silace Howard and Harriet Dodge, Award for Excellence: Best Narrative Feature, Silace Howard and Harriet Dodge 2002 Paris Lesbian Film Festival, Winner of Audience Award: Best Film, Silace Howard and Harriet Dodge 2002 Philadelphia International Gay & Lesbian Film Festival Jury Prize: Best Feature - Lesbian, Silace Howard and Harriet Dodge 2002 SXSW Film Festival: Audience Award: Narrative Feature, Silace Howard and Harriet Dodge By Hook or by Crook at the Internet Movie Database Official Website By Hook or by Crook film uploaded to Vimeo by Harry Dodge

Ashkenazi Hebrew is the pronunciation system for Biblical and Mishnaic Hebrew favored for liturgical use and study by Ashkenazi Jewish practice. It survives today as a separate religious dialect within some parts of the Haredi community alongside Modern Hebrew in Israel, although its use amongst non-Israeli Ashkenazi Jews has diminished; as it is used parallel with modern Hebrew, its phonological differences are recognized: א ʾālep̄ and ע ʿáyin are silent at all times in most forms of Ashkenazi Hebrew, where they are both pronounced as a glottal stop in modern Hebrew. A special case is Dutch Hebrew, where ‘ayin is traditionally pronounced as a velar nasal under the influence of the local Spanish and Portuguese Jews. ת ṯāw is pronounced in Ashkenazi Hebrew, unless there is a Dagesh in the ת, where it would be pronounced. In some respects, this is similar to the Yemenite pronunciation as well as some other Mizrahi Hebrew varieties, except these varieties pronounce ת without dagesh as the non-sibilant fricative.

It is always pronounced in Sephardi Hebrew. אֵ ṣērê / e / is pronounced in Ashkenazi Hebrew. אָ qāmeṣ gāḏôl /a/ is pronounced in Ashkenazi Hebrew, as in Yemenite and Tiberian Hebrew, where it is in modern Hebrew. אֹ ḥôlam /o/ is, depending on the subdialect, pronounced, or in Ashkenazi Hebrew, as against in Sephardic and modern Hebrew or in Yemenite Hebrew. Unstressed אֻ qubbuṣ or וּ shuruq /u/ becomes in Ashkenazi Hebrew, when in all other forms they are pronounced In the Hungarian and Oberlander dialects, the pronunciation is invariably. There is some confusion between final אֵ tzere /e/ and אִ hiriq /i/ There are considerable differences between the Lithuanian, Polish and German pronunciations; these are most obvious in the treatment of ḥôlam: the German pronunciation is, the Galician/Polish pronunciation is, the Hungarian is, the Lithuanian pronunciation is. Other variants exist: for example in the United Kingdom, the original tradition was to use the German pronunciation, but over the years the sound of ḥolam has tended to merge with the local pronunciation of long "o" as in "toe", some communities have abandoned Ashkenazi Hebrew altogether in favour of the Israeli-Sephardi pronunciation.

Tzere is pronounced in the majority of Ashkenazic traditions. In Polish usage, however, it was not infrequently. Another feature that distinguishes the Lithuanian pronunciation, traditionally used in an area encompassing modern day's Baltic States and parts of Ukraine and Russia, is its merger of sin and shin, both of which are pronounced as; this is similar to the pronunciation of the Ephraimites recorded in Judges 12, the source of the term Shibboleth. The pronunciation of resh varies between an alveolar flap or trill and a voiced uvular fricative or trill, depending on variations in the local dialects of German and Yiddish. In addition to geographical differences, there are differences in register between the "natural" pronunciation in general use and the more prescriptive rules advocated by some rabbis and grammarians for use in reading the Torah. For example: In earlier centuries the stress in Ashkenazi Hebrew fell on the penultimate, instead of the last syllable as in most other dialects.

In the 17th and 18th centuries there was a campaign by Ashkenazi rabbis such as Jacob Emden and the Vilna Gaon to encourage final stress in accordance with the stress marks printed in the Bible. This was successful as concerned liturgical use such as reading from the Torah. However, the older stress pattern persists in the pronunciation of Hebrew words in Yiddish and in early modern poetry by Hayim Nahman Bialik and Shaul Tchernichovsky; the merger of ח to כ and ע to א in speech occurred at some point between the 11th century and the 18th century, but many Ashkenazi authorities advocate using the pharyngeal articulation of ח and ע when representing the community in religious service such as prayer and Torah reading though this is observed in practice. Strict usage requires the articulation of initial א as a glottal stop. In general use, the mobile sheva is omitted. However, in liturgical use strict conformity to the grammatical rules is encouraged. There are several theories on the origins of the different Hebrew reading traditions.

The basic division is between those who believe that the differences arose in medieval Europe and those who believe that they ref