Overview
Judaeo-Spanish, also known as Ladino, Djudyó or Judezmo, is a Romance language spoken by Sephardic Jews who were expelled from Spain in 1492 and resettled in the Ottoman Empire and around the Mediterranean.
This talk examines the "language question" arising among Sephardic Jews in the Ottoman Empire in the late 19th century. Debates in the press questioned whether Judaeo-Spanish should even be maintained, weighing its abandonment or "improvement." Although vocabulary expanded through French borrowings, Judaeo-Spanish was still seen by its own speakers as inferior to major European languages and the newly standardized Balkan national languages: a language without territory, dictionaries, or grammars, and dismissed as a corrupt, mixed jargon.
The talk centers on an attempted effort of re-Hispanicization, led by scholars from the northern Balkans who took Castilian Spanish as their model, wrote in the Latin alphabet, and viewed the “mixed” varieties as inferior, reflecting the era's linguistic purism. The presentation traces the stages of this "purification": abandoning Turkish and Hebrew words, favoring Romance vocabulary, and eventually shifting to standard Spanish in writing. The talk suggests how to reconcile this pro-Spanish stance with the movement's Zionism, explores why it ultimately declined in the 1930s, and closes by comparing it to today's Judaeo-Spanish revitalization efforts.
Speaker
is a linguist specializing in Judaeo-Spanish. Her doctoral dissertation examines the language of a proverb collection written in re-Hispanicized Judaeo-Spanish, and her research more broadly explores language ideology and deliberate language change. Her recent work turns to the documentation and preservation of spoken Judaeo-Spanish, as part of the "Speaking Ladino" project. She currently teaches as a lecturer at Université Sorbonne Paris Nord.
Details
This event is open to all and free to attend with no need to book.
This is a hybrid event, which will take place in-person in the Gatsby Room (Chancellor's Centre) and also on Zoom.
If you would like to attend online, .
Refreshments will be available for the in-person audience.
Access
This event will take place in the Gatsby Room on the first floor of the Chancellor's Centre. It has step-free access with a lift and there is an accessible toilet located each floor of the building.
Contact
If you have any questions, please contact our events team - events@wolfson.cam.ac.uk
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