Seventh International Ladino Day

Statement: Today is the Seventh International Ladino Day at the University of Washington in Seattle. We at the Congress for Jewish Culture send greetings to Professor Devin Naar at the University of Washington and to everyone celebrating Ladino today.

Though Yiddish continues to be an important vehicle for Jewish national identity, in the 21^stcentury, it exists along with a growing awareness of the multiplicity of Jewish cultures and ways of being. We honor the traditional internal trilingualism of Eastern European Jewry (Hebrew-Aramaic, Yiddish, and local vernaculars) while positioning ourselves as language maximalists. As advocates for the centrality of Yiddish to Ashkenazi Jewry, our work situates Yiddish within a context of other diasporic Jewish languages.

Diasporic Jewish languages are those fusion languages which developed wherever Jews picked up new vernaculars and set them to Jewish purposes. Ladino is one of the most important diasporic languages in Jewish history, containing a number of regional varieties and a rich tradition of music and poetry. Events like International Ladino Day demonstrate the vitality and importance of diasporic Jewish languages.

We salute the global community of Ladino speakers, teachers and artists. Munchos y Buenos!