Spain To Create Ladino Academy In Israel To Help Preserve Dying Jewish Language
A Jewish prayer in Ladino in Izmir Image by Shmuel Aiello
(JTA) — Spain’s leading linguistic authority will create an academy in Israel dedicated to the study and preservation of the Ladino language.
The institution will be the 24th branch of the Spanish Royal Academy, the Guardian reported Tuesday.
Dario Villanueva, director of the Spanish Royal Academy, or RAE, said Ladino is “an extraordinarily important cultural and historical phenomenon” that deserved its own academy.
Nine Ladino specialists have been appointed to help start the institution’s work. The academy’s 23 other branches specialize in other Spanish dialects and are located across Latin America and other countries, such as the Philippines.
Ladino, sometimes referred to as Judeo-Spanish, is an endangered species in the language world. Some estimates say less than 100,000 people currently know how to speak it.
“The idea isn’t to absorb Ladino into modern Spanish, it’s the opposite: to preserve it,” Villanueva said.
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.
We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.
If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
