Transcript Judeo-Español

Judeo-Español
History pre-1492
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Jews played a key role in public administration.
The helped found and influence the economy.
Jews “opened the windows of Andalucia” (Harris).
Prominent in certain professions: Medecine, Law, Money
Lending.
• Most learned and influential class of fifteenth century Spain.
• They served as the go-between for Christians and Muslims
and so had a knowledge of Arabic which matched their
knowledge of Hebrew.
• 4th June 1391: Start of the end.
The 1492 Decree
• 31st March 1492 – historical decree of expulsion of
the Jews signed in Granada by King Ferdinand and
Queen Isabella, los reyes católicos.
• Any Jew that did not convert to Catholicism would be
expelled or killed.
• Could not leave with money, gold or silver so left the
country with few material belongings but with most
precious possessions: their language, customs and
Spanish-Jewish heritage.
The Language of the Jews in PreExpulsion Spain
• Certain differences in the language of the Christians and that
of the Jews due to a religious nature.
• Jews interspersed their dialects with Hebrew words and
expressions.
• Due to religious reasons, Jews were fairly isolated, lived in
juderías:
not exposed to as many varieties of Spanish as non-Jews were,
developed a different linguistic inventory.
the need to describe technical aspects of religion (dietary laws,
utensils, religious beliefs + theories) naturally lead to a
Hebrew origin. Hebrew technical vocabulary.
Post 1492
• 3 mains routes of exile: North Africa, Portugal and
other European countries and Ottoman Empire
(Eastern European Empire reigning from 1299 to
1923 with Istanbul (Constantinople) as its capital).
Routes of exile
Western Europe
• A certain number of expelled Jews took refuge in Portugal but
they were subjected to forced baptisms or were expelled
again in 1497.
• Along with other Portuguese Jews this group went mainly to
Holland, France, England and Germany and other Western
European countries.
• 1593: first Sephardi Jews settled in Amsterdam where there
was a state of bilingualism.
• Spanish was still a notable language in books and prayer.
Routes of exile
Northern Africa
• Thousands settled here especially in Northern
Morocco.
• The language they spoke developed into a
mixture of Spanish and Arabic, Hakitia.
• In a large number of cases it was eventually
replaced with a local form of Arabic.
Routes of exile
The Ottoman Empire
• 125,000 exiles settled in various regions, invited by the Sultan, Bayezid II,
to colonise the devastated and conquered regions of the Empire and make
it as commercially successful as Spain pre-1492.
• They built up small communities in which they spoke Spanish and lived
autonomously.
• They enjoyed extensive freedom: had their own schools, used the
language freely, emigrated abroad and maintained their use of Spanish in
business and everyday life.
The Ottoman Empire Cont.
• Language was able to survive as there was no enforced
national language.
• Islamic people respected Jews as a minority.
• “While the ancient Ottoman Empire existed, the use of JudeoSpanish was never opposed or hindered.” (Harris: 36)
• Due to its high prestige, non-Sephardic as well as non-Jews
learnt Judeo-Spanish for use in business.
• Forced isolation enforced their status as foreigners – but
helped maintain their language.
The Ottoman Empire Cont.
• In the 17th century, lack of contact with the West (which was
in full renaissance) and the abandonment of the Latin
alphabet in favour of Hebrew characters meant that the
Judeo-Español dialect did not evolve in the same way as
Castilian.
• Influx of surrounding languages became noticeable, such as
Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish and Greek.
• Decline in the Ottoman Empire in 18th and 19th centuries.
Poverty and natural disasters struck the Jewish Sephardi
communities.
• First half of 19th century, Judeo-Spanish stopped being the
universal language of trade.
Harris, Tracy. Death of a Language: The History
of Judeo-Spanish. Univ. of Delaware Press,
1994.
Judeo-Español Balcánico - Phonology
• Grammar and core vocab (approx 60%) are
basically Castilian
• Some elements, however, closer to
Portuguese/Galician
• Retained characteristics that Castilian later
lost
• Eg: aninda (still), ainda (P), aínda (G), aún (C)
• Fija (daughter), filha (P), filla (G), hija (C)
Archaic Phonological Features Retained
• Modern Spanish: v/b same bilabial phoneme
• Old Castilian and Judeo-Spanish: v is a labiodental (bivir),
the distinction is made
• Modern Spanish: j pronounced [x]
• Old Castilian and Judeo-Spanish post alveolar fricatives
either ‘sh’ (voiceless): baxo, or ‘zh’ (voiced): mujer
• Modern Spanish: z pronounced as ‘s’ or ‘th’ (dental – does
not exist in Judeo-Spanish)
• Old Castilian and Judeo-Spanish alveolar fricatives either
ç/s (‘ts’) or z (‘dz’) - korason (coraçon, corazón), dezir
(decir)
• Conservation of initial f in some words: fumo, ferir
Some other newer phonological features
• [s]  [ŝ] in the endings –ais and –eis, avlas, keres, saves.
Also in seis (ses) – as in Portug and the sk group (buskar)
• Closing of final e, o (madri, kwantu), especially in the west
and northwest of the Balkan peninsular, aside from
Bucharest
• e  a infront of trilled consonant (tiara), except in Romania
and Serbia
• Monothongation or dipthongation ken (quien), buendad
(bondad), mostro (muestro), pueder (poder)
• rd  dr (godro, vedre): the notion is intensified in forms
which have maintained the rd: Verdad
• Initial n  m infront of ue (muestru, muevi, muevu), mos,
mozostros
Neologisms due to lexical borrowing
• Appearance of a velar consonant /x/,
borrowed from Arabic, Hebrew and Balkan
languages: xazinu (enfermo), malax (ángel)
• Appearance of /ŝ/ phoneme in borrowings
mainly from Hebrew, ŝar (miedo), ŝava (orden)
• Z no longer only in interior of words, but may
also be at start (did not occur in Old Castilian)
e.g. Zaxut (food eaten at a funeral)
Other phonological phenomena
• Yeísmo, (yave) generalised with only a few
exceptions in Turkey and Monastir (covers
parts of Albania/Greece/Macedonia)
• Disappearance of ñ  ni (aniu, punio) in Ruse
(Bulgaria) and Bucharest (Romania)
• Multiple trill /ŕ/  simple trill /r/ in Bucharest
(ariba, barer, tiera)
Judeo-Español Balcánico Morphology
Pronouns
• Usted and ustedes do not exist
• Instead ‘vos’ is used for formal singular and
‘vosotros’ for formal plural
• Tú is maintained for second person, informal
singular
• ‘os’ does not exist in Judeo-Español. ‘vos’ is
used instead
Verb Conjugations
• Present
• very similar to modern Castilian
• E.g. Regular –ar verb avlar (hablar):
Yo avlo
Tu avlas
El/eya avla
Mosotros avlamos
Vozotros avlásh - habláis
Eyos/eyas avlan
–er and –ir verbs
• Similarly, only the you plural ending is different to
the endings of modern Castilian
• E.g. komer
Yo komo
Tu komes
El, eya kome
Mosotros komemos
Vozotros komésh - coméis
Eyos, eyas komen
Preterite
• E.g. Regular –ar verb Avlar
Avlí – é (í is used at the end)
Avlates - aste
Avló
Avlimos - amos
Avlatesh - asteis
Avlaron
Regular –er verb e.g. komer
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Komí
Komites - iste
Komyó - ió
Komimos
Komitesh - isteis
Komyeron – ieron
Imperfect
• Ending –iƀa (iva) is used where modern Castilian uses ía
• E.g. kiriƀa – quería, riyiƀa - reía
General Points
• First person present endings –oy e.g. estoy, soy, voy,
Judeo-Spanish use –o instead. E.g. estó, so, vo
• In general the plural endings for judeo-Spanish words
are –im for masculine plurals and –ot for feminine
plurals.
• These endings mainly appear in words of Hebrew
origin. E.g. batlanim –ociosos, beemot (bema) –
bestia.
• -im is also sometimes used to make plurals of words
of Spanish origin. E.g. ladronim, ermanim, retonim.
Continued
• They are also used for words of Turkish origin.
E.g. seraphim – usureros, kasapim – carniceros
• Due to influence from Balkan languages, the
subjunctive is used where, for certain
expressions, modern Castilian would use the
imperfect
• E.g. kali se la deše – tiene que dejarla (in
Bitola and Skopje – Macedonia)
Judeo-Español de MarruecosPhonology
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Prothesis of –a
Addition of letter at the beginning of the word
E.g. arrobar, adormir, aprestar.
Common feature of all types of Spanish
Aphaeresis
Loss of sound at the beginning of a word
E.g. šuar – ajuar, parece – aparece
Changeability in the unstressed
vowel
• E.g. dizzilde – decidle, pidiste, asperando,
sospiro
• These can be found in a complete dictionary
of Moroccan Judeo-Spanish, where parecer,
dicer, pider, asperar, o sospirar can be found
• This changeability can affect the conjugation,
where it wouldn’t be rare to hear mole –
muele.
Paragoge
• Addition of the old –e to Moroccan JudeoSpanish words, not just after an –r, but in
other cases. E.g. gavilane, lumbrale, pesare,
veluntade (- voluntad).
• In Morocco, this is used in Hebrew words
(cahale – comunidad), or Arabic words (ašuare
– ajuar). It is thought that this added –e at the
end of the words is unnecessary.
Castilian Archaisms
• Sibilant Consonants
• This is conserved from old Castilian
• Distinction between unvoiced S and voiced Z
(although the S is pre-dorsal).
• “The most maintained and archaic element,
and the most characteristic of the dialect.”
• Vitality is unquestioned.
Difference between š and ž (j)
• Pre-palatal voiced and unvoiced fricatives
respectively
• Castilian words (cobijar – covižar), but also
from Arabic (šorreados – arrastrados)
• It is possible that in this case, the maintenance
of this sound is helped by the same sound in
Arabic, which already appears to be the case
for the modern Castilian jota (gente).
Difference between Ѳ and the Z
• Voiced and unvoiced alveolar affricatives
• Most vulnerable distinction between letters,
especially since Andalucian Z – unvoiced postdental fricative.
Yeísmo
• Disappearance of the ‘y’
• When in contact with í (portío, Castía, ahí)
• Well known phenomenon in all Spanish
languages, but in terms of Judeo-Spanish, this
comes from the second half of the 17th
century.
Lengthening of Consonants
• Used in Moroccan Judeo-Spanish, influenced by
Arabic
• E.g. s - SS (dos-sientos), d-dd (meatad del corazón)
• Adding of 2 different consonants together
• E.g. r+l = l-l (contal-la)
• L+r = rr
• N+l = l-l (el la – en la)
• N+m = mm (emmano)
Initial -F
• Occurs in many words, e.g. fadar, folgar, filos,
faldiquera
• Due to the geographical origin of the
Sephardic people in Morocco.
Loss of final –s, -n and -r
• Like in Andaluz, leads to vocal opening,
although not always.
• Also as in Andaluz, there is often loss of the
final –n (chapí, cordobá)
• Loss of final –r (azumbé – azumbar).
Judeo-Español de Marruecos – Morphology
• Archaisms retained: Naide (Nadie), Mosotros, Mos,
Muestros
Verbal perculiarities:
• -er verbs  -ir (eg vister for vestir, suber for subir) – ir
verbs unchanged (vivir, depedir)
• Preterite: sení (cené), encontrí (encontré), vide (ví)
• -ad, -id lose the ‘d’ (dejá, vení), but also levantai
(levantad), daime (dadme) – similar to leonese
• -d + -l  ld (dezilde)
• -imus  -emos (venemos) y –tis: retained old form –
des (quieríades, besedéisme – me beseís)
LANGUAGE DEATH
What is “language death?”
• Fishman 1964: “language shift” versus
“language maintenance.”
• Fasold 1984: “the members of a community,
when the shift has taken place, have
collectively chosen a new language where an
old one used to be used.”
• Desire for social mobility or a better standard
of living.
How does a language die?
• minority or ethnic languages of a lower prestige
and spoken by only a small part of the
community’s population.
• Unstable bilingualism.
• Fasold: “a substantial proportion of the
individuals in a society seldom completely give up
the use of one language and substitute another
one within their lifetime. In the typical case, one
generation is bilingual, but only passes on one of
the two languages to the next.”
• First generation: fluent in original language.
• Second generation: Bilingual (in both original
and replacing language)
• Third generation: fluent in replacing language.
The situation of Judeo-Spanish today…
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United States, Israel and turkey
1966: 360,000 speakers
1979: 160,000 speakers
Today: 60,000 speakers
Only 42% of the children of those who can speak
Judeo-Spanish have a passive knowledge of the
language.
• 100% of the grandchildren cannot speak it at all.
Lack of institutional or community support
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• THE ETHNIC MOTHER TONGUE PRESS AND
PUBLICATIONS
• ETHNIC LANGUAGE BROADCASTING ON BOTH
RADIO AND TELEVISION
• NON-ENGLISH ETHNIC MOTHER TONGUE
SCHOOLS
• LOCAL RELIGIOUS UNITS UTILIZING
LANGUAGE S OTHER THAN ENGLISH
How did the process of the death of JudeoSpanish begin?
1.NATIONALISM IN THE BALKANS:
• Closing of Jewish schools
• Obligatory military service
• Introduction of “Turkish Unity”
• 2. LOSS OF PRESTIGE:
• New international trade agreements
• 3.ASSIMILATION IN THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE
• 4. AMERICANIZATION & ISRAELIZATION
• 5. FRENCH INFLUENCE – THE ALLIANCE ISRAELITE
UNIVERSELLE SCHOOLS IN THE LEVANT
• 6. OTHER FOREIGN INFLUENCES: A POLYGLOT MIXTURE
• 7. ABSORPTION BY OTHER ROMANCE LANGUAGES
• 8. HEBREW IS REINFORCED AS THE LANGUAGE OF
RELIGION AND WAS REVIVED AS THE NATIONAL
LANGUAGE OF ISRAEL.
• 9. NO SEPHARDIC SCHOOLS TO PROMOTE RELIGION OR
SEPHARDIC CULTURE
• 10. NO LANGUAGE ACADEMY OR CENTRAL
ORGANIZATION TO ESTABLISH LINGUISTIC NORMS
• 11. LIMITED EDUCATION IN THE MOTHER TONGUE –
ILLITERACY IN JUDEO-SPANISH
• 12. USE OF THE HEBREW ALPHABET INSTEAD OF
THE LATIN ALPHABET
• 13. COMPLETE BREAK OF RELATIONS WITH SPAIN
• 14. NO PRESTIGIOUS JUDEO – SPANISH
LITERATURE
• 15. CONTACT WITH ASHKENAZIM –
ASHKENIZATION
• 16. INTERMARRIAGE (Sephardic Jews with
Ashkenazi)
• 17.DISPERSAL OF SEPHARDIC NEIGHBOURHOODS
• 18. NO POWERFUL MOVEMENTS TO CHAMPION
THE CAUSE OF THE JUDEO – SPANISH LAMGUAGE
OR ITS PRESERVATION EVEN ON THE PART OF THE
SEPHARDIM THEMSELVES
• 19. NO EFFECTIVE CENTRAL UNITING SEPHARDIC
ORGANIZATIONS
• 20. NO “OLD COUNTRY” OR HOMELAND – NO
NEWLY ARRIVING IMMIGRANTS
• 21. REDUCTION OF THE SEPHARDI POPULATION
• 22. REDUCTION OF LANGUAGE DOMAINS OR
USES
Is a Judeo-Spanish Revival possible?
• No monolingual speakers or young JudeoSpanish speakers
• Critical stage in its history
• Fishman: “threatened languages whose
intergenerational continuity is proceeding
negatively, with fewer and fewer users, are
often beyond the help of efforts to reverse
language shift.”
Conclusion…
• Denison (1977): “the direct cause of ‘language
death’ is seen to be social and psychological:
parents cease transmitting the language in
question to their offspring.”
• Edwards (1985): “Languages themselves
obviously obey no organic imperatives, but their
speakers do. Languages do not live or die at
all…Yet they clearly do have an ‘allotted life’
which is granted, not by the laws of nature, but
by human society and culture. The fortunes of
language are bound up with those of its users,
and if languages decline or ‘die’ it is simply
because the circumstances of their speakers have
altered. The most common scenario here is that
involving language contact and conflict: one
language supplants another.”