Ottoman Legacies, Émigre Culture, and Linguistic Crossroads

Annual UCLadino two-day symposium

Ottoman Legacies, Émigre Culture, and Linguistic Crossroads

Postponed in 2020 due to the closure of the UCLA campus, the annual UCLadino symposium will be back this year on April 7-8. The theme of “Ottoman Legacies, Emigre Culture, and Linguistic Crossroads” will lay emphasis on heritage, culture, and communication related to Sephardic Jews. The music-filled program – all organized by graduate students – will feature panels on Ladino Linguistics, History and Memory, and Social Networks, a keynote address by Dr. Olga Borovaya (Stanford), as well as two concerts.

Wednesday, April 7

3:00-3:05pm: Opening Remarks by Simone Salmon

3:05-3:55pm: Panel: Language and Translation

  • Moderator: Max Daniel
  • Y kada uno podra ser rabi: R. Meir Ben-Beniste’s Ladino Translations and the Rise of the Jewish Book, Itay Blumenweig (University of Pennsylvania)
  • Documenting Judeo-Spanish in Solitreo, Bryan Kirschen (Binghamton University) and Nathan Gross (Binghamton University)

3:55-4:05pm Break

4:05-5:05pm Panel: History and Memory

  • Moderator: Rachel Smith
  • Jewish Music and the Ottoman Cultural Tapestry, Simone Salmon (UCLA)
  • Bulgaria’s Post-Ottoman Sephardic History, Joseph Benatov (University of Pennsylvania)
  • Recuperating Ladino & Sephardic Life Cycle Customs Through Digital Media, Makena Mezistrano (University of Washington)

5:05-6:00pm Live Concert by Flor de Kanela: Andrea Fishman (UCSB) and Eric Ederer (UCSB)



Thursday, April 8

10-11am: Keynote

  • “The Emergence of the Ladino-Speaking Community: Print Culture and Politics of Ottoman Jews in Sixteenth-Century Salonica and Istanbul,” Olga Borovaya (Stanford University)

11:00-11:15am break

11:15-12:15pm Panel: Networks

  • Moderator: Simone Salmon
  • Por tierras extrañas, Jacobo Sefami (UC Irvine)
  • Our Sephardic Family: A Global Social Media Network, Mark Angel (Independent Scholar)
  • Southern Tobacconists, Greek fishmongers, and Japanese florists: Sephardic immigrants in the early 20th century US Economy, Max Modiano Daniel (UCLA)

12:15-1:15pm lunch break

1:15-2:15pm Panel: Linguistics

  • Moderator: Jennifer Manoukian
  • An Approach to Everyday Ladino Words and Expressions Borrowed from Spoken Languages in Balkan Countries Within the Ottoman Empire, Marcel Israel (Independent Scholar)
  • Linguistic Justice and Judeo-Spanish Revitalization, Rey Romero (University of Houston-Downtown)
  • Borrowed Verb Morphology in Ladino, Fatma Belgin Dinç (Boğaziçi University)

2:15-2:30pm Prerecorded Concert by Simone Salmon, Gal Kohav, Kiera Weiss, Jonathan Salman, Alyssa Mathias, and Brandon Wallace

2:30-2:45pm Closing Remarks by Rachel Smith


Sponsor(s): Center for Near Eastern Studies