If you browse the newsstands in Istanbul, you will find The Amaneserthe only newspaper in the world that is currently printed entirely in Judeo-Spanish or Ladino. This supplement, published by the Sephardic Center of Istanbul, is a living testimony of the language spoken by the Jews expelled by the Spanish Inquisition starting in 1492, a language that they spread in their diaspora for more than 500 years.
Printed in color, with 24 pages and monthly, The Amaneser It has been published since 2005. It was born with the vocation of recovering the tradition of the Sephardic press that flourished in the Ottoman capital since the mid-19th century. “We also wanted to show the entire world that you can still write in Judeo-Spanish,” says Karen Gerson, head of the supplement.
Gerson is one of the personalities most committed to defending Sephardic culture. In fact, she left her position as an English teacher at the Bosphorus University to found the Sephardic Center of Istanbul, which she has directed since 2003. “As we were working a lot, we thought it would be good to have a publication where we could show what we were doing,” she explains. the Turkish intellectual Archiletters. They found shelter as a newspaper supplement salomone of the oldest in Türkiye and the only one associated with the Jewish community of this country. In fact, when salom It went on sale for the first time in 1947, its content was entirely in Ladino and it was not until 1983 when it was published in Turkish.
His name, symbol of hope
And why was the supplement named that way? “We wanted it to be a dawn for our language, which is in danger of extinction due to the passage of time and the consequent disappearance of those people who had Ladino as their mother tongue. In Türkiye, the Sephardic community is about 15,000 people and the country has 85 million people,” says Gerson.
Ladino suffers severe abandonment by the young people of this community, as they prefer to speak in Turkish, the official and most widespread language in the country. This trend suggests a dark horizon, but for Karen Gerson it is one more motivation to dedicate herself to preserving the cultural wealth that this language contains. Gerson’s optimism is reflected in a saying that can be read on each cover of the supplement and that is already its motto: ““When much eskurese is for amaneser”. In other words, when things are at their worst is when they can only get better.
Seduce the new generations
Aware of the need to seduce youth, Gerson campaigned heavily during the pandemic to recruit young people to write in The Amaneser: “Now we have quite a few, from different countries. There is even one who is neither Jewish nor Sephardic. His name is Kenan Cruz, his father is Turkish; and his mother, Portuguese. And he has learned Ladino wonderfully well.”
This young researcher and writer learned about the publication when he was in high school and, since 2019, he has published cultural and travel articles on its pages, as well as interviews with personalities from the Sephardic world. “I was immediately intrigued by the historical, social and linguistic aspects of Ladino. I felt an instant connection with the language and began to study it by reading The Amaneser as often as I could,” Cruz tells us.
During his university studies, Cruz researched a lot about the Jewish community in Türkiye, began listening to Ladino music and interacting with the language more actively. Finally, he decided to try his luck writing in Ladino and that is how he became a collaborator of this unique medium.
“In many ways, I can say that The Amaneser and its editor, Karen, have acted as teachers in my journey of learning Ladino. Writing in this publication has given me the opportunity to deepen my knowledge of this language and to interact with the Turkish Jewish community and the Sephardic diaspora around the world,” concludes the researcher.
Another tool for youth seduction has been Netflix. Gerson tells us that, shortly after the pandemic, this platform launched The cluba soap opera that portrays the life of the Sephardic community of Istanbul. Although the series takes place in Turkish, at some moments, the characters speak in Judeo-Spanish and these interventions appear subtitled. The series has awakened curiosity about this language and The Amaneser has added the occasional new reader to a list headed, naturally, by the Sephardic Jews of Türkiye. However, the impact of this publication transcends Turkish borders. With the digital version available shortly before the coronavirus crisis, the supplement has readers in Israel, Europe, North America and Latin America.
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