Created in 2013, the Léxico Judío Latinoamericano, “a collaborative data base of words used by Spanish-speaking Jews from Latin America and the Caribbean, in writing and in speaking” (http://www.jewish-languages.org/lexico-judio-latinoamericano/welcome), proposes, purposefully or not, the existence of a coherent group of Latin American Jews. Based on the ideas of Benedict Anderson and Joshua Fishman about the role of language in national projects, one can say that a dictionary plays a special role in the creation of group identities. In a certain sense, a dictionary validates, institutionalizes and makes official that language of its users, in some way representing and prescribing the uses of the language and the behavioral habits of its speakers. The LJL not only includes vocabulary from distinct Latin American regions and different groups of Jews but also is put together in an atypical way: it is a project in constant development where the users present entries to be included. In this article, we are interested in examining the ideological consequences of the composition and constitution of the LJL. We will ask, what perspectives facilitate positing a Latin American Jewish people and how do the identities of those who head the project influence the symbolic possibilities of the Lexico? What are the effects of forming an artifact of group identity in supposedly collaborative way? Finally, what does the Léxico Judío Latinoamericano hope to be and what functions does it aim to accomplish?
Keywords:
Jews, lexicons, linguistic ideologies, group identity
Gartenberg, C. (2017). Ideologies and Identities in the Léxico Judío Latinoamericano. Boletín De Filología, 52(1), pp. 107–128. Retrieved from https://revistaestudiostributarios.uchile.cl/index.php/BDF/article/view/47576
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