Decolonial Atlas on Nostr: 150 years ago, Hebrew had no native speakers. It’s the only language in history to ...
150 years ago, Hebrew had no native speakers. It’s the only language in history to experience a revival of millions of native speakers. But for those doing the critical work of language revitalization in their own communities who might be tempted to see Hebrew as an exemplar - don’t.
For the Zionists who transformed Hebrew from the sacred language of Jewish ritual to the state language of Israel, Jewish languages like Yiddish, Ladino, and Judeo-Arabic were seen as weak and feminine (Hebrew literacy in the 19th century was mostly limited to men). This stood in stark contrast with Hebrew, which they associated with the modern, masculine and “pure” Jewish identity they sought to engender in the Jewish colony in Palestine.
The campaign to suppress Yiddish and “Hebraize” the Jewish people was vicious. In the decades before 1948, as Hebrew became the dominant language of the colony, organizations like the Hebrew Language Defense League propagated Hebrew and drove Yiddish from the public sphere, sometimes by force. Their more militant activists harassed shopkeepers who put up Yiddish signs; physically broke up film screenings, lectures and cultural performances in Yiddish; and even burned down newsstands that sold the leftist Yiddish-language paper Nayvelt.
In 1948, the state of Israel was established, and Arabic, too, was redefined as a “foreign” tongue. The victors seized Palestinian land, destroyed Palestinian villages and drove more than 700,000 Palestinian Arabs into exile. In the years that followed, tens of thousands of Jews immigrated to Israel from the Middle East and North Africa. While Yiddish was the native language of most Ashkenazim, the majority of the Mizrahi or “Eastern” Jews who came to Israel from the Middle East and North Africa spoke Arabic. Arabic in Israel, whether spoken by Palestinians or Mizrahi Jews, faced opposition as fervent as that directed at Yiddish.
For the Zionists who transformed Hebrew from the sacred language of Jewish ritual to the state language of Israel, Jewish languages like Yiddish, Ladino, and Judeo-Arabic were seen as weak and feminine (Hebrew literacy in the 19th century was mostly limited to men). This stood in stark contrast with Hebrew, which they associated with the modern, masculine and “pure” Jewish identity they sought to engender in the Jewish colony in Palestine.
The campaign to suppress Yiddish and “Hebraize” the Jewish people was vicious. In the decades before 1948, as Hebrew became the dominant language of the colony, organizations like the Hebrew Language Defense League propagated Hebrew and drove Yiddish from the public sphere, sometimes by force. Their more militant activists harassed shopkeepers who put up Yiddish signs; physically broke up film screenings, lectures and cultural performances in Yiddish; and even burned down newsstands that sold the leftist Yiddish-language paper Nayvelt.
In 1948, the state of Israel was established, and Arabic, too, was redefined as a “foreign” tongue. The victors seized Palestinian land, destroyed Palestinian villages and drove more than 700,000 Palestinian Arabs into exile. In the years that followed, tens of thousands of Jews immigrated to Israel from the Middle East and North Africa. While Yiddish was the native language of most Ashkenazim, the majority of the Mizrahi or “Eastern” Jews who came to Israel from the Middle East and North Africa spoke Arabic. Arabic in Israel, whether spoken by Palestinians or Mizrahi Jews, faced opposition as fervent as that directed at Yiddish.