The Concept of the Judeo–Spanish Language in Kalmi Baruh’s Writings: A Sociolinguistic Case Study

The focus of present research is on the attitudes and beliefs that Kalmi Baruh (Sarajevo 1896 – Bergen-Belsen 1945) manifested towards Judeo-Spanish language throughout his writings. Interested in an in-depth study of this language, his mother tongue, the author was determined to include both diachronic and synchronic perspective in his philological inquiries. Moreover, Baruh was an active supporter of the maintenance of Judeo-Spanish in Bosnian and Yugoslav milieu, in which this language was generally perceived by local Sephardim as “obsolete” and “incapable” of expressing modern concepts and ideas. Due to his efforts, he had well deserved the name of “the father of Hispanic Studies in Yugoslavia” (Vidaković Petrov 2016: 169).

The corpus of the paper consists of Baruh’s publications pertaining to scientific, periodical and popular aspects of his work. The selected texts were published between the two world wars and written in Serbo-Croatian and Judeo-Spanish. Although the author’s ideas related to language were dispersed all over his writings, in which the main concepts were often repeated, I argue that critical sociolinguistic analysis of his attitudes and beliefs offer valuable data for further research on Sephardic language and culture, but also provide an insight into ideologies that prevailed during a turning point period for the maintenance/shift of Judeo-Spanish.