Reflections on Yiddish Barcelona 2026

The Fortunoff Archive is proud to have supported Yiddish Barcelona 2026 (Yiddish Barcelona), the first edition of an intensive Yiddish summer program based at Casa Adret in Barcelona’s historic Jewish quarter.

It was a unique opportunity for participants to be introduced to the development and collection of the Fortunoff Video Archive while engaging with video testimonies in Judeo-Spanish, Yiddish, and Spanish. In the afternoons and evenings, the program featured cultural activities in various venues throughout the city, a guided tour of the old Jewish quarter, the screening of a film in Yiddish, and poetry readings in Yiddish, with Catalan and Judeo-Spanish translations.

Congratulations to organizers Violeta Bronstein, Malena Chinski, and Golda van der Meer, who wrote a short recap of the program:

“We deem the collaboration between the Fortunoff Archive and Yiddish Barcelona an important step in raising awareness on the linguistic dimension of Holocaust testimonies, and on the necessity of transmitting Jewish languages as a means for shaping new audiences for oral testimonies, and new readers for written sources.”

“The public lecture series (July 21-23), which focused extensively on Holocaust testimonies and Holocaust literature, both in Yiddish and in translation, enabled the program to reach a broader audience interested in Yiddish language and culture. The session devoted to the Fortunoff Video Archives, held at the University of Barcelona on July 21, introduced students, researchers and members of the audience to the Archiveʼs unique collections, methodology and mission. More broadly, the session opened new perspectives for future collaboration between the Fortunoff Archive and the University of Barcelona.”

Thank you for the support provided by: Mozaika Universitat de Barcelona.

And Yiddish Barcelona collaborators: Estudios Judíos Barcelona, Goethe-Institut Barcelona, Call de Girona, Cinema Jueu, Toldot, Consulado General de Alemania.