Talk:Judeo-Berber language

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This article is about a person, place, or concept whose name is originally rendered in the Berber script; however the article does not have that version of its name in the article's lead paragraph. Anyone who is knowledgeable enough with the original language is invited to assist in adding the Berber script.

For more information, see Wikipedia:Manual of Style (Berber).

[edit] judeo-berber speaking jews

is there an ethnic name for judeo-berber speaking jews? are they part of the mizrahim and/or maghrebim?

i'm finally getting around to signing the above post. Gringo300 07:51, 8 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] ethnonym for Judæo-Berber speaking communities

Maghrebim is not a Jewish ethnonym, it refers only to the location of a large number of Jewish communities, which were predominantly Ladino or Judæo-Arabic speaking. The Ladino-speaking communities were sephardim, and the Judæo-Arabic speaking communities were either sefardim or "mizrachim". The Judæo-Berber speaking communities are mostly just considered mizrachim. You seem to have a penchant for wanting to classify Jews, almost to the point of obsession. I don't know why. You should understand, the term "Mizrachim" is not an ethnonym, it's actually an epithet used by the anti-religious elements in the 1950's ashkenazi community in Israel, and to a lesser within the sefardi community, to refer to "those strange eastern Jews". This is covered briefly in the article at Mizrahi Jew and on the talk page there. Tomer ^TALK 20:32, Apr 5, 2005 (UTC)

the question is: who started the idea of subclassifications of jews in the first place? i'm under the impression that it was the jews themselves, but i could be wrong.

i'm also currently working on documenting the names of all indian tribes (native american, not india) and african ethnic groups.

First, I hope you're not offended that I've altered your previous post's format slightly. Please refer to Talk:205.208.159.171 for more information, if you haven't already read what I've written there.

To answer your question, I think that you're concentrating too much on "classification" as opposed to "identification". Jews do not "classify" each other as "ashkenazi" or "sephardi", or even as "mizrachi" or "etyopi" or whatever. These words refer to community origins first, and secondarily to community traditions, not to community identity. An ashkenazi Jew might feel somewhat lost at certain points in a Parsi synagogue, but that's because the liturgy is slightly different. For instance, the specific Psalms used to welcome some certain holiday in one community might be used in another community to welcome only the sabbath, or be used only on the 4th day of passover when the 4th day of passover is a monday. In such a case, the Ashkenazi Jew in the Parsi synagogue would be equally confused as the Parsi would be in an Ashkenazi synagogue. "Wha? Why are we saying tehilim for chol hamoed pesach to welcome shabat!?" In fact, even between various Ashkenazi communities there are numerous differences in liturgy, just as there are between various Sephardi communities. If you want to try to understand divisions in Judaism from outside the Jewish world, it's best to first shuck the idea that such divisions will in any way be comprehensible through analogy with Christian divisions. Next, shuck the idea that the divisions are geographical, regardless of how much homogeneity might be found in certain areas. Many times, Jewish communities with vastly different traditions have coexisted quite peacefully within even the same city (cf. the Jewish communities in Saloniki and Istanbul...in both cases, there were three distinct Jewish communities, each maintaining its own distinct traditions, yet comfortably interacting with each other regularly as Jews). That said, what you imagine as "classifications" were indeed first applied by Jews to each other, not as an indication of ethnic differences, but as geographic identifiers. Hence, "Ashkenazi", from the Hebrew word "Ashkenaz", meaning "Germany". To this day, "Ashkenazi" means "German". "Tzarfat" is "France", and "Tzarfati" is "French(man)". "Sfarad" is "Spain", "Sfaradi" is "Spaniard". Over time, some of these geographic terms have taken on ethnic connotations, but evenso, they're not "classifications". Tomer ^TALK 06:19, Apr 6, 2005 (UTC)

i know little about the berbers, except that i've heard that they are hamites. so far, i know far less about the hamites than i do about the semites(shemites), though i'm working on learning more about them.

Again, PLEASE, stop using horizontal rules to separate your comments within a thread from those comments preceding them. If you haven't yet read them, PLEASE, review my comments at Talk:205.208.159.171. That said, I find your obsession with classifications to be uniquely disturbing. The classification of the Berbers as "Hamites" is an outgrowth of the thoroughly-debunked racial theory nonsense of the late 19th century. While the Berber languages are classified as the "Hamite" part of the "Hamito-Semitic" language family, this classification, not only of the Berber languages, but even of this name for the language family, has long since fallen into disuse, not because, as many pro-racist theorists presume, because of "political correctness", but because there is neither ethnological nor linguistic evidence sufficient to support such a division between the "Hamite" and "Semite" languages. Tomer ^TALK 10:10, Apr 6, 2005 (UTC)

ok, now it's afro-asiatic instead of hamito-semitic. but then, i've long heard that the term "asiatic" is considered derogatory.

the hamitic thing... yes, about ham and a drunk, naked noah... whatever that is supposed to be about... i've always failed to see the alleged significance.

i'll sign this as gringo300. i'm finally getting around to doing so... Gringo300 10:15, 8 October 2005 (UTC)