Conference on Jewish Cultures in Latin America – When Yiddish Met Tango
Jewish people from Central and Eastern Europe (Ashkenazim) brought their linguistic, literary, and musical traditions with them to Latin America. There, these traditions were preserved, further developed, and blended with new influences. The conference, conducted in English, focuses primarily on developments in major cities such as Buenos Aires in Argentina, São Paulo in Brazil, and Montevideo in Uruguay. Researchers are exploring, for example, how Yiddish songs, klezmer (traditional Jewish instrumental music), and theater music intersected with tango, samba, and bossa nova, and how experiences of migration and other social issues were reflected in the music.
The program for the two-day event features topics related to Yiddish culture — ranging from theater in Argentina to literature in Cuba and Mexico, to Argentinian writer Jorge Luis Borges’s engagement with Kabbalah, the Jewish mystical tradition. In doing so, the conference brings together scholarship and artistic practice: A significant part of the overall project consists of artistic research, the results of which will be presented on Sunday at 5:00 p.m. in the spectacular concert “Yiddish Tango: Jewish Music from Latin America.” The concert is sponsored by the Alfried Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach Foundation.
Starting at 2:30 p.m. on Sunday, the organizers will screen the documentary “The Exile of the Musicians.”
The conference is part of a multi-year collaborative project on Jewish cultures in Latin America, led by Prof. Dr. Susanne Zepp-Zwirner, professor of Spanish and Hispanic American literature at the University of Duisburg-Essen, and Prof. Dr. Diana Matut, director of the Alte Synagoge in Essen. The Rothschild Foundation is funding the project.
Event details:
When? October 18 and 19, 2026, starting at 10 a.m. each day
Where? Alte Synagoge – House of Jewish Culture, Edmund-Körner-Platz 1, 45127 Essen
Admission is free; registration is not required.
Further information:
For further information and program details, please see this link.
Contact person: Prof. Dr. Susanne Zepp-Zwirner, Spanish and Latin American Literature, Tel. 0201/18 3-3891, susanne.zeppzwirner@uni-due.de