eSefarad Noticias del Mundo Sefaradi
In a ceremony at the Spanish Ambassador to Israel’s residence last Tuesday evening, Prof. Tamar Alexander was awarded the Order of Civil Merit at the direction of His Majesty King Juan Carlos I of Spain. The Order of Civil Merit was created in 1926 and is bestowed upon Spanish nationals and foreign nationals for their contribution to Spain.
In a letter from the ambassador, Fernando Carderera, Alexander was praised for “promoting bilateral relations between Israel and Spain and her contribution to research about Sephardic Jewry and the heritage of Spain in the Middle Ages.” At the ceremony, Alexander talked about her work, about her Sephardic roots and about the relationship between Spain and Israel. She delivered her remarks in Ladino to great appreciation from the audience. Itzhak Navon, the fifth president of Israel and the head of the National Authority for Ladino Culture, was among the guests.
Alexander is the founder and director of the Moshe David Gaon Center for Ladino Culture. The center focuses on promoting Sephardic culture in five tracks: research; teaching; art and culture; community; and public relations. The center publishes an academic journal called El Prezente and a bulletin called El Kontakto, both edited by Alexander.
Incumbent of the Estelle S. Frankfurter Chair in Sephardic Studies, Alexander researches, among other things, Sephardic folklore, and has published 10 books and 100 articles. She has been chair of the Department of Hebrew Literature twice and is the head of the folklore unit.
Past recipients of the medal include Placido Domingo, Angel Sanz Briz, and Gideon Saar. Also honored on Tuesday night were Colette Avital, Enrico Zimmerman, and Prof. Ruth Fine.
Fuente: Ben-Gurion University of the Negev
