Chica Brown from San Jose State University wrote:

Dear Rabbi,

Hello, my name is Chica Brown and I'm a senior at San Jose State University and I'm looking for some information on the Jewish community for a presentation I'm doing. My class is in communications - language, meaning and culture - and the group I'm working with chose the Jewish community. How does the Jewish community communicate? Verbal, non-verbal? What language is used?

Dear Chica Brown,

Jews usually talk with their hands (just kidding). We communicate in all languages, since there are Jews all over the world. Jews speak a variety of languages, including English, Spanish, French, Arabic, German, Russian, even Chinese and Japanese. In Israel, the main language is Hebrew.

Jews in Europe and Spain developed their own language. In Europe the Jews spoke Yiddish, which is based on German, and in Spain they developed Ladino, which is based on Spanish.

Chica Brown responds:

Thank you so much, I gave my speech on Monday and it turned out very interesting and I'm sure I got an "A."

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