Linguistic diversity in Spain
When you pronounce the name of a country often associated with this fossilized stereotypes, its use and abuse, in the lore. The simplification involved the topic leads to a uniform and distorted image of the complex and varied realities that can offer any State which has a long history. Thus, it would seem that in Spain all the people enjoy a nap, drink wine or sangria, eat paella, like the bullfights and speak Spanish. No one can say that the previous sentence is completely false, not to be true, but that does not conform to reality, and reality in Spain is a plural concept that requires much more nuanced than this article can offer. On the lines will not be discussed here start of cuisines or morals, but of that essential part of culture posed by language and how languages are closely tied to the identity of human communities, identities, moreover are hardly comparable.
The Spanish speak Spanish, but not only Spanish, a large proportion of the population is bilingual and sometimes trilingual. Castilian, in a continuous historical progress reached every corner of the Spanish territory, crossed the seas and lodged in distant places of the Iberian Peninsula, especially in America, where it grows vigorously enrich the important collection of Spanish speakers. This Spanish language or Spanish, the two names now respond to the same language, is made possible by a wealth of dialects and varieties, some of these forms of speech will deal with this text, but will have particular responsibility of the other languages that exist on Spanish soil.
The word "dialect" motivates often defensiveness and can hurt some sensibilities, as strange reaction that we all speak a dialect, since language is always an abstract entity that encompasses the various ways in which it occurs. Is not proposed to revive the controversy and used the word "tongue" in its broadest sense, to understand that when we speak of a standard language refers to an object existing only in textbooks and dictionaries, but not in life daily, in which we communicate with our own varieties of a language distinct from others.
At present there are four, at least, the most spoken languages in Spain: three have their origin in Latin, Spanish, Catalan and Galician, the fourth is older and its origin has not been determined, it is the Basque language or Euskara (Euskara in Basque). To these can add Aranese Gascon dialect spoken in the Aran Valley, which is also an official language processing in its territory. Moreover, the Aragonese and Leon are two groups of speakers who, from the Latin, failed to gain the recognition of languages and today are considered dialects of Spanish. A map accompanies this text with the objective of bringing about in the peninsula of languages spoken in Spain and also the main dialects of Spanish in the country (the Canary Islands do not appear on the map although there is no mention of important dialect canary). However, the map would have little value unless it offered minimal historical notes on the evolution of those languages.
Prior to the arrival of the Romans and was spoken in the north of the Iberian Peninsula Basque, one that resisted the intense language romanization mainland, the South was occupied by the Turdetani, the Iberians inhabited the east and toward the century VII JC, Celts settled in the area of modern Galicia, the highland regions of Central and large areas of the South. It's easy to think that there were other people, all with their own languages. With the Roman occupation began a process of unification which introduced the Latin language in most of the territory. The Latin spoken by the inhabitants of the peninsula was called Vulgar Latin, with influences from the previous languages. Towards the V century the invasion of the Germans to adopt the new Latin and exert an influence on the language of the Romans. Subsequently, the occupation of the Arab force Christians to retreat to the north of the Peninsula and settled in more protected areas and more difficult access in these areas of North and because of the lack of communication between them would evolve language differently in the various pockets of resistance and lead to different Spanish languages derived from Latin, from East to West: Catalan, Aragonese, Castilian, Leonese and Galician. The progress of Christians spread southward those languages which continued its development with obvious influences of the Arabic language. A start from the tenth century to write texts in different languages that will become the evidence of his independence from the Latin and between them.
The current status of the languages spoken in Spain is very uneven, Spanish is spoken throughout the country and also from the Transition to Democracy in the last quarter century, there has been a process of recognition and recovery of different cultural and linguistic identities, with obvious difficulties, have resisted pressure for a long time it was only officially recognized language. The map is intended to reflect the geographic location of the main dialects of Spanish in the Iberian Peninsula and also of languages other than Spanish and, therefore, the least known. The following lines try to outline some circumstances of each of these languages.
Catalan
It is considered that the Catalan spoken appears between the eighth and ninth centuries. The first written texts in Catalan, which are documented twelfth century, are the "Liber iudiciorum, translation into Catalan of a Visigothic law code, and" Homilies d'Organyà, the first text written directly in Catalan, which discussed some passages from the Gospels. The Catalan language was the language of the Crown of Catalonia-Aragon, constantly expanding Mediterranean power in the Middle Ages. Between the XIII and XV was taken to the Balearic Islands and Valencia, Sardinia, Sicily, Naples and Greece. The literary educated in Catalan suffered a decline since the sixteenth to the eighteenth century but never stopped talking. Since the nineteenth century a new stage of literary splendor and standardization that will give way to setting the rules of this language during the twentieth century.
Currently, the Catalan language is spoken in four European countries: Spain, the regions of Catalonia, the Balearic Islands, Valencia, Aragon and Murcia (the "Strip" of Aragon, formed by the surrounding areas of Catalonia three Aragonese provinces, and the Carxe, territory close to the Valencian Community); Andorra, which is the only official language, France, in five regions integrated into the Department of Pyrenees-Orientales, Italy, l'Alghero and Alghero, city of Italy, Sardinia, province of Sassari.
It is estimated that the Catalan language is understood by nine million people and is spoken by more than seven million people, making it the seventh European language on the number of speakers.
In 1861, Manuel Milà i Fontanals established the Catalan dialect division into two parts, West and East, mainly based on phonetic criteria. Eastern Catalan together four dialects: Roussillon, central, Balearic Algherese and their sub-dialects. Western Catalan Catalan is divided into north-western "and Valencian.
In Valencia, for political reasons, the Valencian Catalan or Valencian language called officially.
Galician
The Galician language was formed in the zone between north and south of the Rio Minho. In the twelfth century the northern Urraca was given to his father, Alfonso VI of Castile and Leon, who assigned the southern area from the Minho to the Tagus, to her other daughter, Dona Teresa. The extreme rivalry between the two resulted in the subsequent independence of Portugal and the border between the two kingdoms favored the progressive splitting of the Galician-Portuguese in two different languages from the fifteenth century. During the thirteenth century, Galician-Portuguese, was the language of poetry along with Provencal. For this reason, Alfonso X, which led to a definite contribution of the Spanish language, wrote his poems in Galician-Portuguese language as this is the most prestigious for the composition in verse. After this golden age suffered centuries of decline, but not stopped talking, and resurfaced in the nineteenth century with the Romantic writers.
Galician is spoken by more than two million people and its standardization process has caused a controversy between those who defend the current situation of the language and those who would like a closer to the Portuguese. This latter language has a presence on Spanish territory in some border areas of Castilla and Extremadura.
Basque or Euskera
The oldest language among which are spoken in Spain has nearly a million speakers. Its territory occupies most of the Basque Country and the northern half of Navarra and runs through France, the Netherlands Department of the Pyrenees, where it reaches one hundred thousand speakers.
His situation is very different from the other languages mentioned:
First, its origin is uncertain, some theories suggest a kinship with the Caucasian languages spoken between Russia and Turkey, other study its relationship with some African languages, neither of the two theories can be based on acceptable evidence and the origin of this language remains an enigma. It is known that is not an Indo-European language that was spoken before the Roman conquest of the peninsula in a large area of the North, between Cantabria and the Aran valley minimum ("Aran" is a place name of Basque origin, "plow" means valley).
Secondly, Euskera has no secular literary tradition of the Romance languages, the Basques used the Castilian language of culture for a long time and was for centuries Euskera locked in a rural family.
The revival of the language, which began in the nineteenth century, prompted a literature that has gained momentum and has already prestigious authors.
There are seven varieties of Euskera, from them is called Euskera unified "batua" currently being taught in schools in the Basque Country.
Aranese
The Aran Valley is an area in the central part of the Pyrenees, in the Catalan province of Lleida. The registered population is around 7,000. The situation of the valley, facing France, and its difficult access for centuries from Catalonia and Aragon favored the preservation of the language Aran, which is actually a dialect of Gascon.
The Occitan language belongs to the Romance languages or Latin-and consists of five dialect groups: the Provencal, the Limousin, the languedocino, the Auvergne and Gascony. Of the five groups, the Catalan is farthest from the Gascony. Gascon is a set of dialects, missing some French spoken in Gascony. Aranese is one of those dialects, but their isolation and the fact that it has lost give legal treatment of language, and is recognized as an official language of the Aran Valley in the Statute of Autonomy of Catalonia, which also recognizes the autonomy and their own institutions Valley (Conselh Generau d'Aran).
Aranese is the language of instruction in all preschools and primary Aran Valley. The native population of the Aran Valley speaks, therefore, three languages.
Respect it is recalled that the Spanish is the official language of Spain and co-official in communities where other languages are spoken by Spaniards who have been recognized in their respective statutes of autonomy. It has several dialects in the Spanish territory, including: the Aragonese (held in the valleys near the Pyrenees), Leonese, Asturian or Bable (actually it is a set of dialects very close together, called likely, spoken in Asturias) and southern dialects as the Andalusian (set of common features have spoken), canary, Extremadura (Spanish-based dialect and influence of Leon) and Murcia (Spanish-based dialect, but with many features of Aragon and of Valencia). Moreover, the dividing line between the north of Aragon and Catalonia has an area of Catalan and Aragonese transition, which can highlight the Benasque.
To conclude this brief should be mentioned slang variant of Romani spoken by Gypsies and Arabic dialects spoken in the African territories of Ceuta, Melilla and in areas that are hosting large numbers of North African immigrants in recent years .
Final clarification and references
Like it on Facebook, Tweet it or share this article on other bookmarking websites.