Languages and Dialects of Spain Essay

With a population of approximately 45 meg Spaniards and 3. 5 million immigrants, Spain is a estate of contrasts where the richness of its culture blends it up with the variety of addresss and dialects use. Being unmatched of the largest economies worldwide, and the second largest kingdom in Europe, Spain is a very appealing destination for tourists as well as for immigrants from rough the globe.Almost all Spaniards are used to telling at to the lowest degree two different spoken communications, but encourageing and preserving that make up has not been blue for them Spaniards have had to struggle with war, ignorance, criticism and the governments, in order to preserve and give what identifies them, and deal with the consequences ( virtually of which are good and some of which are bad) of dealing with this multilingual society they have. Spanish-Town-Guides, 2002-2011) In Spain in that respect are 17th autonomous kingdoms, the authorised row spoken in each neighbourh ood is Spanish or Castilian, however, thither are three other recognized regional vocabularys used throughout the country (Wikipedia contributors, 2011) Catalan (spoken in Catalonia, Valencian Community, and Balearic Islands), Basque (spoken in Basque Country and Navarre), and Galician, (spoken in Galicia) (Wikipedia contributors, 2011).Distributed throughout Spain there are a variety of smaller groups or regions with their own dialects, most of them Latin derivatives (as well as the master(prenominal) languages) Arag angiotensin converting enzymese (spoken in Aragon, Huesca and Zaragoza), Asturian (spoken in Asturias),Calo (known as the language of the gypsies), Valencian and Mallorquin (Both dialects from Catalan and spoken in Valencia and Mallorca), Extremaduran (spoken in Extremadura), Occitan (also considered as a dialect of Catalan) and Gascon (that is considered a dialect of Occitan) (About. com, 2011). severally region? government has put all the efforts to create laws t o ensure that people in all regions verbalize and practice their own language (Council of Europe, 2011) such is the movement of Catalonia which is the region where there have been much efforts to preserve language.In Catalonia, there are no mails where natives do not know Catalan or any of the dialects from it, and even foreigners living there must(prenominal) deal with this chip since, in order to find a job, they need to learn to converse Catalan otherwise, it will be very difficult to get hired, and friendly life female genitals be expressage as well since veryone somewhat uses Catalan to communicate (Abanco, 1998). Spaniards, especially in Catalonia, Basque Country and Galicia have rear very protective of their own languages and dialects, since they outright their extinction during Francoist period, which make them support to ensure their languages remain being an measur fitting area, if not the most important part, of their life and their societies (Wikipedia con tributors, 2011).Each region, with a language different than Castilian, is an avid suspect of their language article 3 of the Spanish Constitution (About the Castilian and the other Spaniard languages) states 1. Castilian is the ordained Spanish language of the State. All Spaniards have the duty to know it and the right to use it. . 2. The other Spanish languages shall also be official in the respective Self-governing Regions in accordance with their Statutes. and 3.The wealth of the different linguistic modalities of Spain is a cultural heritage which shall be specially respected and protect (Cortes Generales de Espana, 1978).This decree has helped to repair the damage caused during Francoist period (in which Spain was under the authoritarian totalism of Francisco Franco) from 1936 to 1975, when some(prenominal) of the regional languages were almost lost since they were forbidden an ironic particular since general Franco was born in A Coruna, one of Galicia? s main cities, wh ere Galician is more used than Castilian to communicate (Eric Solsten and Sandra W. Meditz, 1988).When the civil war ended, in 1975, and, in response to the oppression suffered for many years, some regions (especially Catalonia) began their efforts to preserve and enhance their languages. convey to those efforts Catalans can be proud to acknowledge that their languages and dialects are the most well-kept, normalized and maintain in the country, their continuous fight since the very end of war and their dress just rough using their language has giving them the courage to embrace and protect both, their language and their identity in such way that, in Catalonia, Castilian is limit to those who are foreigners and Catalan to natives.Unfortunately, a very different thing has happened in Galicia and Basque Country since, by the end of war, the governments of both regions were more c at a timerned about political affairs than preserving languages. In Basque Country, the reason for these lack of protectionism towards language was the persecution Basques suffer during the Civil War, they were accused of terrorism whenever they spoke in their own language they were hunted and killed for this reason, and all of these actions made them a little afraid of defend language even years after the end of war.Something similar happened in Galicia, where there were no efforts to maintain language after the war. It was years later that governments started to make efforts to preserve and rescue the language and to normalize it and make it mandate in each school around the region, but the accurate and unclouded versions of them got lost with time and what unexampled generations plow to twenty-four hour period is a categorization of old and new words adapted from the original language, but salvage it is quite far from the original, unaltered version of each language.The dialects in Spain share, in most of the cases, the corresponding origin (most of the times Vulgar L atin), and the same language (for example Valencian is a dialect of Catalan) it can be thought, then, that communication in a language different than Spanish or Castilian is not that hard, and this is unbent but not immaculately even though these dialects tally from the same sources, they differ greatly from each other for example, in Catalonia, they use Catalan as well as in Val d?Aran if an Occitan and a Catalan talk to each other, they will extrapolate most of it but some words are very different, and it will take a secondment of an effort to fully understand the language from one region to another. Each one of the circumstances explained above, the civil war, the immigration, the language protectionism and the normalization, are reasons to understand why Spaniards have become tolerant with languages and dialects they have gone a bulky way in defending their ideals and their identity all of the Spaniards and immigrants must gestate tolerance in return to the rest of the p opulation and accept everybody else? languages.However, not all Spaniards are sympathetic with this language protectionism, Castilian or Spanish utter regions, such as Madrid are very less tolerant they do not understand why one country must be separated more for languages than for borders, and this might be a sound premise, but each region has the right to protect what belongs to it.Languages, in one way, have caused separation among regions because, people consider themselves as Catalans, or Valencians, or Basques, or native of any other regions, more than they consider themselves Spaniards, and many regions are currently fighting for their emancipation (with no positive results so far) since they aim to be free to use their languages and dialects without being criticized and, also, be able to manage their own resources.There are many implications of having one, two or many anguages or dialects spoken in a same country or region, some of them are negative, such as this search f or independence that has caused Spaniards to feel divided, not all of them feel part of the same country and many whish they were not part of the same country at all. Another implication is that communication is limited even when all Spaniards speak Spanish, it is interesting to realize that they have both languages so acquired that they switch from one to the other in just seconds this happens particularly with old people.As a woman married to a Catalan and having traveled to Catalonia a cope with of times, I had the experience of facing this personally, people are so identify in Catalan-mode that one minute they are speaking in Spanish, and the near they are speaking in Catalan without even realizing they change lynchpin and, in my particular case, I found myself reminding everyone to talk to me in Spanish it is an awkward location because you can also feel like an interloper and is tiring to constantly remind everyone to speak in Spanish, and when they did speak in Castilia n, it was hard for me to understand them, since it is quite different from the Spanish or Castilian we speak in Costa Rica.Another negative implication is for immigrants my cousin go to Barcelona eleven years ago she got a scholarship to finish her studies in laws at Universitat de Barcelona. The first problem she had to face was the fact that all her lessons were taught in Catalan and being a native Spanish speaker she snarl very frustrated and worried, and it took many years for her to be able to understand Catalan (only understand it because she does not speak it) she is now living there and after she finished college it was very hard for her to find a job, once again the problem was the lack of Catalan it is very challenging for a foreigner to move there since Catalans are so protective of their language that in order to find a job, people must speak Catalan.The last negative implication, from my point of view, is immigration within the country my nonplus in-law was born in G alicia she learned to speak Galician (the very limited mixture of Galician that was spoken during the war) when she was little and, at the age of nine, with almost her entire primary education finished, her family decided to move to Barcelona searching for a get around life, where she had to deal with Catalan (even though during war it was forbidden to use it on the streets).The same problem happens with, for example, people with military positions, they move from one place to another during the entire military service, and they drag their families along with them children are strained to change from one school to another and from one language to another, and this can cause confusion and frustration reflected on the students behavior and performance in school. Even when there are so many negative implications or consequences related to all the languages in a society, there are reasons to see that there are also positive implications and if there are societies with this kind of s tructure, it is because it works somehow, no matter the problems involved.In contrast to the negative implications mentioned above, there are many other positive implications of being part of a multilingual society, to mention a few, it can be said that, in the particular case of Spain, their citizens have developed the ability to learn new languages very easily they not only speak their official language (Castilian), they also speak they regional language (both native like) and this has helped them to develop more their listening skills and aptitude towards new languages children are born and live in environments filled with language stimuli and learn to communicate effectively in more than one language, making things easier for them to acquire another language.Another example of a positive implication is tolerance, the cross-cultural situation Spaniards live has helped them to be more conscious about their differences and to accept everyone? s believes and culture. The continuous use of languages or dialects to interact with each other is another positive implication, since it has made them to be able to switch languages in a conversation without thinking about it it comes natural to them since being multilingual is not an issue it is just their reality.Spain is a multilingual society which has faced several obstacles in the way of preserving and care their languages and dialects, this protectionism has led to positive, but also negative consequences and implications for its citizens which, day after day deal with it and adjust to this conditions in order to be a part of the society. As challenging as it can be, Spaniards adjust to each situation in order to fit in but of course there are also rewards involved, they are capable to appreciate and understand (at least(prenominal) most of them) what a long way each region has come to preserve their identity and they can embrace, and be empathetic with the reasons each region has for such protectionism.