Catalan Language - Research Proposal Example

Catalan Language From the Romance languages group, the Catalan language came into existence during the time period of 8th and 10th Centuries on either side of Pyrenees, in the regions of Carolingian Empire that gave birth to the counties of Spanish March. The 12th and 13th centuries marked the spread of Catalan Language from southwards to eastwards with conquests of Catalan Aragonese Crown, and also the linguistic border was established in Jaume 1st reign. It is widely spoken in 68,000 kilometers square area where there are 12, 529, 127 people residing. This area is further divided into almost seven territories in four states known as Spain, Andorra, Italy, and France. As with many languages, it is also spread in many geographical regions such as Northern, Central or Roussillon, Balearic, Northwestern, dialect of Alghero located in Sardinia, and Valencian. The Balearic Islands is the fashionable name of Catalan dialect in Comunitat Valenciana infamous Statute of Autonomy of 1982: the Valencian (Jaspaert, 1991). It is important to still learn about Catalan Language because it is spoken by around 11 million people around the world. It is a language which is derived from neo-Latin language such as Italian, Spanish, French, Rumanian, and Portuguese. Because of the geographical location of the language, it has many similar features of Spanish basically in its morphology and also French in its phonetic vocabulary and system. In particular, it is somewhat like the Occitian languages and also the Old Provncal Catalan is still spoken in four of the European states known as Andorra, Italy, France, and Spain. The distribution begins with Andorra being the official language, then Land of Valencia, Balearic Islands, Catalonia, and Eastern Aragon (co-official). Subsequently, comes the Catalunya Nord which is in the Southeast of France and has a non-official status. The last in the distribution is the Sardinian city of Alghero also having the non-official status (Bourhis, 1977). The population residing in this region who speaks Catalan is as follows: around ninety six percent of the people are in Spain; three percent are in France, and 0.6 percent are in Andorra with 0.4 percent in Italy. The people who speak Catalan cover an area of around sixty eight thousand square kilometers, and has a population of 11, 4000,000 people. Of this population, about 9,900,000 can comprehend Catalan and 7,200,000 can speak it. Catalan Culture has given demonstrations of arts and humanities and also the scientific research. The ecological location of the Catalonia and territories where Catalan culture and language are based made it a doorway for entrance in this area of novel trends in the European currents and art as a piece of thought. Another highly important capital city, Barcelona, played an eminent role in bolstering the Catalan culture and the science both beyond and within the borders of Catalonia (Austin, 1962). Most of the scholars researching on Catalan language have devised that the knowledge of this language as being official language is not consistent, because of the diversity of political and historical events. The rejuvenation of electoral rolls and censuses of years 1986, 1991, 1996 and 2001 were used to find out information on the amount of linguistic knowledge. These surveys give us an idea that the averaged number of people who can speak Catalan is 9, 118, 882, and those who can comprehend is 11,011, 168. Furthermore, the regions where Catalan is not spoken, the areas where Catalan is spoken, is extended around the globe, and about more than 200,000 people still use Catalan at home (Jaspaert, 1991) The development of Catalan literature began in Hispania Terraconenis, a Roman province. The fall and break down of Roman Empire brought many successive attacks. The Arabs (Moors) from 711-717 AD to Visigoths (in 414 AD) conquered the whole Peninsula, nut their languages had little or no impact on Catalan literature and art and language. In the period 778, the Franks of Charlemagne subjugated a little strip towards the south of Pyrenees with Barcelona and made the so called Marca Hispania (the Spanish mark) as a shield for the Muslims. The local romance phrase since it came into existence was in close ties with Southern Gaul language also called the Occitan language. In this time period, the Provencial was regarded as a language of status and was accepted by Catalonian troubadours too. Despite of the many influences from Catalan, Gaul, and never unspecified the two-case system of declension, which is a distinctive system of Occitan and French (Bourhis, 1977). The end of the 10th Century marked the beginning of fully formed Catalan language, which was lucidly evident and different from origins of Latin. It emerged initially in the written documents when the second half of 12th Century began which were a time period of charter and six sermons, which was written in late 12th or in the beginning of 13th century in Homilies of Organya. It is the initial present text which was originally written in Catalan. The Catalan poetry was abundantly spread from the 13th Century, before the time the Catalan poet even wrote Provencal. The first genuine CCatalan poet was called Roman Llull (1235 to 1316), and also the biggest Catalan poet was called Ausias March who was a Valencian (Jaspaert, 1991) The 13th and 14th Centuries are the point of zenith of geographical growth in the Iberian peninsula through the takeover of kingdoms of Murcia and Valencia. This language also penetrated in the Mediterranean region through conquer of kingdoms of Athens, Naples, Sicily, Majorca, Sardinia (which still has a population of Catalan speaking people), Athens, Neopatria, and Peloponnese. The era of Catalan began which speeded around the five states in the Mediterranean region to be ruled by Catalan dynasties. Because of the royal Chancellery, whose fashion and style were powerfully manipulating the Catalan writing, the writing style of 14th and 15th Centuries was also highlighted by this huge uniformity degree (Jaspaert, 1991) The dynamism of Catalan was restored till Aragonese and Castilian union in the year 1474. After this unison, the grammatical works that came perished. After the Spanish Succession War (1705-1715), Philip V eliminated all of the government institutions which were prevalent in Catalonia and executed these Spanish laws. The language of Catalan survived many periods of metamorphoses and exclusions and also oppression, starting with Decretos de Nueva planta, also called the Decrees of New Freedom of 1716 (Gal, 1979). The resurgence or renaissance started in late 19th century with economic growth of Catalonia. It was reborn as a literacy culture language via poetry contest called as Jocs Florals or Floral Games. The first language of Catalan in 1906 attracted some three thousand participants and also the Institut d’Estudis Catalans began. It published in 1913 as Normes ortografigues (Spelling Rues)and Spelling Dictionary in 1917. The Catalan Grammar came into existence in 1918 by Pompeu Fabra. The Second Republic assured that Catalan was re-established as a n official language status, but the enduring expansion was tartan by Civil War and its outbursts. This usage of Catalan in the public was not allowed and language was withdrawn at home. Barcelona University was a chair in the language of Catalan literature and art was not established till 1961. Since the restoration of these democratic institutions, the procedures was re-instated in Catalan usage (Gal, 1979). The impediment of Catalan language and literature is in a dispute as whether the Catalan is widely related to Gallo-Romance or Ibero-Romance languages. The Medieval Catalan was close to Lemosi, which is the literacy dialect of this Occitan in the southern Gaul, which is why many scholars believe it has been taken from somewhere outside Pyrenees in the voyage of refugees from Moors. In the modern era, Catalans, somewhat, have been made as close as Argonese and Castilian, so this is the family-tree distinction which becomes less permanent over time. It was sometimes known as Llemosi in the 19th Century by Catalan revivalists. But those who preferred independence from other Iberian languages stressed upon its relevancy to Occitan (Jaspaert, 1991) Even in the middle Ages, there was no substantiation of dialectalization, because the influence on standardization in its power of Kingdom of Aragon, ever since its change to dialects of Balearic and Valencia Isles, particularly, which have intended to distinguish from Central Barcelona dialect. Nonetheless, there is some degree of uniformity still prevalent in literary language, which still flourishes. The two basic dialects of modern Catalan in Occidental further divided into Valencian and North-West Catalan, and also Oriental divided into Balearic, Central dialect, Algurese (spoken in Sardinia, Alghero, where it was introduced in 14th Century) and Roussillonnais. All of these dialects, except Algurese are further divided into sub dialects, eighteen of which were identified (Heller, 1988). These numerous dialects are relatively different in minor perspectives such as vocabulary, pronunciation details, verb conjugation which are easily reciprocally intelligible. These differences in dialects are not shown in written language. The Catalan Studies Institute is solely accountable for making and frequently updating the normal standard language, which is relied on the dialect of Barcelona with few ad mixtures from Valencian. No one all of a sudden speaks the language, but it is used by media and writing. The Valencians- despite the intellectual affluent- are basically disposed to believe their speech as a distinguished language. For many historical reasons, a number of Valencian people are profoundly distrustful, and antagonistic towards Catalans. The main rightist party of Unio Valenciana bolsters this emotion, and between other things, it calls for a linguistic secession by imparting a differentiated orthography (Giles, 1979). Catalan is taught as a detached subject and is also used as teaching medium in all educational levels in Catalonia. Children study Catalan in school in the immersion programs. The Catalan autonomous government likes the full authority over these elementary schools, the nine universities of the region and the secondary schools as well. This condition in Valencia and also the Balearic Islands is diverse. Ever since the democracy was reestablished in 1977, the Balearics were then ruled over by pan-Spanish that is the non-nationalistic parties, which were on one side not against the Catalan language introduction at school, and not really eager to perform it as a fast speed too. The situation in Valencia is weaker than that in the Balearic Islands. Even though the government of Valencia controls education, the efforts are aimlessly aimed at using the Catalan dialect at school. The public support for these initiatives is not appropriate either. Furthermore, the Valencian groups are also involved in demanding the Catalan language unity, as an integral part of anti-Catanism effort (Simmons, 1998) The first books on Catalan language are Forum ludicum and also Les Homilies d’Organya, which were both formed in the 12th Century. These Catalan literature went through a prominent growth as creation and government language among 13th and 16th centuries, the time when Catalan Aragonese crown went through reign in Siciliy, Naples, Athens, and Mediterranean. In the literary workd of university, this period was highlighted by Ramon Llull as a modern, yet native and thousand year old voice. The Dante, the four Croniques that were presented by Ramon Muntaner were deemed as first contemporary novel in the western world. This relationship in Italy means that the translations of this Divine Comedy was Catalan by Andreu Febrer, the writer who changed thee great literature works into Catalan, including Decameron (Milroy, 1980) The alteration in the main course of language Catalan in everyday life, the collection was done by asking questions to participants to demonstrate that whether they learn the language in early life in a comparison to present language which is still known as main language in their daily lives. In many cases, this language was known for both of the categories. But, few participants in certain groups said that their present language was different than old Catalan (Báez, 1977). The sample size drawn was of two thousand people who say that their everyday language Catalan is dissimilar to their old language. Fifty percent of the people said that Catalan spoken at their home varied but about thirty percent said that it varies in their workplace. These all members of the population form a sociolinguistic network. Twenty five percent of participants said that their mother and father have changed the course of the language as compared to their native language. However around five percent said that it was their mother and wife who have modified the language. Even though it was a minute sample, these findings are related to Martin of 1998 who said that a former shift ignites the new shift. Around ten percent of the people said that their children speak a different version of Catalan in comparison to them. It is possible that nuptials between people of different sociolinguistic group transformed the sociolinguistic network and environment of a participant, by giving the power to other language group and also gives credit as a legal speaker of language of that group. All the participants were bilingual in Spanish and Catalan. These findings demonstrated that one individual can report more than one kind of modification. The data also showed study samples towards Catalan usage more, as the standard percents of each of the groups indicated usage of Spanish and Catalan. This is known that Catalan has been recently made an official language again after it was limited, and there was no transformation in Castilian official status. The contemporary study has many hinders and is not that effective; but; in considering the many aspects of this language problem transformation in enhancing the theoretical and questionnaires indications relating to the linguistic mobility of many different individuals in the linguistic markets. This current scenario in Spanish and Catalan dialect is energetic in official language planning and policy and also in interpersonal situations. References Austin, J. L. 1962. How to do things with words. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Báez de Aguilar González, Francisco. 1997. El conflicto lingüístico de los emigrantes castellanohablantes en Barcelona. Universidad de Malaga. Bourhis, R., H. Giles. 1977. The language of intergroup distinctiveness. In Howard Giles, (Ed.), Language,ethnicity and intergroup relations (pp. 119-135). London: Academic Press. Gal, Susan. 1979. Language shift: Social determinants of language change in bilingual Austria. New York: Academic Press. Giles, H., R.Y. Bourhis, D.M. Taylor. 1977. Towards a theory of language in ethnic group Relations. In Howard Giles, (Ed.), Language, ethnicity and intergroup relations(pp. 307-346). London: Academic Press. Giles, Howard and Philip Smith. 1979. Accommodation theory: Optimal levels of convergence. Heller, Monica, (Ed.). 1988a. Codeswitching: Anthropological and sociolinguistic perspectives. Amsterdam: Mouton de Gruyter. Jaspaert, Koen and Sjaak Kroon. 1991. Social determinants of language shift by Italians in the Netherlands and Flanders. International Journal of the Sociology of Language, 90, 77-96. Milroy, Lesley. 1980. Language and social networks. Oxford: Blackwell. ... Read More