September 2006

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THE PROTECTION OF VENETIAN TO BE DISCUSSED IN PLENARY SESSION FROM 12 OCTOBER ONWARDS

September 2006 – The Regional Assembly of Veneto, with headquarters in Venice, will start the discussion of a bill on the protection, revalorisation and promotion of the Venetian language on 12 October. Mercator-Legislation had published the bill in Bulletin 65 and now informs on the assembly proceedings, which aims at granting Venetian a greater recognition.

Italy’s Minorities Act 482/99 only recognizes 12 linguistic minorities (French, Occitan, Franco-provençal, Catalan, Albanian, German, Friulian, Ladin, Slovenian, Sardinian, Greek and Croatian). However, there are several independent linguistic varieties –or languages– that developed directly from Latin and are still considered as “dialects”. This is the case of Venetian and Piedmontese. Intelligibility between them and Italian is quite low, and both enjoyed processes of literary standardization mainly during the 18th century.

Like in Piedmont, the Veneto Region has approved several laws over the years in respect of its linguistic heritage. A first law was passed in 1974 (Protection of the historical, linguistic and cultural heritage of Veneto Act), followed five years later by Regional Act 38/1979 on Interventions on the part of the Region for the knowledge of the local cultures and civilizations of Veneto, both of which were later revoked. In 1984 the Interventions of the Region for the development and the promotion of cultural activities Act was approved, followed three years later by Regional Act 8/1987. In 1990 the Regional Natural Park of Lessinia was finally established (Regional Law 12 of 1990), an institution whose aim was to protect not only the natural environment, but also the traditional cultures present in it. Finally in 1994 a comprehensive law was passed (Regional Act 73 on the Promotion of ethnic and linguistic minorities of Veneto), later modified by Act 3/1998, which protects and promotes German, Ladin, Friulian and other ethnic and linguistic communities present in the region.