MERCATOR :: News File

04/02/2008 The General Council of the French département Pyrénées-Orientales, comprising Northern Catalonia and La Fenolheda, has recently approved a historic Catalan language Charter.

The Catalan language has had official recognition in Northern Catalonia since last December following the approval of the Charte en faveur du catalan (Catalan language Charter). Despite the significance of such an event, the news had gone unnoticed until Vilaweb published it today.

Although the impact of the Charter on the lives of northern Catalans remains to be seen, it marks a very significant step. The French state has traditionally been extremely reluctant to recognize linguistic diversity -article 2 of its Constitution reads as follows: The language of the Republic is French.

The recently approved Charter opens with the following statement: The Catalan language, born more than a thousand years ago, constitutes one of the pillars of our identity, of our heritage and of the richness of the département of Pirineus Orientals (i.e., Northern Catalonia). The Charter upholds the principle of bilingualism, promises to guarantee the durability of Catalan language and culture, and recognizes the Institut d'Estudis Catalans (Institute of Catalan Studies) as a linguistic authority".

It will be interesting to see what effect the news of the Charter has on the other minority languages spoken within the French State, namely Basque, Breton, Corsican, Occitan, German and Dutch. Only last week the Office Public de la Langue Basque (Public Office of the Basque Language) presented its working plan in Baiona (Bayonne), in Iparralde (the Basque territory under French administration), another event that perhaps suggests that the French state is becoming more tolerant towards minority languages.

Nationalia.info

Catalonia, the Basque Country and Galicia sign Paris Declaration for linguistic plurality

02/13/2008 The Declaration reinforces the collaboration protocol that the three language communities signed in 2007.

The deputy minister for language policy of the government of the Basque Country, Patxi Baztarrika, the secretary-general for language policy of the government of Galicia, Marisol López, and the secretary for language policy of the government of Catalonia, Bernat Joan, signed the Paris Declaration for linguistic plurality last Friday (8 February).

According to Bernat Joan, the signature of the document is important because 'it expresses the intention of the governments of Galicia, the Basque Country and Catalonia to work together to achieve linguistic plurality, not only in Spain but also throughout Europe'. He went on to explain that the aim was to extend the agreement to the Balearic Islands, where Catalan is a co-official language alongside Spanish, and said that the forum's next meeting would be attended by four members.

One of the goals of the Paris Declaration is for the European Union to recognise Europe's real linguistic plurality. Another is for Galician, Basque and Catalan to obtain their rightful status within the Union, i.e. that of official languages on a par with similar tongues, such as Latvian, Lithuanian, Czech, Slovenian and Slovak, which, in many respects, are comparable with other official languages of the EU. Bernat Joan has also publicly stated that the group is seeking to set up a language policy forum in which the governments of Scotland, Wales and Flanders will participate.

The Paris Declaration for linguistic plurality was signed last Friday at the Expolangues 2008 fair in Paris, against the backdrop of the International Year of Languages and the collaboration protocol signed by the Basque, Galician and Catalan language communities in relation to language policy.

News from Lingua Món

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European Commission holds first-ever Ministerial Conference on Multilingualism

02/15/2008 The Commission and ministers from European Union member states will discuss a report on the importance of promoting intercultural dialogue and the notion of a personal adoptive language.

Culture and education ministers from all EU member states have met today for the first Ministerial Conference on Multilingualism hosted by the European Commission (CE) in Brussels. During the session ministers will discuss a document entitled A rewarding challenge, drafted by a group of intellectuals headed by writer Amin Maalouf and presented in Brussels on 31 January. The report details a series of recommendations "within the framework of the celebration of the European Year of Intercultural Dialogue".

Today's session is intended to address various aspects of multilingualism, including intercultural dialogue, multilingual states, and the relationship between business and linguistic diversity. One of the report's innovative recommendations is to promote the concept of the "personal adoptive language", in other words, to encourage European citizens to learn a second language that is not an international communication language as a "second mother tongue".

Nationalia.info

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Multialphabetism in the European Union)

Final Report (High Level Group on Multilingualism, EU Commission)

Lingua Món News

2008: United Nations' YEAR OF LANGUAGES

01/02/2008 The United Nations General Assembly proclaimed last May 2007 the year 2008 as the International Year of Languages. It will aim to promote unity through linguistic diversity.

The Assembly called upon States and the Secretariat to work towards the conservation and defence of the world's languages and requested the Secretariat to appoint a coordinator for multilingualism. Many events may take place during this year dealing with this proclamation.

Devoting a whole year to languages was proposed by Austria at the 33rd UNESCO General Conference held in Paris in 2005.

Related links...
United Nations' Press Release (in English)

The UNESCO Courier (in English, French, Castilian/Spanish, Russian, Arabic and Chinese)

Wales launches a new tool for participating in language legislation

02/07/2008 Wiki Deddfu - Wiki Lawmaking, a project based on the same technology as Wikipedia, intends to allow everyone to participate in drawing up a new Welsh language act. On a completely bilingual site, Welsh people can suggest specific legislation, report cases of linguistic discrimination and discuss the current state and needs of the Welsh language.

The website was presented this week at the Welsh National Assembly, together with the report Creating a Truly Bilingual Wales, which states that current legislation does not protect Welsh speakers from discrimination.

The site will be online until May 2008, but its contents are not binding for the Welsh Assembly nor for the British Parliament.

Nationalia.info

Dead language spoken by over 10,000 people in Aragon

02/11/2008 Aragonese is not a living language, according to the organizers of Expo Zaragoza 2008..

Ligallo de Fablans de l'Aragonés, Ligallo de Fablans de l'Aragonés, an NGO that protects Aragonese language and the rights of its speakers, has recently reported that Expo Zaragoza 2008, which will take place in the capital of the autonomous community of Aragon, will not provide visitors with any information in Aragonese because it is "not a living language" and is "not currently used in our society". Aragonese is a Romance language spoken mainly in the Pyrenees, a mountain chain in the North of the Peninsula. It has no official recognition in Aragon nor in Spain, despite being spoken by several thousand of people (around 11,000 according to some recent estimates).

Nationalia.info

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P.E.A. : "Defensa de la Toponimia bilingüe en Aragonés" (in Castilian/Spanish)

Hostile response to restrictions on Breton and Gallo education in Brittany

02/13/2008 The Academy of Rennes, the education authority representing the French Republic in the region, has recently announced that as of next year fourteen centres will no longer provide teaching in Breton and Gallo, Britanny’s two territorial languages.

Associations that protect minority languages in Brittany have expressed their indignation this week following the decision to end Breton and Gallo education in fourteen secondary schools in the region. The vice-chancellor of the Academy of Rennes, Jean-Baptiste Carpentier, announced the proposal at the last Academic Council of Regional Languages, which took place on 15 January.

The news went largely unnoticed until the Union of Breton Teachers began spreading the word. The Breton League of Human Rights (LBDH) was one of the first organizations to react, declaring that "the French state is orchestrating the death of the Breton language" and reminding us that the French Republic has not yet ratified the European Charter for Minority Languages.

In a press release, the Federation of Gallo Associations, Andon Dou Gallo, claimed that the decision "shows the contempt of the Academy of Rennes for our languages", and maintained that, for some years now, "the demand for teaching in Gallo has been increasing, but since this demand is not met by the national curriculum, learners have to resort to associations, most of which do not have the means to cater for them".

Nationalia.info

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FSU - Région BRETAGNE (in French)

Agence Bretagne Presse (in French)

CONTROVERSY IN CATALONIA ABOUT A SPANISH GOVERNMENT DECREE THAT INCREASES AT THREE HOURS PER WEEK THE TEACHING OF SPANISH IN PRIMARY SCHOOLS

December 2006 - The Spanish government approved on the 7th of December the Royal Decree 1513/2006 that establishes the minimum contents that primary education pupils have to achieve on finishing this educational cycle. The royal decree could mean an increase to three hours per week of Spanish language lessons at primary schools in Autonomous Communities with co-official languages.

In Catalonia, the decree has produced a great controversy among politicians, in cultural and linguistic organizations as well as among education professionals. The majority consider that this decree, apart from interfering in the government of Catalonia’s competences in education, attempts against its model of linguistic immersion which already guarantees the achievement of linguistic competence in the two languages by all pupils at the end of their primary education. This model has been praised in the Council of Europe’s evaluation report on the application by the Spanish State of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages.

The Catalan executive has decided to present a requirement for incompetence to the Government of the State after considering a juridical report according to which the decree trespasses the article 111 of the Statute of Autonomy of Catalonia, where shared competences between the State and the Generalitat are established. The report considers that the Spanish decree has exceed its area of regulation since it sets up more than 55% of schools schedule. Thus, the Government Catalonia has asked to revoke 5 articles of the Spanish decree (6, 7,11.2, 13.5, 13.6), the final first disposition and the annexes I, II and III. It does not discard either the presentation of an appeal before in the Spanish Constitutional Court if an agreement is not reached within the framework of the bilateral commission State-Generalitat.

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The Royal Decree (in Spanish)
Catalan Statute of Autonomy
Report of the Council of Europe (08/04/2005)

CONVENTION PROTECTIONS DENIED TO CORNISH IN DRAFT REPORT (Source: Celtic League)

December 2006 – In its long awaited draft “UK Framework Convention Compliance Report”, the Westminster Government has once again shied away from including the Cornish under the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities. As has been reported previously on the Celtic League news site, the report is almost three years overdue from the Council of Europe deadline.

According to the draft report, since the UK government ratified the FCPNM, a number of Cornish organisations and individuals have made representations to the Government arguing that the Cornish should be considered within the scope of the FC's application in the UK. The Government therefore included these organisations in its consultation prior to the preparation of this 2nd report under the FC. The Government has considered the arguments put forward for the inclusion, but has not been convinced that a move away from the Race Relations Act formula can be justified. This means that the Government is sticking to its belief that the Race Relations Act (RRA) is the only possible recourse for an ethnic group in the UK to be included under the Framework Convention. In other words, it implies that a Cornish individual must bring and win a civil court case in order to be included under the Convention, like the Welsh and the Scottish have done in the past. However, in the Compliance Report itself, mention is made of minority ethnic groups (e.g. Chinese, Black people), who the government indicates receive official support as per the Convention (FCPNM), but do not have RRA case law references either. It seems, therefore, that the Westminster Government is unclear about its own criteria.

Campaigners have until 20 January 2007 to recommend changes to the draft document, an electronic copy of which can be obtained by contacting neil.harris@communities.gsi.gov.uk.

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First UK report (1999)
Celtic League
Cornwall County Council

POSTPONEMENT OF A POPULAR INICIATIVE BILL FOR “THE SICILIAN LANGUAGE, CULTURE AND MEDIA”

December 2006 – The Promotion Committee for a Popular Initiative Bill for the “Sicilian Language, Culture and Media” has postponed the collection of signatures in support of this bill. The reason of the postponement is due to the fact that the Regional Commission in charge of validating the signatures has not yet been established. Nevertheless, the campaign to give support to the bill’s Promotion Committee remains open. Until now this campaign has been extremely successful and has overcome the most optimistic forecasts.

Although Sicily has a sixty years special autonomy statute which guarantees, for instance, exclusive powers on primary education, the statute makes no explicit mention to language demands but it does not rule them out either. The bill’s objectives are not purely linguistic in nature, as it also aims at promoting literary, cultural and wider social aspects of Sicily.

The demands, which are respectful with the official status of Italian language, focus on three main issues: “1. The introduction of the study of Sicilian language, culture and society to all schools at different educational levels; 2. The introduction of bilingualism in legislation, in the administration and in public signs, and 3. The creation of a regional public TV and radio service with a certain amount of programs broadcast in Sicilian language.”

THE FRENCH NATIONAL ASSEMBLY REJECTS AN AMENDEMENT FOR THE CONSTITUTIONAL RECOGNITION OF THE “REGIONAL” LANGUAGES

December 2006 – Marc Le Fur, elected deputy for the Breton department of Côte-d'Armor (Aodoù an Arvor), presented an amendment before the French Assembly which called on the French Constitution to recognize the so-called “regional” languages in the plenary session of December 13. The constitutional debate was on the agenda as a result of the discussion of a bill on the electoral census in New Caledonia, a France’s overseas territory where a self-determination referendum is planned for 2014.

The debate on New Caledonia and its consequences on the Constitution allowed Marc Le Fur to attempt for the second time the modification of Article 2 of the French Constitution, which establishes that “the language of the Republic is French”. The Breton deputy proposed to add a second clause to the former article guaranteeing “respect for regional languages, which are part of our common heritage”. According to Le Fur, the constitutional amendment is essential for France to ratify the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages, an international instrument signed by France in 1999 but which has not been yet ratified, as the Constitutional Council of France declared that the implementation of the Charter would be unconstitutional and incompatible with article 2. In fact, it is interesting to remember that article 2 of the Constitution was urgently approved just before the deadline to ratify the European Charter.

The final vote resulted in 57 votes against the modification and 44 in favour. La Fur said that in spite of the result, “the cause is progressing”. The deputy reminded that “last time, the amendment was rejected by more than 25 votes”. As usual, though, the linguistic debate in France has been greeted with mistrust by the leftist parties –although some of their deputies voted in favour– and the extreme hostility of some right-wing members of the Assembly such as Jean-Pierre Soisson, as can be seen in the minutes of the plenary that Mercator Legislation offers.

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French Constitution
Mercator related news
Minutes of the plenary session (in French)

REGULATIONS ON ADVERTISING IN IRISH STILL TO BE DRAFTED AFTER THREE YEARS OF ENACTMENT OF THE OFFICIAL LANGUAGES ACT

December 2006 – The Joint Oireachta Committee for Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs started the discussion last week about the regulations on advertising in Irish by public bodies. Section 9.1 of the Official Languages Act establishe