The Catalan Language

Many foreigners who visit or come to live in Catalonia are either unaware of the importance of the Catalan language or are worried that their minimal Spanish will not be understood by the locals. There is no cause for concern. Most Catalans are bilingual, and are surprised when they encounter a non-Catalan with a good working command of the language – although Catalan is spoken by around 10 million people, they are well aware that in comparison with 400 million Castilian-speakers, theirs is a minority tongue.

Since the passing of the Spanish Constitution in 1979, both Castilian and Catalan are official languages in Catalonia, and given that the Principality is a magnet for tourists, the Generalitat is investing considerable resources in the teaching and learning of English. Catalan children begin their English lessons aged four in most schools, and there are plans to stipulate a minimum level of English competence before university students can obtain their degrees, so Catalonia’s linguistic future looks bright.

At the moment, though, you will normally have to ‘get by’, in Castilian. Apart from in the remotest villages, this should be no problem, as four out of the six major television channels that can be seen in Catalonia broadcast in Castilian to the whole of Spain, and the flood of immigration from the south that began in the fifties mean that many ‘New Catalans’ grew up speaking Castilian at home. However, out of politeness, it is not a bad idea to learn a few basic expressions. These should provoke a broad smile in recognition of the fact that you are making an effort, and if you are eating out in a Catalan (pero molt Catalá) restaurant, you might get slightly better service. I will include some basic vocabulary in a separate Catalan Phrasebook, but Si us plau (Por favor in Spanish) meaning ‘Please’ would be a good place for any visitor to begin.

Catalonia has suffered long periods of repression by the Spanish State, and apart from brutality and political violence, the target has often been the language. Catalan was first banned in 1714, when Philip V annexed Catalonia, and it was prohibited again under the dictatorships of General Miguel Primo de Rivera (1923-1929) and General Francisco Franco (1939-1975). The language is robust and flexible with a strong literary tradition, and although Catalans could be arrested for speaking it in public, the police state never managed to eradicate it from the private world of the home and family. However, even though Spain has been a democracy since 1979, many older Catalans are unable to read or write in their mother tongue as their schooling was conducted completely in Castilian.

Franco was particularly anti-Catalan, and his propagandists claimed that the language was nothing more than a dialect of Castilian. This fabrication was part of the fascist rewriting of Spanish history, and ignores the fact that the two languages developed from different roots, albeit both of Latin origin. When the Romans conquered Spain, they divided it into two provinces – Hispania Citerior comprising of modern Catalonia where Vulgar Latin dominated and Hispania Ulterior consisting of the rest of Spain where principally High Latin was spoken. The result of this is that Catalan has as much in common with French and Italian as it does with Castilian Spanish. A few examples should make this clear.

In literary Latin, the word metus, meaning ‘fear’, gives us miedo in modern Castilian, whereas the Vulgar Latin word pavor results in por in Catalan, peur in French and paura in Italian. Similarly, comedere is the root of comer in Castilian which means ‘to eat’, and the relationship between manducare and the words it spawned is obvious when we look at the Catalan menjar, the French manger and the Italian mangiare. If we are aware that phonetic changes in Castilian have often led to the substitution of h for f, it is easy to see from where hablar, the Castilian verb meaning ‘to talk’, derives – in High Latin it is fabulare. The Catalan, French and Italian words, parlar, parler, and parlare respectively, however, are rooted in the Vulgar Latin term parabolare.

Furthermore, Catalan is a pure Latin language with no Arabic sounds, unlike Castilian which was influenced by the Moors for 800 years, meaning that around 15% of Castilian words are of Arabic origin. For example, all Spanish words that begin with ‘al’ (alcachofa – artichoke, alfombra – carpet) have an Arabic root and the expression Ojalá meaning ‘If only’ is the contraction of an Islamic oath. In contrast, Catalan has much more in common with northern European languages, and if you can get to grips with its complex grammar and pronunciation system, it is actually easier to pass for a native Catalan than it is to pass for a native Spaniard. Barcelona taxi drivers, for example, who can only see my Anglo-Saxon complexion through their rear view mirror, have often mistaken me for a Catalan born and brought up in another part of Catalonia.

The language is full of short sharp sounds like cap for ‘head’, fill for ‘son’ and clau for ‘key’. Many verbs are similar – crec for ‘I believe’, vaig for ‘I go’ and vull for ‘I want’. These words make the Catalans sound brusque and direct, in comparison with their flowery and romantic Castilian neighbours, and there is an element of truth in the jibe that if you just say the first half of the Spanish word and keep a grim expression on your face, you’ll find yourself speaking Catalan. However, Catalan pronunciation is more varied than Castilian which only has five vowels sounds – a, e, i, o, u – whereas as Catalan has a myriad of possible vowel pronunciations. It also has diphthongs just like English does. To get a feel for it, my advice is to listen, listen, listen.

So if you are coming to Catalonia on holiday, you don’t need to bother learning Catalan. Similarly, if you come to live here and spend most of your time with other expats, you will be able to get by in Castilian. However, if you want to live and work with the Catalans and expect to make friends with them, you will find that you can only go so far without learning their mother tongue. They will be polite if they know you don’t speak Catalan and do their best to address you in Castilian, but if you work in an office or go out with a group of them, you really cannot expect them to speak to each other in a foreign language just because you cannot be bothered to learn theirs. How do we British feel about immigrants who spend years in our country without ever gaining a good command of the English language? The Catalans are quite a lot more tolerant than we Brits, but at the end of the day, the choice is yours – it all depends on the extent to which you want to integrate into Catalan society.

If you decide to take the plunge and get to grips with this beautiful ancient literary language, you have lots of options available. There are government-run language schools called Escolas Oficials where you can learn the language and your local Community Centre will probably offer short courses in Catalan for Spaniards and foreigners. If you want to go slightly more upmarket, the Servei d’Idiomes Moderns, the Modern Languages Department of the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona offers an excellent reasonably-priced service on a lovely campus just outside Barcelona or at its sister centre near Hospital de Sant Pau – I can certainly vouch for the quality of the teaching as the SIM is where I give English classes to the Catalans. For more information, visit www.uab.es/sim.