Linguistic Politics in Regional Schools

Here is an article from the newspaper El Mundo, one of the three major newspapers of Spain (it's generally targeted towards a moderate to right-of-center audience). The article is by Manuel Romero and it appeared in today's edition (October 28, 2008). It was on the front page, next to a giant picture of Obama and the news of the attempted assasination. It should shed light on the heated education controversy over teaching classes in regional languages like Catalan and Gallego.



The following translation is my own.





The Textbooks of Catalonia and Galicia ridicule those who speak Spanish
The publishing house Castellnou identifies Martians as speakers of Spanish; Anaya turns to vignettes with clear racist content, and Xerais presents Castellano as an invading language.

A Catalan language manual says that “the Martians speak in Spanish” and a textbook of Galician literature claims that talking Castellano is “as if Michael Jackson made himself pass off as white.”
A large part of the Catalan and Galician textbooks accomplish, to the greatest extent possible, that there will be no scorn satisfied unless it comes with its dose of ridicule.


The use of Spanish is prohibited in all the teaching cycles of these two communities, but that is no obstacle for the native language manuals to battle it out against the Castillian language. They do this as if it was against a rival or a foreign enemy that needs to be ridiculed in front of their students.


Some Catalan texbooks that teach with the Castillian language constantly repeat formulas not too innocent, like the inclusion of certain articles that generate unanimous laughter among the students.


An example of this is the use, in a 3rd year manual of ESO (Secondary Compulsory Education) of the Catalan language from the publishors Castellnou, of this series of stories called The Martian men speak Spanish and the Martian women have no chest?


It's chosen so that students can complete exercises in the textbook that lend themselves to ridiculing Spanish and those students who use it, students who will no doubt be considered Martians. This is just a small sample of their linguistic pedagogy.


The continous references to Spanish as the language of the empire and the repeated allusions to Franco's regime is reflected in numerous vignettes and photographs that mix language and politics in school textbooks.


Another way they refer to the Castillian language transforms it into a foreign language, next to the official Catalan. Frequently, Spanish is presented solely as the language spoken by immigrants from Latin America.


The textbook of the Catalan Language published by La Galera, for 3rd year primary students, shows a world map with all the languages that Catalan children can hear in their streets. Spanish finds its origins in countries like Colombia and Ecuador, not in Spain, and is presented on the same level as Arabic, from the Moroccan immigrants, or Urdu, of the Pakistanis.


In Galicia, the treatment given to the Spanish language in their school textbooks is not much different. The manual of Galician Language Literature for 2nd year Bachelor Students, by Anaya, shows Galician citizens that have Castellano as their maternal language or as their language of choice in social relations.


The textbook, designed for 17 year old students, includes in their pages a comic strip with clear racist content. One vignette, known as The Galician Voice, shows a man that describes the following argument: “Speaking about the problem of standardizing the languages in Catalonia, I have pride in being Galician and speaking only Castellano.” The person he's talking to responds: “Then it's like Michael Jackson, who is black and makes an effort to be white.”


Racist humor is prohibited in majority of democratic countries. In this case, it has a educational mission. The manual from the publishing house Anaya justifies it by presenting the Galician language as a victim of Spanish. According to the manual, the linguistic process in Galicia leads to “the substitution of Gallego over Castellano, and this can only occur through an appropriate linguistic politics.”


The manuals pass on to students, in repeated forms, the idea that it is the Castillina language that threatens the Gallego language and that its speakers are found at a clear disadvantage and are its victims.


The linguistic conflict is presented to students in a very visual manner in the manual for 1st year Bachelor students from the publishing house Xerais. It includes a traffic sign in Spanish with sprayed-in corrections, turning it into Gallego. Furthermore, the bottom of the front page of the textbook also blames the Spanish language: “The pressure of Castellano not only has consequences on a social level, but also a lingustic one.”