V INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM ON EUROPEAN LANGUAGES AND
LEGISLATION: LINGUISTIC ENCLAVES IN THE EUROPEAN UNION: JURIDICAL
AND LEGISLATIVE DIFFICULTIES.PROSPECTS
Miranda do Douro, Portugal, April 25-28, 2002.
The holding of the Vth International Symposium on European Languages and Legislation in
the Portuguese town of Miranda do Douro arises from a compromise previously undertaken
during the IVth Symposium (Aosta Valley, Italy, April 2000) by the CIEMEN itself and
members of the Institute of Mirandese Language, and other local authorities.
The workshops were intended to present through some examples the sociolinguistic situation
in which those communities considered as linguistic enclaves find themselves, as well as the
possibilities they have to raise their claims, under the aegis of legislation, in order to enjoy a
further recognition and respect from the Administrations. Accordingly, the European Charter
for Regional or Minority Languages was also intended to be an object of debate as it can
represent –despite its limitations- a stimulus for the undertaking of political and legal
measures aiming at the survival of these communities.
In the introductory lecture, and before putting forth a more specific definition of linguistic
enclaves, Carme Junyent reminded the fact that throughout the last forty years language
diversity has been reduced by approximately 40%. This direction leads us to foresee that such
proportion is very likely to grow bigger throughout the XXIst century. Language shift
processes are considered part of this tendency, and are oriented towards a linguistic
homogenization which should be avoided. However, one should also, at the same time, accept
the inviability of this homogenization due to the parallel diversification processes, of which
we have historical evidences such as the Romanization in many parts of Europe and the
current language diversity deriving from it.
Although a definition of linguistic enclave may be found in any handbook or dictionary,
Carme Junyent proposed in her lecture a categorization including five types of enclaves: a)
residues of previous linguistic continuums (such as the case of the Mirandese language); b)
peripheral enclaves, resulting from the reduction of its territorial basis, either from the
political-administrative periphery, or else from big urban areas; c) superposed enclaves,
resulting from massive migrations to other places (the case of Greek and Albanians in Italy, or
Afrikaans in South Africa); d) linguistic islands, conditioned by their physical or geographical
environment; and, e) nomadic communities and their linguistic singularity inasmuch as a
“territory” (one should note the loss of native languages among these communities when they
become sedentary as, for example, the case of most Gypsies in the Iberian Peninsula).
Last but not least, a question: what is the profit or the advantage for someone quitting a
language? Preserving the boundaries with the past, as most linguitic enclaves strive to do,
represents an original and unique cultural contribution.
In the second lecture, Jaume Vernet re-examined the theory of linguistic juridical systems
within the EU’s framework from a two-folded perspective: on the one hand, the constitutional
one, and on the other, the international one (including either supra-state structures and states
themselves).
As for the constitutional recognition of cultural and language issues, Jaume Vernet showed
that typologies are set up according to the principles of personality and territoriality:
- official monolingualism, or the non-envisaging the existence of other languages (as is
the case of France and the fact of the introduction of the second article in the current
constitution, after Maastricht);
- territorial co-officiality, or the diversity of situations and languages in a given
administrative space (the case of the Italian state and its regions);
- institutional pluralism, or the policy consisting in providing the officiality for two
languages, from a juridical (and not always social, as in the Finnish case) point of
view;
- linguistic federalism, where different territories within a state declare the officiality of
one different language in each case (for instance, in Belgium).
At an international level, a historical evolution has been taking place after the French
revolution and until the end of the cold war. Such is an evolution directed towards the
achievement of personal, national and collective rights, plus the appearance during the last 20
years of the linguistic minority concept and its recognition by global institutions such as the
UN or ILO.
Mr. Vernet pointed out as well that there exist in the European scope relevant institutional
contributions: from the OSCE (in relation to the legal protection of language diversity as a
source of identity and political conflicts); the EU (as the definer of “integral multilingualism”,
though only in the official languages, and also from where the respect towards linguistic
rights beyond state powers is being discussed, specially after the Declaration of Nice, 2000),
and the Council of Europe, mainly by means of a cultural -rather than political- treaty such as
the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages, deemed to be, according to the
lecturer, a step ahead in this respect, though only (optative) obligations are stated, whereas not
the citizens’ rights.
The third plenary session was presented by Prof. Xavier Lamuela, Department of Romance
Philology, University of Girona. On the basis of his findings from his experience in the
codification of the Occitan and Friulan languages, his lecture was an analysis of language
standardization models, underlining both the elaboration and codification processes. His
presentation also arised relevant questions in this respect as, for example, about which
variables justify the codification of a language, the creation of a standard and its unity. As for
the elaboration, the lecturer insisted on the role of the speaking community in relation to the
definition of communicative needs, and the establishment of social uses according to which a
language requires to be elaborated. According to Lamuela, it is important to appraise the
incidence of dominant languages in the formation of standard varieties, in order to attain a
high degree of autonomy to allow minority languages to become distinctive cultural vehicles.
He finally underlined that any codification and elaboration must be undertaken on the basis of
social meaning and needs: providing a language with an orthography, while not guaranteeing
the presence of written production and readers, may even be counter-productive.
The participation of representatives coming from several enclaves (see list and program)
confirmed the need to exchange experiences among them, as well as the common concern
about the progressive disappearance of languages.
Most of the relevant aspects –most of them shared by all instances- that define the nowadays
defintion of linguistic enclaves were arised during their statements:
a) the loss of territorial basis and the breaking up of the language continuum are
phenomena common to every case (note the Celtic languages in the Brittish Islands or
the Frisian language, now with speaking communities scattered over distant
territories);
b) geographical or human isolation, which has allowed a major preservation of the local
variety as well as, in many cases, the fact that the communities we are dealing with are
numerically small and under conditions that hinder them from living in their historical
environment, a circumstance that is unfortunately relevant within this context (as an
example, 90-95% of the population in the Aran Valley (Catalan Pyrenees) one century
ago were practically monolingual Aranese speakers);
c) political subordination -and in some cases economic as well- is also a fact that directly
affects these languages as, at a linguistic level, the language of power and prestige is
usually irradiated from the nuclei of power themselves. Beyond the diglossic
phenomenon (which may not be as a rule against the existence and use of the nonprestige language), we also identify this circumstance in those so-called minority
communities, which may lead us to the conclusion that nowadays linguistic enclaves
may be considered lessened “regional” or “minority” languages, or languages in a
terminal state according to experts;
d) language codification and standardization is, and has always been throughout the last
centuries, a main process concerning the maintenance of certain language varieties. In
some cases, such as the Mirandese, this is still an ongoing process, although the
written production has multiplied after the establishment of a Mirandese grammar;
e) tourism as a principal economic resource may entail in the cases of linguistic enclaves
a source of welfare that, on the one hand, would allow the autochthonous population
to stay (as is also the case of the Mirandese language) although, on the other hand, it
also attracts external labour force which may negatively affect the general attitude
towards the minoritized language (and subsequently its loss of social prestige), and the
overall proportion of speakers (as in the case of Aranese at present);
f) the naming of languages is still a source of unresolved discussions which in general
tend to disintegrate similar and/or common wills, as is the case of those between
Galicians and Asturians in Spain. In this respect, a counteracting example can be
found, for instance, in the unique denomination for all Frisian varieties which,
desregarding their common unintelligibility, provides a major sense of belonging and
cohesion at a symbolical level;
g) the legal recognition regarding linguistic enclaves occurs, as in the Mirandese and
Scottish Gaelic cases, when substitution processes are rather irreversible, that is, they
are granted “in extremis”. Despite this fact, one must get to the conclusion that
political actions are generally beneficial as regards the self-perception of language,
although it may also entail, in some cases, a relaxing effect among the speaking
population, who attributes the responsibility of promoting the language to the
institutions and to the academic field.
Finally, the Vth Symposium was also the occasion to made public the creation of the
EBLUL’s state committee in Portugal, one of the two EU member-states that did not have any
representativeness within this body. In the presence of the EBLUL members attending the
event, representatives of the Institute of the Mirandese Language undertook to set up a
network of organizations and institutions working for the Mirandese language, which will be
represented in this European organization. The recognition of Mirandese as an official
language has allowed the EBLUL to be present in Portugal, a country considered a
monolingual one before this recognition. A Portuguese representative is therefore expected to
attend the next EBLUL’s General Assembly (June 2002).
List of lecturers (in alphabetical order)
- García Arias, Xosé Luis, ex-chairman and member of the Academia de la Llingua
Asturiana, and teacher of Asturian Philology at the University of Oviedo. (alla@asturnet.es)
- Junyent, Carme, Professor of the Linguistics Department at University of Barcelona, and
member of the Group of Study on Endangered Languages (GELA). (mcjunyen@fil.ub.es)
- Lamuela, Xavier. Professor of the Faculty of Language and Literature at the University of
Girona. (xavier.lamuela@udg.es)
- Martainn, Domhnall. Acting Chief Executive of “Comunn na Gàidhlig”, member of the
Gaelic Broadcasting Committee and member of the Scottish Gaelic subcommittee of EBLUL
in the United Kingdom. (domhnall@cnag.org.uk)
- Morelli, Domenico. President of the EBLUL’s Italian Committee and ex-adviser of the
Ministry of Public education for linguistic minorities in Italy (morellidomenico@tiscali.it)
- Muuss, Harro. Second Chairman of the Frisian Council –section North, Germany-, member
of the Board of the Interfrisian Council and of the Frisian subcommittee of EBLUL’s German
committee.(OFPMuuss@gmx.de)
- Raposo, Domingos. Teacher of Mirandese language and member of the Instituto de Língua e
Cultura Mirandesa. (sara.raposo@clix.pt)
- Sans, Josep Lois. Member of the Office for the Promotion and Teaching of Aranès (Conselh
Generau d’Aran). (ofea@aran.org)
- Vernet, Jaume. Professor of Constitutional Law, Faculty of Juridical Sciences, University
Rovira i Virgili (Tarragona). (jvll@fcj.urv.es)
- Viudas Camarasa, Antonio. Member of the Real Academia de Extremadura i teacher of
Spanish Philology at the University of Extremadura. (viudas@eresmas.net)