Initiative pol Asturianu: "There is a linguistic conflict in Asturias because there are cases of discrimination"

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• Hemeroteca The turn of the PSOE unleashes the war so that the bable is co-official language in Asturias

• Opinion All in bable, by Leyre Iglesias

Iniciativa pol Asturianu

proposed a decade ago to make the demand of the

official "more transversal"

and now, with some 500 partners, it contemplates how the

negotiates the support of the deputy of

that would allow reaching the majority necessary to reform the

.

, member of Institutional Relations of the organization, praises the linguistic model of neighboring

and appeals to the

to defend its goals.

What are the objectives of Iniciativa pol Asturianu? We were born 10 years ago with the idea of ​​generating a social and political consensus, doing pedagogy on the issue of the Asturian language and trying to make the claim more transversal. We were born with the idea of ​​being absolutely independent, we do not request public aid and we always try to have an equanimous and positive position. Also reward the good actions that are done through the language, because in some way, the vindication movement was always a bit against it. We try to change that idea, build, get people of all kinds to join. And I think we have succeeded. We are Spaniards, speakers of a Spanish language and what we ask is that the Spanish Constitution be complied with, that this right be recognized in order to be able to do so in all places.In Asturias the Law of Use and Promotion has been in force since 1998. Isn't it enough to protect the

? No, because within the framework of the Constitution the languages ​​that are not official practically do not exist, and what this time has shown us is that the Law of Use is not enough, because cases of discrimination continue to occur. We have made, two or three years ago, a documentary in which we go through the life of a person and we are seeing how they continuously encounter difficulties when using Asturian. Not usually among people, where the coexistence of the two languages ​​is absolutely normal, in the street, in shops, but when these problems occur is when you collide with the Administration. To register a child and give him a name in Asturian, so that your children can take the Asturian subject ... We continue to have problems so that they can access the subject, even if they are voluntary, as it is.To register a company and that the statutes are in Asturian, to make arrangements with the Administration ... In addition, the Law of Use is only relevant for the Autonomous Administration, therefore, before any other management that you have to do in the Administration central, the language does not exist. In addition, the lack of official status has prevented an important part of economic and recognition items, some more than anything symbolic, but important, have not occurred because the central State does not include Asturian among the languages ​​of the State. , Adrián Barbón, always refers to a "friendly" model in which, for example, Asturian is not a vehicular language in teaching nor is it required of doctors, as is the case in other communities with co-official languages.What is your opinion on these restrictions? We fully agree. We must have our own official model, adapted to the sociolinguistic reality of Asturias, which guarantees rights and does not imply obligations, only for the Administration, which obviously has to have the obligation to guarantee these rights to citizens, but that does not imply that obligation that is presupposed. We like the Galician official model, we look at it with sympathy because it is close to us, we know it well, we have seen how Galicia has managed to put its language and culture in a much more positive situation than it had more than 30 years ago . We have gone the other way around, and not only that, but they have also achieved, when they were a poorer region, go up and improve, and go to the right in all indicators,and we have not succeeded. Officiality and language is an element that, although it will not make us rich as a community, it will not lead us to ruin, that's for sure.When it was recognized, Galician was the most widespread co-official language among the population, for above Catalan and Basque. How many people speak Asturian? We have data from the sociolinguistic surveys carried out by Professor Francisco Llera Ramos with the Euskobarometer, a person of recognized prestige who was threatened by ETA, and who has done marvelous jobs. In 2017 we have the latest data, and they are very positive because an important part of the population of Asturias has already passed through the educational system and has had the Asturian language subject, up to 45%, and up to 50% continue to have as language they speak at home, with their family,the Asturian. People are constantly saying: "Asturian is not spoken, I come to Asturias and I cannot hear Asturian". Apart from the fact that this is hardly acceptable, because anyone who comes to Asturias hears Asturian to a greater or lesser extent, depending on the area, mixed with Spanish, it must also be taken into account that it is a stigmatized language, and therefore, in In public areas, speakers tend to use Spanish, because 90% of Asturians are bilingual. There is still a part of the older people who are still monolingual Asturian, but among people under 80 years of age, everyone can handle both languages ​​more or less easily.That still in these circumstances more than 50% of people are still speaking Asturian at home indicates that there is an important vitality and that when this situation is normalized there will be a much greater presence. Support for the officialdom in these polls is very high: more than 53% and only 20% against, according to the last one. There is another 20% undecided. The data is very good, and the perception of the language itself has improved a lot. What's the matter? That anyone who comes to the institute, as I am as a teacher, can see how in the newer generations the transmission is being cut off, and there are few families where it continues. It's complicated. When you go into adulthood, people regain their home language, there is a process of re-assimilation, but it is very difficult now to guarantee the future. It is normal to hear older people speak in Asturian,but it is rarer to hear young people. The only solution is through a recognition of the language that is not something that we have invented in Asturias, but was approved in the Constitution in 1978. Being such the proportion, what do they say to those who assimilate official status as a linguistic imposition? There is no imposition. The officers are simply going to guarantee everyone's freedom to express ourselves in one language or another. The educational system will guarantee that Asturian and Spanish are learned at school. Asturian is going to be a normal subject on the curriculum, as it happens in most places. You have to guarantee a few hours a week so that anyone who goes through the educational system learns Asturian, and Spanish, and the foreign languages ​​that are considered.What is this going to allow? That once you face adult life, you decide: "I am going to speak in Asturian, or I am going to speak in Spanish." What happens to us now? At Iniciativa pol Asturianu we have courses to which many people sign up who have not had the opportunity to learn Asturian because their family did not speak, or they spoke little, or their grandparents did not speak it to them, because that continues to happen too, that the Grandparents speak Asturian to each other and they do not want to transmit it to their grandchildren because they have many prejudices and they have been crushed with the language, at school, especially during the dictatorship, but also afterwards. The question is to guarantee that freedom, because if you don't know the language it is impossible for you to be free to choose. In the educational system that should be guaranteed.The official model will have to be decided later in a normalization law that requires significant majorities, and will be developed in different ways depending on who governs, for that is democratic plurality. Is there a linguistic conflict in Asturias? Yes, there is a conflict linguistic in Asturias because there is a part of society that when faced with the use of Asturian at certain times cannot do it directly. This use is denied, and that means that the speakers cannot live in freedom. Therefore, of course, there is a conflict, and this has been demonstrated in claims, lawsuits, complaints, throughout these years and it continuously occurs. A very minority part of society does not want Asturian to be used in any area, and wherever it is, it tries to prevent it from being used. Then in generalcoexistence is very good. This conflict is basically with the administrations due to the lack of legal status. Do you expect the officers to lessen this conflict or to be able to revive it, as those who oppose fear? It is going to normalize a situation that is now abnormal and unconstitutional. We will have a total normalization in the sense that right now, many people go through the educational system without any contact with the language or with the linguistic reality of Asturias. It is true that there are people who can say: "Asturian is not spoken in my environment". It is perfectly possible, of course it is. There are certain environments and families where it is not spoken. For me, it is a bit difficult to understand that they never hear it, because it is a very environmental language even in cities.We need in the educational system there is also an awareness that reality is more plural. As communication between neighbors, families, especially in urban areas, is sometimes increasingly reduced, unfortunately, we can be in a place without knowing absolutely anything about the reality that we have around us. Officials will help make that language and the cultural richness that it entails visible. We see radical changes only with the few normalization policies that have been made in these 40 years. A very important change has been achieved, because at the beginning of the 80s for an important part, according to the polls, speaking Asturian was "speaking badly", which was what they said in Franco's school. Today it is a minimal percentage who think that.Now everyone considers Asturian to be a language with the same dignity as any other. If we really give it the dignity it deserves, and we equate it through the Constitution and article 3.2 as an official language, we believe that it will help make the situation even better. Still better? If the Asturian is still alive and improves social perception without official status, it is difficult to understand why another mechanism that does not go through the official status can not be developed to defend it. Social perception has improved, but we have lost speakers, and that is an obvious reality for anyone who lives in Asturias. I am 35 years old and I have seen how my generation speaks much more Asturian than the students at my school. There are always exceptions, and there are families in which transmission is achieved, but it is a heroic thing,because you teach your Asturian son and the school works as an engine of Castilianization. There are no tools at school to get that child to keep his mother tongue. This is very serious, because families are not having the freedom to have an educational system that guarantees that what they have learned at home is not unlearned at school. There is discrimination against families who want their children to speak Asturian. The officers will not prevent whoever wants their children to be educated in Spanish from continuing to be educated in Spanish. We have no problem with that, the only thing we want is that Asturian can also be taught in schools with full normality.There are no tools at school to get that child to keep his mother tongue. This is very serious, because families are not having the freedom to have an educational system that guarantees that what they have learned at home is not unlearned at school. There is discrimination against families who want their children to speak Asturian. The officers will not prevent whoever wants their children to be educated in Spanish from continuing to be educated in Spanish. We have no problem with that, the only thing we want is that Asturian can also be taught in schools with full normality.There are no tools at school to get that child to keep his mother tongue. This is very serious, because families are not having the freedom to have an educational system that guarantees that what they have learned at home is not unlearned at school. There is discrimination against families who want their children to speak Asturian. The officers will not prevent whoever wants their children to be educated in Spanish from continuing to be educated in Spanish. We have no problem with that, the only thing we want is that Asturian can also be taught in schools with full normality.There is discrimination against families who want their children to speak Asturian. The officers will not prevent whoever wants their children to be educated in Spanish from continuing to be educated in Spanish. We have no problem with that, the only thing we want is that Asturian can also be taught in schools with full normality.There is discrimination against families who want their children to speak Asturian. The officers will not prevent whoever wants their children to be educated in Spanish from continuing to be educated in Spanish. We have no problem with that, the only thing we want is that Asturian can also be taught in schools with full normality.

Attendees of a demonstration held in Oviedo in favor of the officers.

The secretary of Organization of the Asturian Socialist Federation, Gimena Llamedo, pointed out this week that "time may be important, but more important is the agreement." Is the possibility of reforming the Statute in this legislature moving away, as the defenders of the officiality claim? We hope not, because there is a very majority consensus, of 27 deputies compared to 18, three-fifths of the Asturian Parliament, which is what marks the Statute for reform. We have to sit down to negotiate, which is what the parties have to do, and close a reform of the Statute that not only includes the officiality. Asturian society would not understand, after 40 years claiming this change, that when there are sufficient majorities it will not be carried out. It must be done in this legislature so that it also goes to Congress and is approved.Majorities occur both here and in Madrid, and it must be done now. What do you think about the proposal of former socialist president Juan Luis Rodríguez-Vigil, who proposed holding a referendum? It is not legally possible to make a consultation on this issue because the Court Constitutional ruling 103/2008 [on the Ibarretxe Plan] specifies that only in the cases expressly provided for can these consultations be made. And to get an idea of ​​how exceptional it is to hold a consultation in Spain, we have to remember that only three have been carried out: the Constitution, the referendum on NATO and the European Constitution. We have already done our referendum in Asturias when we voted almost 89% 'yes' to the Spanish Constitution, which in its article 3.2 says that the other languages ​​will be official in accordance with their statutes,and there we are developing that article, of something that we already voted in the majority. There is no legal place for a referendum, and those who propose it know that. They try to buy time and they want what they have not won at the polls. It seems that the issue of officers has now come up by surprise. It was the central theme of the 2019 elections in Asturias, and the parties that explicitly carried it on their program got 312,000 votes. Those of the 'no' reached 199,637, it is almost double. Others of those that we can put in the 'no' did not explicitly take it as 'no' in the program either. The PP has maintained an ambiguous position. Now they have kept it very clear on the 'no', but they have been supporting the officialdom in the past continuously. The last time, Gabino de Lorenzo, when he presented himself to Congress,took officiality as the central theme. In other territories where they have governed, in the Valencian Community, in the Balearic Islands, in Galicia, they have supported and developed the officiality. We do not understand why what is worth on one side of the Eo estuary is not worth the other. In Galicia, the officiality can be supported, and Feijóo continually praises the benefits of multilingualism, and it seems great to us, but here the PP maintains the opposite position. And the same with Citizens. It seems incredible to us that a party that was born to promote the balanced bilingualism promoted by Albert Rivera, which also seemed great to us, a bilingualism in freedom, and in which there is a coexistence between languages ​​like the one he promoted for Catalonia, that that is not It is worth it in Asturias, in a party that claims to have a position for the entire State.Here they have the opportunity to develop balanced bilingualism to demonstrate that their proposal is valid. How much would the implantation of Asturian as a co-official language cost? They have acted precisely with great restraint, and they are continuously throwing hoaxes, they attack the politicians who defend the officiality, they attack us and harass us in networks, and they are already starting with the physical and the personal. They have said 74 million, if I am not mistaken. The estimates we have is that it may be around eight million euros, because it must be taken into account that an investment in language policy is already being made, which is small, but which has allowed progress on many issues. We do not start from scratch,as they were leaving in other territories when the officers were launched in the 1980s. We already have a teaching staff, an academic and institutional structure. But we are also losing games due to that coefficient of linguistic plurality that the State contributes to the communities with official languages. Every year we lose between six and eight million transfers from the State that should come to Asturias because they have an official language, and which have been lost for 40 years. That is very serious. We have to bear in mind that it will have a benefit in the self-esteem of Asturians, who today still have a difficult relationship with their own language. A man from Soria is not ashamed to speak Spanish anywhere, but a man from Asturias does in some areas, and that has to disappear.If we value our culture, we are also making an investment, which is not going to get us out of the poor, but it is certainly not going to lead us to ruin. I like to compare studies on the value of languages ​​with data from other places. The Instituto Cervantes gives us every year the value of the Castilian language, the economic importance, and it is very positive. We do not renounce here, far from it, the Spanish language, and it seems very important to us, but also that of other places. For example, in Valencia 3% of GDP is generated by activity around the language. That is 1,037 million euros and 35,500 jobs. If we extrapolate it to Asturias, we can be talking about 7,000 jobs and close to 200 million. It is very positive, something that we cannot give up, especially in a place like Asturias that is in continuous crisis,where the young have to go. The officiality is not going to be the solution to all problems, hopefully, but it can help to have a greater self-esteem as a community, to have state transfers and another economic tool, another sector that can be strengthened. Detractors fear that equalization of Asturian is a way of placement for like-minded people through the creation of what they call "chiringuitos". I know many people who have been claiming the language for 40 years and the vast majority what they have done is spend a lot of money, of his time, of his energies, in trying to contribute something, each one from his field, from music, literature, teaching ... When I hear this, I think of specific people, and all their work, and it seems incredible to me . I don't think there are people, or there may be,I don't know, but of course I, the people I know, what they try is that the rights of the speakers of a language are equated, that the language that their grandparents and they speak, and they want their children to speak, is still alive, Because you can't imagine how frustrating it is when we see these attacks and then I talk to my grandmother, who is on social media, because she is very modern, and she can't believe it. "But how is it that this language of mine, from home, that they have always told me is worthless, how can they think that it can cause so much harm?" How can a small tongue in such a complicated situation be as dangerous as they say? It's something I can't understand, that anger. I can understand that they do not want to speak Asturian, that they do not like it, it seems perfect to me. It's more,nobody is going to force them to speak Asturian anywhere. I would never want that to happen. But that they attack us personally, that they try to invent these kinds of questions surprises me. We have absolutely nothing against people who are against the officers, it is a position that we respect and we respect those people. They will never have seen insults come out of our mouths, or any kind of accusation. We simply ask you to respect democratic channels. There have been elections, very powerful majorities, of three fifths, of 27 deputies compared to 18, and there are rules of the system, of the Constitution, of the Statute of Autonomy. Let's take the proposal to Parliament, let's vote and then each development, each measure, will have to be brought back to Parliament, and it will have to be developed, and it will depend on the majorities,and without they win the elections, they will be able to make the modifications they consider. It is something inside that falls within the norm, but we are constantly seeing these attacks. They are also alerted to the disappearance of local variants of Asturian through a normalization that they consider destructive. What do you think of this? For the variants to survive, a standard and normalization of the language is necessary. If not, the language is extinct. Giving use to the language in the media, in school, in music, in literature, through a standard, which is what is done in all languages, will allow languages ​​and variants to be maintained. The Castilian has more than 400 years with a very clear rule, and yet the variants, such as Andalusian, Canary, Murcian,they are still more alive than ever and there is a movement for the recovery of self-esteem and the dignity of these variants. It is not at odds at all. If after 400 years of normalization of Spanish these variants have not been lost, why are they going to be lost in Asturias? We also have a standard, the Asturian Llingua Academy developed in the 80s an orthographic standard that allows writing in all variants, the Academy itself publishes texts in all variants and there is a special sensitivity and respect in Asturias for them. There is no need to see more, for example, than the process of making place names official, where the local variety of each one has been scrupulously respected. It is something that has not been done practically anywhere and is absolutely respected here.We are convinced that the officiality and having a standard written model of educated language will not generate any problem for the variants, but on the contrary, it will give them more value.

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