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Proposed Education Reform Reignites Spain's Language Wars

Graham Keeley

   MADRID - In the land that gave the world the first modern novel, Don
   Quixote, the language of its creator, Miguel de Cervantes, is under
   threat. This is the contention of bilingual campaigners and
   conservative politicians who believe a new education law will erode a
   constitutional guarantee to teach Spanish, also known as Castilian, in
   schools.

   Spain is a linguistically diverse country where the Catalan, Galician
   and Basque languages have equal status that is protected by law.

   Spain's left-wing coalition government has introduced a reform, which
   says Castilian Spanish does not have to be the principal language in
   classrooms throughout the country.

   It means in regions like Catalonia, the Basque Country or Galicia,
   educational authorities must still teach Spanish but it does not have
   to be the first language and instead can be taught as a secondary
   subject.

   The law has sparked a passionate political dispute in a country where
   language wars have been raging since Spain returned to democracy in the
   late 1970s.

   Longtime leader General Francisco Franco banned regional languages for
   four decades. After he diedin 1975 and democracy was stored, regions
   won the power to decide which languages were taught in the classroom.

   Catalonia, which for almost 40 years has been run by nationalist
   regional governments, embarked on a policy of linguistic immersion with
   Catalan as the main language in public schools. Spanish is taught for
   only two hours per week.

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