Fresh assault on Catalan

During the last few years, the Spanish Conservative Party (Partido Popular), moved by a social majority which includes sectors of the Spanish Socialist Party (PSOE), has been carrying out a determined, constant attack against the linguistic normalization of the Catalan language throughout the Catalan-speaking Countries, and particularly against the successful Catalan schooling system. Several surveys reveal that students educated in Catalan have the same knowledge of Spanish (or even greater) as students from regions where Spanish is the only language spoken. So where is the problem?

The language immersion system in Catalan carried out in all schools in Catalonia, most schools in the Balearic Islands and in a third of schools in the Valencia region has widely demonstrated its effectiveness because the students are able to gain a good level of Catalan as well as Spanish. However this is not the only important aspect of this issue. It is to be noted that it brings greater social cohesion among students, as all students are socialized in Catalan. It would be really difficult if it was done any another way, particularly for immigrant schoolchildren.

The system is absolutely essential in Catalan society, as over a third of the inhabitants of the Catalan-speaking countries were not born there, having arrived over two migration periods, the first taking place between 1955 and 1970, with immigrants from other Spanish regions, and the second taking place as of 2000 coming from all over the world, with a huge linguistic diversity. These multiple origins might have caused ethnic conflicts, but the migrants have been peacefully assimilated by Catalan society. Furthermore, the system has created a considerable level of integration of these newcomers, their children, and above all, their grandchildren. Catalan education and social identification with the Catalan language have become the key factors in maintaining social cohesion.

Now, relying on its absolute majority, the Spanish Partido Popular government is trying to carry out its educational reform by establishing a more selective educational system, as well as removing civic education classes. Furthermore, it is attempting to destroy language immersion and to sideline the Catalan language, instead of it remaining the central language in schooling. Last Monday December 3^rd, Spanish minister of education José Ignacio Wert announced the bill for the Fundamental Law for Improvement of Educational Quality (LOMCE). This is the latest assault on the Catalan model of language immersion, after several legal findings over the last two years have attempted to finish off Catalan as the lingua franca at schools, together with the anti-Catalan education measures carried out by the autonomous governments of Valencia and the Balearic Islands. Most particularly, this bill would let any student graduate from compulsory secondary education (ESO) and from high school without ever having passed any exams in Catalan, although the student would have to pass Spanish exams in order to obtain either diploma.

In the case of Catalonia, this new law contravenes the Spanish Constitution as well as the Catalan Statute of Autonomy because it violates the capacities of the Catalan government (Generalitat) in the field of education concerning the vernacular language. Furthermore, the same law imposes a financial obligation (the bill states that the Catalan government will have to pay private schools for those students who want Spanish schooling until the balance between Spanish and Catalan teaching hours is established) without corresponding budget assignations for the Catalan government. Moreover, this would provoke a dangerous apartheid division between students depending on the language they chose.

In any case, the situation is extremely serious because the intent to approve this new educational law comes about when the Catalan people have clearly opted for pro-independence positions, as the November 25^th showed. Meanwhile, by taking advantage of the economic crisis, the Spanish government continues with its recentralizing crusade, of which this bill is more than obvious proof.

Joan M Serra