Galician Language

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The language of the northwestern Spanish province of Galicia, i.e. the Galician language, presents an older state of linguistic development than the current Portugese language, because it has much less detached itself from the formerly common Portugese language than the modern language nowadays spoken in Portugal.

From Galicia's annexation by Spain to recent days, the Galician language had many problems to survive beside the official Spanish language and only recently has it been accepted as a self-contained regional language.

The political situation (separation from the former motherland, Spanish being the country's official language, close neighborhood with Spanish people having settled there) has been leaving its mark, and establishing an official Galician spelling close to the Spanish one (called "isolationist" because it separates Galician from Portugese), the Spanish central government has been trying to prevent too much linguistic or even political fraternization with Portugal.

Nowadays there is also a (nonofficial) "reintegrationist" spelling, which is close to the Portugese language. Thus the Galician-speaking public is divided into two parties as for written texts.

As an anecdote coming from my own approach to the problems of the Galician language, I can contribute the following electronic exchange of ideas. I do not think the linguistic situation has been fundamentally changing during the last years.

Question I Asked a Galician Newsgroup

The following exchange of mails unintentionally demonstrates the set of problems of the Galizian language:

This was the question I asked the newsgroup in Portugese language: "Who can tell me the book references of some Galician dictionary or grammar? Thank you!"

A man who apparently was a Galician native speaker answered in a mixture of Portugese and Galician with reintegrationist spelling: "Since you are writing in Portugese, you do not really need such a dictionary nor such a grammar. If you must absolutely know something on the Galician variant, I recommend you the Dicionário Estravis (the most extensive one of all) and as a grammar, the Estudo Crítico by the Associaçom Galega da Língua (the new edition). I can send you further references.
And if you are interested in the isolationist Galician language (written the Spanish way), you can consult the Dicionário Xerais (Dicionário Gerais) and the Gramática Galega by Rosário Álvarez.
My suggestion: Visit e.g. www.udc.es/dep/lx/cac/sopirrait."

Just one more note: Xerais is the isolationist spelling and Gerais is the reintegrationist spelling of one and the same name.

Galician Film Story

When the very recommendable Film El lunes al sol (Mondays in the Sun) started in Munich in original version, I vaguely hoped (in spite of the Spanish title) that the texts of at least some of the persons would be in Galician, because the whole story played in the harbor milieu of Vigo. Far from it! All in Spanish! Market and politics going hand in hand...

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Bibliography

Using the following links you can have a look at the offers of amazon. Arriving at the bookseller's site, you can use its search field to find expressions, titles, authors, or ISBN / ASIN numbers. You will never be obliged to buy anything.

Hans-Rudolf Hower 2012

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Last updated: April 5, 2016