Catalan language

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Catalan
Catalan–Valencian–Balearic
català
Pronunciation	[kətəˈla]
Native to	Andorra, France, Italy, Spain
Native speakers	4.1 million[1] (2012) Total number of speakers: More than 10 million (L1 plus L2; 2018)[2]
Language family	Indo-European Italic Romance Western Gallo-Romance[3] Occitano-Romance[3] Catalan
Early form	Old Catalan
Standard forms	Catalan (regulated by the IEC) Valencian (regulated by the AVL)
Writing system	Latin (Catalan alphabet) Catalan Braille
Signed forms	Signed Catalan
Official status
Official language in	1 country  Andorra 3 communities of Spain  Balearic Islands  Catalonia  Valencian Community (as Valencian) 1 organisation Latin Union
Recognised minority language in	3 dependencies Alghero (Sardinia, Italy)  Aragon (Spain) Pyrénées-Orientales (France)
Regulated by	Institut d'Estudis Catalans Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua
Language codes
ISO 639-1	ca
ISO 639-2	cat
ISO 639-3	cat
Glottolog	stan1289[4]
Linguasphere	51-AAA-e
Territories where Catalan is spoken and is official   Territories where Catalan is spoken but is not official   Territories where Catalan is not historically spoken but is official
This article contains IPA phonetic symbols. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Unicode characters. For a guide to IPA symbols, see Help:IPA.

Catalan (/ˈkætəlæn, -ən, ˌkætəˈlæn/;^[5] autonym: català) is a Western Romance language derived from Vulgar Latin and named after the medieval Principality of Catalonia, in northeastern modern Spain. It is the only official language of Andorra,^[6] and a co-official language of the Spanish autonomous communities of Catalonia, the Balearic Islands and Valencia (where the language is known as Valencian). It also has semi-official status in the Italian commune of Alghero.^[7] It is also spoken in the eastern strip of Aragon, in some villages of Region of Murcia called Carche and in the Pyrénées-Orientales department of France. These territories are often called Països Catalans or "Catalan Countries".

Catalan evolved from Vulgar Latin in the Middle Ages around the eastern Pyrenees. 19th-century Spain saw a Catalan literary revival,^[8][9] culminating in the early 1900s.

Etymology and pronunciation[edit]

Catalan Countries (Països Catalans): (In orange, strict Catalan-speaking area) NE modern Spain (Catalonia, Valencian Community and Balearic Islands), SE. France (Roussillon, touching the Pyrenees) and Comune of Alghero (NW coast of Sardinia, Island belonging to Italy)

The Crown of Aragon in 1443. King James the Conqueror [1208-1276] dictated his autobiographical chronicles entirely in Catalan. Some of this territory nowadays makes up the Catalan Countries.

The word Catalan is derived from the territorial name of Catalonia, itself of disputed etymology. The main theory suggests that Catalunya (Latin Gathia Launia) derives from the name Gothia or Gauthia ("Land of the Goths"), since the origins of the Catalan counts, lords and people were found in the March of Gothia, whence Gothland > Gothlandia > Gothalania > Catalonia theoretically derived.^[10][11]

In English, the term referring to a person first appears in the mid 14th century as Catelaner, followed in the 15th century as Catellain (from French). It is attested a language name since at least 1652. Catalan can be pronounced as /ˈkætəlæn/, /kætəˈlæn/ or /ˈkætələn/.^[5]

The endonym is pronounced [kətəˈla] in the Eastern Catalan dialects, and [kataˈla] in the Western dialects. In the Valencian Community, the term valencià [valensiˈa] is frequently used instead. The names "Catalan" and "Valencian" are two names for the same language.^{[12][13][inconsistent]} See also status of Valencian below.

History[edit]

Homilies d'Organyà (12th century)

Fragment of the Greuges de Guitard Isarn (ca. 1080–1095), one of the earliest texts written almost completely in Catalan,^[14][15] predating the famous Homilies d'Organyà by a century

Linguistic map of Southwestern Europe

Middle Ages[edit]

By the 9th century, Catalan had evolved from Vulgar Latin on both sides of the eastern end of the Pyrenees, as well as the territories of the Roman province of Hispania Tarraconensis to the south.^[16] From the 8th century onwards the Catalan counts extended their territory southwards and westwards at the expense of the Muslims, bringing their language with them.^[16] This process was given definitive impetus with the separation of the County of Barcelona from the Carolingian Empire in 988.^[9]

In the 11th century, documents written in macaronic Latin begin to show Catalan elements,^[15] with texts written almost completely in Romance appearing by 1080.^[15] Old Catalan shared many features with Gallo-Romance, diverging from Old Occitan between the 11th and 14th centuries.^[17]

During the 11th and 12th centuries the Catalan rulers expanded up to north of the Ebro river,^[16] and in the 13th century they conquered the Land of Valencia and the Balearic Islands.^[9] The city of Alghero in Sardinia was repopulated with Catalan speakers in the 14th century. The language also reached Murcia, which became Spanish-speaking in the 15th century.^[18]

In the Low Middle Ages, Catalan went through a golden age, reaching a peak of maturity and cultural richness.^[16] Examples include the work of Majorcan polymath Ramon Llull (1232–1315), the Four Great Chronicles (13th–14th centuries), and the Valencian school of poetry culminating in Ausiàs March (1397–1459).^[16] By the 15th century, the city of Valencia had become the sociocultural center of the Crown of Aragon, and Catalan was present all over the Mediterranean world.^[16] During this period, the Royal Chancery propagated a highly standardized language.^[16] Catalan was widely used as an official language in Sicily until the 15th century, and in Sardinia until the 17th.^[18] During this period, the language was what Costa Carreras terms "one of the 'great languages' of medieval Europe".^[9]

Martorell's outstanding^[16] novel of chivalry Tirant lo Blanc (1490) shows a transition from Medieval to Renaissance values, something that can also be seen in Metge's work.^[16] The first book produced with movable type in the Iberian Peninsula was printed in Catalan.^[19][9]

Start of the modern era[edit]

With the union of the crowns of Castille and Aragon (1479), the use of Spanish gradually became more prestigious^[18] and marked the start of the decline of the Catalan.^[9][8] Starting in the 16th century, Catalan literature came under the influence of Spanish, and the urban and literary classes became bilingual.^[18]

With the Treaty of the Pyrenees (1659), Spain ceded the northern part of Catalonia to France, and soon thereafter the local Catalan varieties came under the influence of French, which in 1700 became the sole official language of the region.^[6][20]

Shortly after the French Revolution (1789), the French First Republic prohibited official use of, and enacted discriminating policies against, the regional languages of France, such as Catalan, Alsatian, Breton, Occitan, Flemish, and Basque.

France: 19th to 20th centuries[edit]

Official Decree Prohibiting the Catalan Language in France

"Speak French, be clean", school wall in Ayguatébia-Talau, 2010

Following the French capture of Algeria (1833), that region saw several waves of Catalan-speaking settlers. People from the Spanish Alacant province settled around Oran, whereas Algiers received immigration from Northern Catalonia and Menorca. Their speech was known as patuet. By 1911, the number of Catalan speakers was around 100,000. After the declaration of independence of Algeria in 1962, almost all the Catalan speakers fled to Northern Catalonia (as Pieds-Noirs) or Alacant.^[21]

Nowadays, France recognizes only French as an official language. Nevertheless, on 10 December 2007, the General Council of the Pyrénées-Orientales officially recognized Catalan as one of the languages of the department^[22] and seeks to further promote it in public life and education.

Spain: 18th to 20th centuries[edit]

The decline of Catalan continued in the 16th and 17th centuries. The defeat of the pro-Habsburg coalition in the War of Spanish Succession (1714) initiated a series of laws which, among other centralizing measures, imposed the use of Spanish in legal documentation all over Spain.

In parallel, however, the 19th century saw a Catalan literary revival (Renaixença), which has continued up to the present day.^[6] This period starts with Aribau's Ode to the Homeland (1833); followed in the second half of the 19th century, and the early 20th by the work of Verdaguer (poetry), Oller (realist novel), and Guimerà (drama).^[23]

In the 19th century, the region of Carche, in the province of Murcia was repopulated with Catalan speakers from the Land of Valencia.^[24] The Second Spanish Republic (1931–1939) saw a brief period of tolerance, with most restrictions against Catalan being lifted.^[6] Despite orthographic standardization in 1913 and the official status of the language during the Second Spanish Republic (1931–39) the Francoist dictatorship banned the use of Catalan in schools and in the public administration between 1939 and 1975.^[25][8]

Present day[edit]

Since the Spanish transition to democracy (1975–1982), Catalan has been institutionalizated as an official language, language of education, and language of mass media; all of which have contributed to its increased prestige.^[26] In Catalonia, there is an unparalleled large bilingual European non-state speech community.^[26] The teaching of Catalan is mandatory in all schools,^[6] but it is possible to use Spanish for studying in the public education system of Catalonia in two situations – if the teacher assigned to a class chooses to use Spanish, or during the learning process of one or more recently arrived immigrant students.^[27] There is also some intergenerational shift towards Catalan.^[6]

According to the Statistical Institute of Catalonia, in 2013 the Catalan language is the second most commonly used in Catalonia, after Spanish, as a native or self-defining language: 7% of the population self-identifies with both Catalan and Spanish equally, 36.4% with Catalan and 47.5% only Spanish.^[28] In 2003 the same studies concluded no language preference for self-identification within the population above 15 years old: 5% self-identified with both languages, 44.3% with Catalan and 47.5 with Spanish.^[29] In order to promote use of Catalan, the Generalitat de Catalunya (Catalonia's official Autonomous government) spends part of its annual budget on the promotion of the use of Catalan in Catalonia and in other territories.^[30]

In Andorra, Catalan has always been the sole official language.^[6] Since the promulgation of the 1993 constitution, several policies favouring Catalan have been enforced, like Catalan medium education.^[6]

On the other hand, there are several language shift processes currently taking place. In the Northern Catalonia area of France, Catalan has followed the same trend as the other minority languages of France, with most of its native speakers being 60 or older (as of 2004).^[6] Catalan is studied as a foreign language by 30% of the primary education students, and by 15% of the secondary.^[6] The cultural association La Bressola promotes a network of community-run schools engaged in Catalan language immersion programs.

In Alicante province, Catalan is being replaced by Spanish and in Alghero by Italian.^[26] There are also well ingrained diglossic attitudes against Catalan in the Valencian Community, Ibiza, and to a lesser extent, in the rest of the Balearic islands.^[6]

Classification and relationship with other Romance languages[edit]

Chart of Romance languages based on structural and comparative criteria (not on socio-functional ones). Koryakov (2001) includes Catalan in Occitano-Romance, distinct from Iberian Romance.^[31]

The ascription of Catalan to the Occitano-Romance branch of Gallo-Romance languages is not shared by all linguists and philologists, particularly among Spanish ones, such as Ramón Menéndez Pidal.

According to Pèire Bèc, its specific classification is as follows:

• Romance languages
  • Italo-Western languages
    • Western Romance languages
      • Gallo-Iberian languages
        • Gallo-Romance languages (alternatively classified as Iberian Romance language)
          • Occitano-Romance languages (alternatively classified as East Iberian language)
            • Catalan language

Catalan bears varying degrees of similarity to the linguistic varieties subsumed under the cover term Occitan language (see also differences between Occitan and Catalan and Gallo-Romance languages). Thus, as it should be expected from closely related languages, Catalan today shares many traits with other Romance languages.

Relationship with other Romance languages[edit]

Catalan shares many traits with the other neighboring Romance languages (Italian, Sardinian, Occitan, and Spanish).^[24] However, despite being spoken mostly on the Iberian Peninsula, Catalan has marked differences with the Iberian Romance group (Spanish and Portuguese) in terms of pronunciation, grammar, and especially vocabulary; showing instead its closest affinity with Occitan^[32][33][34] and to a lesser extent Gallo-Romance (French, Franco-Provençal, Gallo-Italian).^{[35][36][37][38][32][33][34]}

According to Ethnologue, the lexical similarity between Catalan and other Romance languages is: 87% with Italian; 85% with Portuguese and Spanish; 76% with Ladin; 75% with Sardinian; and 73% with Romanian.^[39]

During much of its history, and especially during the Francoist dictatorship (1939–1975), the Catalan language was ridiculed as a mere dialect of Spanish.^[33][34] This view, based on political and ideological considerations, has no linguistic validity.^[33][34] Spanish and Catalan have important differences in their sound systems, lexicon, and grammatical features, placing the language in features closer to Occitan (and French).^[33][34]

There is evidence that, at least from the 2nd century a.d., the vocabulary and phonology of Roman Tarraconensis was different from the rest of Roman Hispania.^[32] Differentiation arose generally because Spanish, Asturian, and Galician-Portuguese share certain peripheral archaisms (Spanish hervir, Asturian and Portuguese ferver vs. Catalan bullir, Occitan bolir "to boil") and innovatory regionalisms (Sp novillo, Ast nuviellu vs. Cat torell, Oc taurèl "bullock"), while Catalan has a shared history with the Western Romance innovative core, especially Occitan.^[45][32]

Like all Romance languages, Catalan has a handful of native words which are rare or only found in Catalan. These include:

• verbs: cōnfīgere ‘to fasten; transfix’ > confegir ‘to compose, write up’, congemināre > conjuminar ‘to combine, conjugate’, de-ex-somnitare > deixondar/-ir ‘to wake; awaken’, dēnsāre ‘to thicken; crowd together’ > desar ‘to save, keep’, īgnōrāre > enyorar ‘to miss, yearn, pine for’, indāgāre ‘to investigate, track’ > Old Catalan enagar ‘to incite, induce’, odiāre > OCat ujar ‘to exhaust, fatigue’, pācificāre > apaivagar ‘to appease, mollify’, repudiāre > rebutjar ‘to reject, refuse’;
• nouns: brīsa > brisa ‘pomace’, buda > boga ‘reedmace’, catarrhu > cadarn ‘catarrh’, congesta > congesta ‘snowdrift’, dēlīrium > deler ‘ardor, passion’, fretu > freu ‘brake’, lābem > (a)llau ‘avalanche’, ōra > vora ‘edge, border’, pistrice > pestriu ‘fish species’, prūna ‘live coal’ > espurna ‘spark’, tardātiōnem > tardaó > tardor ‘autumn’.^[46]

The Gothic superstrate produced different outcomes in Spanish and Catalan. For example, Catalan fang "mud" and rostir "to roast", of Germanic origin, contrast with Spanish lodo and asar, of Latin origin; whereas Catalan filosa "spinning wheel" and templa "temple", of Latin origin, contrast with Spanish rueca and sien, of Germanic origin.^[32]

The same happens with Arabic loanwords. Thus, Catalan alfàbia "large earthenware jar" and rajola "tile", of Arabic origin, contrast with Spanish tinaja and teja, of Latin origin; whereas Catalan oli "oil" and oliva "olive", of Latin origin, contrast with Spanish aceite and aceituna.^[32] However, the Arabic element in Spanish is generally much more prevalent.^[32]

Situated between two large linguistic blocks (Iberian Romance and Gallo-Romance), Catalan has many unique lexical choices, such as enyorar "to miss somebody", apaivagar "to calm somebody down", and rebutjar "reject".^[32]

Geographic distribution[edit]

Catalan-speaking territories[edit]

Traditionally Catalan-speaking territories in dark grey; non-Catalan-speaking territories belonging to traditionally Catalan-speaking regions in light grey

Northern Catalonia Catalonia Alghero La Franja Valencian Community Carche Sardinia (Italy) Aragon (Spain) Murcia (Spain) France Andorra Balearic Islands

Traditionally Catalan-speaking territories are sometimes called the Països Catalans (Catalan Countries), a denomination based on cultural affinity and common heritage, that has also had a subsequent political interpretation but no official status. Various interpretations of the term may include some or all of these regions.

Territories where Catalan is spoken^[24]

State	Territory	Catalan name	Notes
Andorra	Andorra	Andorra	A sovereign state where Catalan is the national and the sole official language. The Andorrans speak a Western Catalan variety.
France	Northern Catalonia	Catalunya Nord	Roughly corresponding to the département of Pyrénées-Orientales.[24]
Spain	Catalonia	Catalunya	In the Aran Valley (northwest corner of Catalonia), in addition to Occitan, which is the local language, Catalan, Spanish and French are also spoken.[24]
	Valencian Community	Comunitat Valenciana	Excepting some regions in the west and south which have been Aragonese/Spanish-speaking since at least the 18th century.[24] The Western Catalan variety spoken there is known as "Valencian".
	La Franja	La Franja	A part of the Autonomous Community of Aragon, specifically a strip bordering Western Catalonia. It comprises the comarques of Ribagorça, Llitera, Baix Cinca, and Matarranya.
	Balearic Islands	Illes Balears	Comprising the islands of Mallorca, Menorca, Ibiza and Formentera.
	Carche	El Carxe	A small region of the Autonomous Community of Murcia, settled in the 19th century.[24]
Italy	Alghero	L'Alguer	A city in the Province of Sassari, on the island of Sardinia, where the peculiar Algherese dialect is spoken.

Number of speakers[edit]

The number of people known to be fluent in Catalan varies depending on the sources used. A 2004 study did not count the total number of speakers, but estimated a total of 9–9.5 million by matching the percentage of speakers to the population of each area where Catalan is spoken.^[47] The web site of the Generalitat de Catalunya estimated that as of 2004 there were 9,118,882 speakers of Catalan.^[48] These figures only reflect potential speakers; today it is the native language of only 35.6% of the Catalan population.^[49] According to Ethnologue, Catalan had four million native speakers and five million second-language speakers in 2012.^{[citation needed]} The most important social characteristic of the Catalan language is that all the areas where it is spoken are bilingual in practice: together with the French language in Roussillon, with Italian in Alghero, with Spanish and French in Andorra and with Spanish in the rest of the territories.

Territory	State	Understand 1[50]	Can speak 2[50]
Catalonia	Spain	6,502,880	5,698,400
Valencian Community	Spain	3,448,780	2,407,951
Balearic Islands	Spain	852,780	706,065
Roussillon	France	203,121	125,621
Andorra	Andorra	75,407	61,975
La Franja (Aragon)	Spain	47,250	45,000
Alghero (Sardinia)	Italy	20,000	17,625
Carche (Murcia)	Spain	No data	No data
Total Catalan-speaking territories		11,150,218	9,062,637
Rest of World		No data	350,000
Total		11,150,218	9,412,637

1.^ The number of people who understand Catalan includes those who can speak it.

2.^ Figures relate to all self-declared capable speakers, not just native speakers.

Level of knowledge[edit]

(% of the population 15 years old and older).

Social use[edit]

(% of the population 15 years old and older).

Native language[edit]

^[51][52][53]

Phonology[edit]

This article contains IPA phonetic symbols. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Unicode characters. For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA.

Catalan phonology varies by dialect. Notable features include:^[54]

• Marked contrast of the vowel pairs /ɛ e/ and /ɔ o/, as in other Western Romance languages, other than Spanish.^[54]
• Lack of diphthongization of Latin short ĕ, ŏ, as in Galician and Portuguese, but unlike French, Spanish, or Italian.^[54]
• Abundance of diphthongs containing /w/, as in Galician and Portuguese.^[54]

In contrast to other Romance languages, Catalan has many monosyllabic words, and these may end in a wide variety of consonants, including some consonant clusters.^[54] Additionally, Catalan has final obstruent devoicing, which gives rise to an abundance of such couplets as amic "(male friend") vs. amiga ("female friend").^[54]

Central Catalan pronunciation is considered to be standard for the language.^[55] The descriptions below are mostly representative of this variety.^[56] For the differences in pronunciation between the different dialects, see the section on pronunciation of dialects in this article.

Vowels[edit]

Vowels of Standard Eastern Catalan^[57]

Catalan has inherited the typical vowel system of Vulgar Latin, with seven stressed phonemes: /a ɛ e i ɔ o u/, a common feature in Western Romance, except Spanish.^[54] Balearic also has instances of stressed /ə/.^[58] Dialects differ in the different degrees of vowel reduction,^[59] and the incidence of the pair /ɛ e/.^[60]

In Central Catalan, unstressed vowels reduce to three: /a e ɛ/ > [ə]; /o ɔ u/ > [u]; /i/ remains distinct.^[61] The other dialects have different vowel reduction processes (see the section pronunciation of dialects in this article).

Consonants[edit]

The consonant system of Catalan is rather conservative, as is the case with most modern Western Romance languages.

• /l/ has a velarized allophone in syllable coda position in most dialects.^[64] However, /l/ is velarized irrespective of position in Eastern dialects like Majorcan^[65] and standard Eastern Catalan.
• /v/ occurs in Balearic,^[66] Alguerese, standard Valencian and some areas in southern Catalonia.^[67] It has merged with /b/ elsewhere.^[68]
• Voiced obstruents undergo final-obstruent devoicing: /b/ > [p], /d/ > [t], /ɡ/ > [k].^[69]
• Voiced stops become lenited to approximants in syllable onsets, after continuants: /b/ > [β], /d/ > [ð], /ɡ/ > [ɣ].^[70] Exceptions include /d/ after lateral consonants, and /b/ after /f/. In coda position, these sounds are realized as stops,^[71] except in some Valencian dialects where they are lenited.^[72]
• There is some confusion in the literature about the precise phonetic characteristics of /ʃ/, /ʒ/, /tʃ/, /dʒ/. Some sources^[66] describe them as "postalveolar". Others^[73][74] as "back alveolo-palatal", implying that the characters ⟨ɕ ʑ tɕ dʑ⟩ would be more accurate. However, in all literature only the characters for palato-alveolar affricates and fricatives are used, even when the same sources use ⟨ɕ ʑ⟩ for other languages like Polish and Chinese.^[75][76][74]
• The distribution of the two rhotics /r/ and /ɾ/ closely parallels that of Spanish. Between vowels, the two contrast, but they are otherwise in complementary distribution: in the onset of the first syllable in a word, [r] appears unless preceded by a consonant. Dialects vary in regards to rhotics in the coda with Western Catalan generally featuring [ɾ] and Central Catalan dialects featuring a weakly trilled [r] unless it precedes a vowel-initial word in the same prosodic unit, in which case [ɾ] appears.^[77]
• In careful speech, /n/, /m/, /l/ may be geminated. Geminated /ʎ/ may also occur.^[66] Some analyze intervocalic [r] as the result of gemination of a single rhotic phoneme.^[78] This is similar to the common analysis of Spanish and Portuguese rhotics.^[79]

Phonological evolution[edit]

Sociolinguistics[edit]

Catalan sociolinguistics studies the situation of Catalan in the world and the different varieties that this language presents. It is a subdiscipline of Catalan philology and other affine studies and has as an objective to analyse the relation between the Catalan language, the speakers and the close reality (including the one of other languages in contact).

Preferential subjects of study[edit]

• Dialects of Catalan
• Variations of Catalan by class, gender, profession, age and level of studies
• Process of linguistic normalisation
• Relations between Catalan and Spanish or French
• Perception on the language of Catalan speakers and non-speakers
• Presence of Catalan in several fields: tagging, public function, media, professional sectors

Dialects[edit]

Overview[edit]

Main dialects of Catalan^[80][81][82]

The dialects of the Catalan language feature a relative uniformity, especially when compared to other Romance languages;^[38] both in terms of vocabulary, semantics, syntax, morphology, and phonology.^[83] Mutual intelligibility between dialects is very high,^[24][84][55] estimates ranging from 90% to 95%.^[85] The only exception is the isolated idiosyncratic Alguerese dialect.^[38]

Catalan is split in two major dialectal blocks: Eastern Catalan, and Western Catalan.^[55][83] The main difference lies in the treatment of unstressed a and e; which have merged to /ə/ in Eastern dialects, but which remain distinct as /a/ and /e/ in Western dialects.^[38][55] There are a few other differences in pronunciation, verbal morphology, and vocabulary.^[24]

Western Catalan comprises the two dialects of Northwestern Catalan and Valencian; the Eastern block comprises four dialects: Central Catalan, Balearic, Rossellonese, and Alguerese.^[55] Each dialect can be further subdivided in several subdialects. The terms "Catalan" and "Valencian" (respectively used in Catalonia and the Valencian Community) are two varieties of the same language.^[86] There are two institutions regulating the two standard varieties, the Institute of Catalan Studies in Catalonia and the Valencian Academy of the Language in the Valencian Community.

Central Catalan is considered the standard pronunciation of the language and has the highest number of speakers.^[55] It is spoken in the densely populated regions of the Barcelona province, the eastern half of the province of Tarragona, and most of the province of Girona.^[55]

Catalan has an inflectional grammar. Nouns have two genders (masculine, feminine), and two numbers (singular, plural). Pronouns additionally can have a neuter gender, and some are also inflected for case and politeness, and can be combined in very complex ways. Verbs are split in several paradigms and are inflected for person, number, tense, aspect, mood, and gender. In terms of pronunciation, Catalan has many words ending in a wide variety of consonants and some consonant clusters, in contrast with many other Romance languages.^[54]

Pronunciation[edit]

Vowels[edit]

Catalan has inherited the typical vowel system of Vulgar Latin, with seven stressed phonemes: /a ɛ e i ɔ o u/, a common feature in Western Romance, except Spanish.^[54] Balearic has also instances of stressed /ə/.^[58] Dialects differ in the different degrees of vowel reduction,^[59] and the incidence of the pair /ɛ e/.^[60]

In Eastern Catalan (except Majorcan), unstressed vowels reduce to three: /a e ɛ/ > [ə]; /o ɔ u/ > [u]; /i/ remains distinct.^[61] There are a few instances of unreduced [e], [o] in some words.^[61] Alguerese has lowered [ə] to [a].

In Majorcan, unstressed vowels reduce to four: /a e ɛ/ follow the Eastern Catalan reduction pattern; however /o ɔ/ reduce to [o], with /u/ remaining distinct, as in Western Catalan.^[88]

In Western Catalan, unstressed vowels reduce to five: /e ɛ/ > [e]; /o ɔ/ > [o]; /a u i/ remain distinct.^[89][90] This reduction pattern, inherited from Proto-Romance, is also found in Italian and Portuguese.^[89] Some Western dialects present further reduction or vowel harmony in some cases.^[89][91]

Central, Western, and Balearic differ in the lexical incidence of stressed /e/ and /ɛ/.^[60] Usually, words with /ɛ/ in Central Catalan correspond to /ə/ in Balearic and /e/ in Western Catalan.^[60] Words with /e/ in Balearic almost always have /e/ in Central and Western Catalan as well.^[vague][60] As a result, Central Catalan has a much higher incidence of /ɛ/.^[60]

Consonants[edit]

This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it. (March 2014)

Morphology[edit]

Western Catalan: In verbs, the ending for 1st-person present indicative is -e in verbs of the 1st conjugation and -∅ in verbs of the 2nd and 3rd conjugations in most of the Valencian Community, or -o in all verb conjugations in the Northern Valencian Community and Western Catalonia.
E.g. parle, tem, sent (Valencian); parlo, temo, sento (Northwestern Catalan).

Eastern Catalan: In verbs, the ending for 1st-person present indicative is -o, -i, or -∅ in all conjugations.
E.g. parlo (Central), parl (Balearic), and parli (Northern), all meaning ('I speak').

Western Catalan: In verbs, the inchoative endings are -isc/-ixo, -ix, -ixen, -isca.

Eastern Catalan: In verbs, the inchoative endings are -eixo, -eix, -eixen, -eixi.

Western Catalan: In nouns and adjectives, maintenance of /n/ of medieval plurals in proparoxytone words.
E.g. hòmens 'men', jóvens 'youth'.

Eastern Catalan: In nouns and adjectives, loss of /n/ of medieval plurals in proparoxytone words.
E.g. homes 'men', joves 'youth'.

Vocabulary[edit]

Despite its relative lexical unity, the two dialectal blocks of Catalan (Eastern and Western) show some differences in word choices.^[32] Any lexical divergence within any of the two groups can be explained as an archaism. Also, usually Central Catalan acts as an innovative element.^[32]

Standards[edit]

Casa de Convalescència, Headquarters of the Institut d'Estudis Catalans

Standard Catalan, virtually accepted by all speakers,^[26] is mostly based on Eastern Catalan,^[55][93] which is the most widely used dialect. Nevertheless, the standards of the Valencian Community and the Balearics admit alternative forms, mostly traditional ones, which are not current in eastern Catalonia.^[93]

The most notable difference between both standards is some tonic ⟨e⟩ accentuation, for instance: francès, anglès (IEC) – francés, anglés (AVL). Nevertheless, AVL's standard keeps the grave accent ⟨è⟩, while pronouncing it as /e/ rather than /ɛ/, in some words like: què ('what'), or València. Other divergences include the use of ⟨tl⟩ (AVL) in some words instead of ⟨tll⟩ like in ametla/ametlla ('almond'), espatla/espatlla ('back'), the use of elided demonstratives (este 'this', eixe 'that') in the same level as reinforced ones (aquest, aqueix) or the use of many verbal forms common in Valencian, and some of these common in the rest of Western Catalan too, like subjunctive mood or inchoative conjugation in -ix- at the same level as -eix- or the priority use of -e morpheme in 1st person singular in present indicative (-ar verbs): jo compre instead of jo compro ('I buy').

In the Balearic Islands, IEC's standard is used but adapted for the Balearic dialect by the University of the Balearic Islands's philological section. In this way, for instance, IEC says it is correct writing cantam as much as cantem ('we sing') but the University says that the priority form in the Balearic Islands must be cantam in all fields. Another feature of the Balearic standard is the non-ending in the 1st person singular present indicative: jo compr ('I buy'), jo tem ('I fear'), jo dorm ('I sleep').

In Alghero, the IEC has adapted its standard to the Alguerese dialect. In this standard one can find, among other features: the definite article lo instead of el, special possessive pronouns and determinants la mia ('mine'), lo sou/la sua ('his/her'), lo tou/la tua ('yours'), and so on, the use of -v- /v/ in the imperfect tense in all conjugations: cantava, creixiva, llegiva; the use of many archaic words, usual words in Alguerese: manco instead of menys ('less'), calqui u instead of algú ('someone'), qual/quala instead of quin/quina ('which'), and so on; and the adaptation of weak pronouns.

In 2011,^[94] the Aragonese government passed a decree approving the statutes of a new language regulator of Catalan in La Franja (the so-called Catalan-speaking areas of Aragon) as originally provided for by Law 10/2009.^[95]The new entity, designated as Acadèmia Aragonesa del Català, shall allow a facultative education in Catalan and a standardization of the Catalan language in La Franja.

Status of Valencian[edit]

Catalan Wikisource has original text related to this article: AVL: Dictamen sobre els principis i criteris per a la defensa de la denominació i l'entitat del valencià

Subdialects of Valencian

Valencian is classified as a Western dialect, along with the northwestern varieties spoken in Western Catalonia (provinces of Lleida and the western half of Tarragona).^[55][87] The various forms of Catalan and Valencian are mutually intelligible (ranging from 90% to 95%)^[85]

Linguists, including Valencian scholars, deal with Catalan and Valencian as the same language. The official regulating body of the language of the Valencian Community, the Valencian Academy of Language (Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua, AVL) declares the linguistic unity between Valencian and Catalan varieties.^[13]

The AVL, created by the Valencian parliament, is in charge of dictating the official rules governing the use of Valencian, and its standard is based on the Norms of Castelló (Normes de Castelló). Currently, everyone who writes in Valencian uses this standard, except the Royal Academy of Valencian Culture (Acadèmia de Cultura Valenciana, RACV), which uses for Valencian an independent standard.

Despite the position of the official organizations, an opinion poll carried out between 2001 and 2004^[97] showed that the majority of the Valencian people consider Valencian different from Catalan. This position is promoted by people who do not use Valencian regularly.^[26] Furthermore, the data indicates that younger generations educated in Valencian are much less likely to hold these views. A minority of Valencian scholars active in fields other than linguistics defends the position of the Royal Academy of Valencian Culture (Acadèmia de Cultura Valenciana, RACV), which uses for Valencian a standard independent from Catalan.^[98]

This clash of opinions has sparked much controversy. For example, during the drafting of the European Constitution in 2004, the Spanish government supplied the EU with translations of the text into Basque, Galician, Catalan, and Valencian, but the latter two were identical.^[99]

Vocabulary[edit]

Word choices[edit]

Despite its relative lexical unity, the two dialectal blocks of Catalan (Eastern and Western) show some differences in word choices.^[32] Any lexical divergence within any of the two groups can be explained as an archaism. Also, usually Central Catalan acts as an innovative element.^[32]

Literary Catalan allows the use of words from different dialects, except those of very restricted use.^[32] However, from the 19th century onwards, there has been a tendency towards favoring words of Northern dialects to the detriment of others, even though nowadays there is a greater freedom of choice.^{[clarify][32]}

Latin and Greek loanwords[edit]

Like other languages, Catalan has a large list of loanwords from Greek and Latin. This process started very early, and one can find such examples in Ramon Llull's work.^[32] In the 14th and 15th centuries Catalan had a far greater number of Greco-Latin loanwords than other Romance languages, as is attested for example in Roís de Corella's writings.^[32] The incorporation of learned, or "bookish" words from its own ancestor language, Latin, into Catalan is arguably another form of lexical borrowing through the influence of written language and the liturgical language of the Church. Throughout the Middle Ages and into the early modern period, most literate Catalan speakers were also literate in Latin; and thus they easily adopted Latin words into their writing—and eventually speech—in Catalan.

Word formation[edit]

The process of morphological derivation in Catalan follows the same principles as the other Romance languages,^[100] where agglutination is common. Many times, several affixes are appended to a preexisting lexeme, and some sound alternations can occur, for example elèctric [əˈlɛktrik] ("electrical") vs. electricitat [ələktrisiˈtat]. Prefixes are usually appended to verbs, as in preveure ("foresee").^[100]

There is greater regularity in the process of word-compounding, where one can find compounded words formed much like those in English.^[100]

Writing system[edit]

The word novel·la ("novel") in a dictionary. The geminated L (l·l) is a distinctive character used in Catalan.

Billboard in Barcelona (detail), showing the word il·lusió ("illusion")

Catalan uses the Latin script, with some added symbols and digraphs.^[101] The Catalan orthography is systematic and largely phonologically based.^[101] Standardization of Catalan was among the topics discussed during the First International Congress of the Catalan Language, held in Barcelona October 1906. Subsequently, the Philological Section of the Institut d'Estudis Catalans (IEC, founded in 1911) published the Normes ortogràfiques in 1913 under the direction of Antoni Maria Alcover and Pompeu Fabra. In 1932, Valencian writers and intellectuals gathered in Castelló de la Plana to make a formal adoption of the so-called Normes de Castelló, a set of guidelines following Pompeu Fabra's Catalan language norms.^[102]

Grammar[edit]

The grammar of Catalan is similar to other Romance languages. Features include:^[104]

• Use of definite and indefinite articles.^[104]
• Nouns, adjectives, pronouns, and articles are inflected for gender (masculine and feminine), and number (singular and plural). There is no case inflexion, except in pronouns.^[104]
• Verbs are highly inflected for person, number, tense, aspect, and mood (including a subjunctive).^[104]
• There are no modal auxiliaries.^[104]
• Word order is freer than in English.^[104]

Gender and number inflection[edit]

Gender and number inflection of the word gat ("cat")

In gender inflection, the most notable feature is (compared to Portuguese, Spanish or Italian), the loss of the typical masculine suffix -o. Thus, the alternance of -o/-a, has been replaced by ø/-a.^[54] There are only a few exceptions, like minso/minsa ("scarce").^[54] Many not completely predictable morphological alternations may occur, such as:^[54]

• Affrication: boig/boja ("insane") vs. lleig/lletja ("ugly")
• Loss of n: pla/plana ("flat") vs. segon/segona ("second")
• Final obstruent devoicing: sentit/sentida ("felt") vs. dit/dita ("said")

Catalan has few suppletive couplets, like Italian and Spanish, and unlike French. Thus, Catalan has noi/noia ("boy"/"girl") and gall/gallina ("cock"/"hen"), whereas French has garçon/fille and coq/poule.^[54]

There is a tendency to abandon traditionally gender-invariable adjectives in favour of marked ones, something prevalent in Occitan and French. Thus, one can find bullent/bullenta ("boiling") in contrast with traditional bullent/bullent.^[54]

As in the other Western Romance languages, the main plural expression is the suffix -s, which may create morphological alternations similar to the ones found in gender inflection, albeit more rarely.^[54] The most important one is the addition of -o- before certain consonant groups, a phonetic phenomenon that does not affect feminine forms: el pols/els polsos ("the pulse"/"the pulses") vs. la pols/les pols ("the dust"/"the dusts").^[105]

Determiners[edit]

Sign in the town square of Begur, Catalonia, Spain. In plaça de la vila (literally "square of the town"), since the noun vila ("town") is feminine singular, the definite article carries the corresponding form, la ("the").

The inflection of determinatives is complex, specially because of the high number of elisions, but is similar to the neighboring languages.^[100] Catalan has more contractions of preposition + article than Spanish, like dels ("of + the [plural]"), but not as many as Italian (which has sul, col, nel, etc.).^[100]

Central Catalan has abandoned almost completely unstressed possessives (mon, etc.) in favour of constructions of article + stressed forms (el meu, etc.), a feature shared with Italian.^[100]

Personal pronouns[edit]

The morphology of Catalan personal pronouns is complex, specially in unstressed forms, which are numerous (13 distinct forms, compared to 11 in Spanish or 9 in Italian).^[100] Features include the gender-neutral ho and the great degree of freedom when combining different unstressed pronouns (65 combinations).^[100]

Catalan pronouns exhibit T–V distinction, like all other Romance languages (and most European languages, but not Modern English). This feature implies the use of a different set of second person pronouns for formality.

This flexibility allows Catalan to use extraposition extensively, much more than French or Spanish. Thus, Catalan can have m'hi recomanaren ("they recommended me to him"), whereas in French one must say ils m'ont recommandé à lui, and Spanish me recomendaron a él.^[100] This allows the placement of almost any nominal term as a sentence topic, without having to use so often the passive voice (as in French or English), or identifying the direct object with a preposition (as in Spanish).^[100]

Verbs[edit]

Like all the Romance languages, Catalan verbal inflection is more complex than the nominal. Suffixation is omnipresent, whereas morphological alternations play a secondary role.^[100] Vowel alternances are active, as well as infixation and suppletion. However, these are not as productive as in Spanish, and are mostly restricted to irregular verbs.^[100]

The Catalan verbal system is basically common to all Western Romance, except that most dialects have replaced the synthetic indicative perfect with a periphrastic form of anar ("to go") + infinitive.^[100]

Catalan verbs are traditionally divided into three conjugations, with vowel themes -a-, -e-, -i-, the last two being split into two subtypes. However, this division is mostly theoretical.^[100] Only the first conjugation is nowadays productive (with about 3500 common verbs), whereas the third (the subtype of servir, with about 700 common verbs) is semiproductive. The verbs of the second conjugation are fewer than 100, and it is not possible to create new ones, except by compounding.^[100]

Syntax[edit]

The grammar of Catalan follows the general pattern of Western Romance languages. The primary word order is subject–verb–object.^[110] However, word order is very flexible. Commonly, verb-subject constructions are used to achieve a semantic effect. The sentence "The train has arrived" could be translated as Ha arribat el tren or El tren ha arribat. Both sentences mean "the train has arrived", but the former puts a focus on the train, while the latter puts a focus on the arrival. This subtle distinction is described as "what you might say while waiting in the station" versus "what you might say on the train."^[111]

Catalan names[edit]

In Spain, every person officially has two surnames, one of which is the father's first surname and the other is the mother's first surname.^[112] The law contemplates the possibility of joining both surnames with the Catalan conjunction i ("and").^[112][113]

Sample text[edit]

Selected text^[114] from Manuel de Pedrolo's 1970 novel Un amor fora ciutat ("A love affair outside the city").

Loanwords in Catalan and English[edit]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

Bibliography[edit]

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External links[edit]

Catalan edition of Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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• Catalan language at Curlie

Institutions

• Consorci per a la Normalització Lingüística
• Institut d'Estudis Catalans
• Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua
• Secretaria de Política Lingüística de la Generalitat de Catalunya

About the Catalan language

• Gramàtica de la Llengua Catalana (Catalan grammar)
• verbs.cat (Catalan verb conjugations with online trainers)
• Catalan and its dialects

Monolingual dictionaries

• Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, from the Institut d'Estudis Catalans
• Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, from Enciclopèdia Catalana
• Diccionari Català-Valencià-Balear d'Alcover i Moll
• Diccionari Valencià online
• Diccionari Invers de la Llengua Catalana (dictionary of Catalan words spelled backwards)

Bilingual and multilingual dictionaries

• Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana Multilingüe from Enciclopèdia Catalana (Catalan ↔ English, French, German and Spanish)
• DACCO open source, collaborative dictionary (Catalan–English)
• Webster's Online Dictionary, The Rosetta Edition (Catalan–English)
• Optimot: Catalan language consults, dictionary and thesaurus of Generalitat of Catalonia

Automated translation systems

• Traductor automated, online translations of text and web pages (Catalan ↔ English, French and Spanish)
• SisHiTra automated, online translations of text and web pages (Catalan–Spanish)
• apertium.org Apertium (free software) translates text, documents or web pages, online or offline, between Catalan and Aranese, English, Esperanto, French, Occitan, Portuguese and Spanish
• translate.google.com online translations Catalan <> English and other languages

Phrasebooks

• Catalan phrasebook on Wikivoyage
• Basic Catalan phrases (with audio)
• Catalan language with audio

Learning resources

• Catalan Swadesh list of basic vocabulary words, from Wiktionary's Swadesh-list appendix
• Interc@t, set of electronic resources for learning the Catalan language and culture
• Learn Catalan!, an introduction for the Catalonia-bound traveler
• On-line Catalan resources

Catalan-language online encyclopedia

• Enciclopèdia Catalana