Just a decade ago, it would have been unimaginable to walk past a school in Catalonia and hear Spanish being spoken in the courtyard. Children and teenagers at the time, many of whom are now adults, were living under pressure – both from family and from teachers – as they had to … Speak Catalan only So that they do not feel excluded, even if their usual language is Spanish. But something has changed, even in the inner cities, where separatist sentiment has traditionally run deeper.
Frustration over the failure to fulfill promises that pro-independence parties had made to Catalans for many years, such as achieving their own statehood, is part of the reason why the pressures then exerted declined dramatically. But it is not the only factor. the Loss of fear of being discriminated against, The struggle of a small number of families to guarantee their right to education in Spanish, and the emergence of more complex and politically incorrect political forces, with the language permeating the electorate in the future, also have a lot to do with this.
Previously, there was a social need to speak Catalan to feel like someone else, or rather not to feel less than, something that Jordi Pujol’s nationalism established several decades ago as a defensive tool at a time of much internal displacement coming from other autonomous regions in Spain. Today there is a need to speak Catalan. Clear and evident rebellion among some teenagers Who are no longer just sons of TV3, the greatest Catalan manufacturer of all time. YouTube and TikTok are currently the main sources of information and entertainment for under-18s in Catalonia. Although there is a certain effort to create content in Catalan, teens choose the lingua franca of the entire country when they are in front of their mobile phones. Although their knowledge of the language, in some cases, could be more than just an improvement, as a result of an education model that when it comes to protecting Catalan against Spanish manages to achieve an almost absolute majority in Parliament with the PSC aligned with the separatist parties.
In Catalan schoolyards, as in the rest of the country, they talk about everything. The topic of conversation changes depending on the age of the students. First loves and heartbreaks, games or football, which are recurring themes in the entertainment areas, mix with pure and simple current affairs and their connection to politics, as students grow up and finish their compulsory high school and start high school or a training course. Nothing different than it was ten years ago. Or yes…
A decade ago, in the midst of separatist fervor, as children wore a commemorative 9/11 Diada T-shirt during the early days of the political year, independence was one of the topics of discussion discussed from 13 or 14 years old in schoolyards. In Catalan, obviously, since then Few dared not follow him For the fashion that was established at that time. In some places, such as San Andres de la Barca (Barcelona), where the main barracks of the Civil Guard of Catalonia are located, even minor children were selected for agents of the Armed Institute of their parents’ profession.
A decade later, in a central school in the city of Olot (Girona), which has always been controlled by CiU and Junts except for a brief period when the PSC headed the council, two teenagers wear the jersey of the Spanish team. They do this without fear of being bullied for it, something that would have happened a few years ago, although they admit “we received some comments from some parents.”
At this school, where high school training ends, older students leave the playground for a nearby park during break or between classes. Some take the opportunity to go to a nearby bar to get a sandwich, a soft drink or a coffee. As the television turned on and Abascal appeared on the screen, interviewing on a morning show, one of them shouted, “This is the person who should rule.” The person accompanying him nods: “In Olot Fox the city council will get a great result,” he answers. Three adults look at them from the bar table, one telling them “Look how smart they are” and the other “It’s either Foxes or Orioles.” The third remains silent and looks at the scene in amazement.
As in Olot, in Ripoll, a town where Alianca leader Catalana is mayor, migration has become a tangible reality with every step one takes through the city. There is a very central school where, despite the efforts of Orioles, who refuses to speak Spanish, the children can also be heard speaking to them in closed-accented Spanish. In this case they are not foreigners who have recently arrived in the country. “We also speak Spanish among ourselves,” says a teenager born in Ripoll and from a Catalan-speaking family after class. “It’s okay to speak Spanish,” he says, with some difficulty expressing himself clearly. “Sometimes we watch TikTok and something comes up that we find funny and we comment on it.”
When we ask this boy from Ripollense what he feels represents him most, he answers without hesitation for a second: «I’ll vote for the Orioles “She’s the only one who tells things like they are.” He argues his decision with a very specific example: “So far this year, three of our classmates’ cell phones have been stolen, and since there is parental control and our parents can know where they are, the three cell phones were left somewhere here in a town full of Moroccans.”