“Spanish Languages” as a Polysemic Expression: Territories, Borders, and Geopolitical Identities

Abstract

Spain is the country with the most complex geolinguistics issues in the whole of Europe. On the one hand, it is the territory of origin for a language spoken by more than 400 million people across the world, especially in the United States. On the other hand, at least three other joint official languages (Catalan, Basque, and Galego) coexist alongside each other in Spain and are the mother tongues of approximately 18% of the country’s citizens. So, Spanish languages are accompanied by complex territorial issues and are even superimposed in many regions and towns, creating very powerful geopolitical identities. Of these identities, the most significant is the one generated by Spanish or Castilian. This is one of the main languages used on a global scale, from the United States (where it is spoken by more than 40 million people) to the far south of Latin America, with the exception of Brazil. In this immense country, the hegemonic use of Portuguese does not pose any serious problems for communicating with the Spanish-speaking citizens in all its neighboring countries. As can be deduced, the fact that Castilian was born in Spain and has spread from there brings huge advantages when it comes to fostering the global expansion of its economy, leading a highly influential cultural community and acting (together with Portugal) as a bridge between the European Union and Latin America. In the interior areas of Spain, more than 10 million people speak Catalan, a little fewer than 3 million speak Galego, and 850,000 speak Basque. It is true that all these citizens know and are able to speak Spanish too; although by keeping these territorial languages alive, they are expressing a strong sense of their own identity and this has been used by the 1978 Spanish Constitution as a key factor for regarding Catalonia, the Basque Country, and Galicia as nationalities, compared to the term region that applies to most of the country’s autonomous communities. As the paper discusses, the Spanish language issue is a complex one and provides many possibilities for analysis. These possibilities lead to a better understanding of how linguistic geography is fundamental for interpreting political and cultural geography and the set of territorial representations that flourish in Europe.