The impact of Catalan on Castilian can be seen in maritime vocabulary. As old Castile was enclosed by land, with no contact to ports it did not need expressions associated with the sea. Thus, with the development of the Castilian empire and its eventual necessity for overseas trade, there came a requirement for maritime vocabulary. It borrowed terms from Catalan, seen in the table below.
Figure 1. Maritime vocabulary borrowings from Catalan in Castilian
This represents one method of borrowing which is founded on necessity. This idea is explored by Feijoo within his Teatro crítico universal, in which he discusses the importance of “voces facultativas”. These are words that exist in one language, yet “no tienen equivalente” in another, and he cites the example of the Castilian desenvoltura. Battling against a superstitious Spain, he had to try to allow for the incorporation of foreign words that were useful for the Spanish lexicon. This is exactly what occurred for maritime vocabulary.
A modern influence of Catalan on Castilian can be seen in the rise in popularity of Catalan cuisine. For an area like food, it is easy for Catalan to impose its lexicon upon the Castilian, particularly nowadays thanks to the disintegration of repressive techniques on Catalan.
Figure 2. Catalan food in the Castilian lexicon
An important change in history, in terms of the impact of Catalan lexical influence, is the development of the first printing technology. Printing posed a way of dispersing information, as well as instigating and universalising a language. At the critical time, Catalonia didn’t have the political power necessary to ensure the propagation of its language, and thus were stopped entering modernity. Similarly, early printers found it more profitable to print in Castilian, as works could be sold outside of Catalonia or traded for works not published within Catolonia. However, the late nineteenth century can be seen as a period of renaissance for the Catalan language. 1907 saw the Institut d’Estudis Catalans founded, subsequent publishing of Normes ortogràfiques (1913) and Diccionari ortogràfic (1917) confirming the presence of Catalan once again. It took a little longer for a course in Catalan to appear at University of Barcelona, namely in 1944. Similarly, there was only a chair of Catalan language and literature founded in 1961. Despite this belated re-emergence of Catalan strength, the language has remained intact. What’s more, it is now possible to see Catalan phrases emerging in Castilian newspapers. Below are examples of political parties and terms, in Catalan, which have been incorporated into El País:
Figure 3. Catalonian political groups incorporated within the Spanish newspaper “el País”.
Moving on, the manner in which neologisms are dealt with is of interest. The industrial revolution, and the technologic revolution, bring the necessity for neologisms to be assimilated. For Catalan, this has meant reliance upon Castilian because of the lack of contact with certain anglicised terms. In this way, Catalan has adopted Castilian terms, which have come from English.
Figure 4. Neologisms in Castilian and Catalan
Essentially, these were new technological advances and once built in Spain needed a Spanish word. However, with Castilian being the dominant language, when a new term was necessary, the English “railway” would be translated into Castilian. Therefore it was applicable for Catalan speakers to adopt this word rather than create their own.
Mireia Galindo Solé study of the contact phenomenon of Castilian and Catalan between school children in Barcelona, depicts the current situation of lexical exchange of the two languages. The adoption of other words into a language can be expressed by the term “transcodic marker” a term defined by G.Lüdi. This covers a range of phenomena, two broad typologies are recognised. The first is “codeswitching”, the second “interferences”. Codeswitching can only occur in areas of bilingual speech as it is the “alternate activation of more than one language and is only possible for bilingual speakers”. Interferences is the focus point of the study, dealing with phonetic, lexical, morphosyntactic or semantic material that is transferred from one language to another, a process which can occur for both bilinguals and monolingual speakers. As stated in the introduction, the acquisition of language is a accumulative process, and the study represents the most recent part of this process. The Castilian spoken by these children is influenced by Catalan which is taught in the school, differentiating their Castilian from Castilian habitually spoken in other monolingual areas.
My hypothesis that Castilian and Catalan would have relatively low lexical relations due to the conflict between its peoples is confirmed by the low level of transcodic markers in each language. However, the percentage of transcodic markers found in Castilian are considerably lower than in Castilian. The study highlights that transcodic markers made up for 3.57% of words included in Catalan speech, yet only 0.57% in Castilian. It is important to note that this is a study on colloquial conversation and therefore would struggle to be assimilated into the lexicon of the language because the necessity of written forms. However, it is an important study as it represents an example of modern lexical relations. It is possible to see that the loan words incorporated came from the field of games and leisure. For instance “hide” could be used in hide and seek, cau is the play centre and the children would eat cake in break times.
Figure 5. Loanwords. Absolute and relative frequencies.
Interestingly, the Catalan words that the children adopt are the ones which are shorter than the Castilian equivalent. For instance, va instead of venga is used as this is much quicker. Similarly, ara is a lot easier than ahora therefore the children choose their speech in terms of ease. Another situation has occurred, and that is seen in esplai and cau, where these two words have no Castilian equivalent and therefore the children will have to adopt the Catalan term in order to portray the message.
Having analysed the lexical borrowings, it is possible to see that these are low, particularly considering the amount of contact between the two languages due to the vicinity of the speakers. An explanation is the animosity between the two linguistic groups, meaning lexical borrowings were kept to a minimum. Another explanation is the fact each area was influenced by a different group of people, thus words that would be deemed to be lexically related have incurred changes with have clouded this relation. Let us consider first the influence of Arabic on Castilian and Catalan:
Figure 6. Arabic influence on Castilian and Catalan.
Catalan was able to resist the agglutination of the Arabic ‘al-‘ which meant that the two languages evolved in a different way. However, the influence of Germanic, especially Frankish was incorporated within Catalan but also Castilian and we can see lexical relations but in fact they are borrowings from Germanic:
Figure 7 Germanic influence on Castilian and Catalan.
Here we can see that there are some similarities: robar, ropa/roba and rico/ric. The ric can be attributed to the Catalan tendency to drop the final o which in a similar way allows veterinario (Cast.) to give veterinari (Cat.). In this way we are able to see that although there are lexical relations it is not via transcodic markers nor loanwords from each other but rather from a Germanic influences. This influence has meant that although these words seem to be similar, they are in fact borrowings from Germanic, rather than loanwords. Similarly, this problem arises with Latin, as both languages have their roots in Latin. This poses problems when looking at the etymology of a word, as often it has been sieved through Latin. For instance, (cast.) lanza can be said to come from (cat.) llança, yet in Corominas’ work, this is not cited. Instead he attributes the origins with the Latin lancea.
Having analysed the lexical relations between Catalan and Castilian it is possible to say that the relations are scarce. Conflicts surrounding the two groups of speakers have made borrowing undesirable. For this reason, only “voces facultivas” have been incorporated into each language. Due to repression, the Catalan influence on Castilian has been slight, and the influence can be seen in places such as the media, food items and historically in maritime vocabulary. It seems that political power, economic welfare and literary grandeur provide the foundations for the lexical dominance of language. The desire for autonomy, power and governance, inherent within human nature, transcends to the world of language and is the inhibitor of lexical relations in this case. Furthermore, the dominance of Castilian has meant that foreign words that come from abroad are first assimilated into Castilian, then to Catalan. It is unlikely to occur inversely, and often any Catalan influence upon Castilian can be annulled by looking to the Latin term.
Bibliography
Works Cited:
Variation and Change in Spanish
Ralph Penny
Cambridge University Press 2000
A brief history of the Spanish language
David A. Pharies
The University of Chicago Press Fifth edition 2002
How Spanish Grew
Robert K. Spaulding
University of California Press, Berkeley, Los Angeles, London , 1943
Breve Diccionario Etimológico de la lengua castellana
Joan Corominas
EDITORIAL GREDOS, S. A. Sánchez Pacheco, 81, Madrid. España
Tecer Edición, julio 1973
Multicultural Iberia: Language, Literature, and Music
Dru Dougherty & Milton M. Azevedo, Editors
University of California Press 1999
El español y el catalán, juntos y en contraste
Germán Colón
Editorial Ariel, S. A. Córcega, 270-09009 Barcelona, 1.a edición: mayo 1989
The Spanish language, together with Portuguese, Catalan and Basque
William J. Entwistle
Faber 1974
Astrology and Numerology in Medieval and Early Modern Catalonia
John Scott Lucas
BRILL 2003
A question of empire: Leopold I and the War of Spanish Succession
Lindsa Frey, Marsha Frey
East European Monographs 1983
“Essays in honour of Josep M. Solà-Solé: linguistic and literary relations of Catalan and Castilian”
Suzanne S. Hintz
1996 Peter Lang Publishing, Inc., New York
Background Reading:
Diccionario Etimologico: General de la lengua castellana
Fernando Corripio
Impreso en los Talleres Gráficos de EDITORIAL BRUGUERA
S. A. Mora la Nueva 2 – Barcelona – 1973
La llengua catalana mil anys enrere
Joan Bastardas
Curial Edicions Catalanes 1995
Estudis de llengua i literatura catalanes/xii
Antoni M. Badia I Margarit
L’Abadia de Montserrat 1986
Internet Resources:
Overview of Catalan language, number of speakers etc:
Articles taken from the Spanish newspapers website online:
Mireia Galindo Solé study on the contact phenomenon currently occurring in Barcelona
Language Contact Phenomena in Catalonia: The Influence of Catalan in Spoken Castilian
Universitat de Barcelona
PDF of a brochure of the Institut d’Estudis Catalans for date of inauguration
For citing historical events the online encyclopaedia was used, both English and Catalan:
Copy of the complete works of Feijóo’s Teatro cítico universal:
"Variation and Change in Spanish" (Penny 2000:12-13)
"Variation and Change in Spanish" (Penny 2000:12)
“Variation and Change in Spanish” (Penny 2000:16)
Definition: A regional dialect or language that becomes the standard language over a wider area, losing its most extreme local features. Taken from:
“The Spanish language, together with Portuguese, and Basque” (Entwistle 1974:84)
"Variation and Change in Spanish" (Penny 2000:12)
“How Spanish Grew” (Spaulding 1943:46)
“How Spanish Grew” (Spaulding 1943:52-54)
“The Spanish language, together with Portuguese, and Basque” (Entwistle 1974:82)
“The Spanish language, together with Portuguese, and Basque” (Entwistle 1974:96)
“Multicultural Iberia: Language, Literature, and Music” (Dougherty 1999:200)
“Breve Diccionario Etimológico de la Lengua Castellana” (Corominas 1973:103) Parece tomado del cat. bosquejar ‘desbastar (un tronco)’
“El español y catalán, juntos y en contraste” (Colón 1989:76)
“Astrology and Numerology in Medieval and Early Modern Catalonia” (Lucas 2003:21)
“A question of empire: Leopold I and the War of Spanish Succession” (Frey 1983:15)
“Essays in honour of Josep M. Solà-Solé: linguistic and literary relations of Catalan and Castilian” (Hintz1996:19)
“The Spanish language, together with Portuguese, and Basque” (Entwistle 1974:102)
“Breve Diccionario Etimológico de la Lengua Castellana” (Corominas 1973:80) Tomado del cat. vaixell
“Breve Diccionario Etimológico de la Lengua Castellana” (Corominas 1973:444) Especie de polea de barco h. 1573. Probte. del cat. pasteca
Table found in: “A brief history of the Spanish language” (Pharies 2002:72) excluding other referenced terms.
“Teatro crítico universal” (Feijóo 1726:Tomo Primero, Discurso XV, Parágrafo V, 25)
“Teatro crítico universal” (Feijóo 1726:Tomo Primero, Discurso XV, Parágrafo V, 19)
“Multicultural Iberia: Language, Literature, and Music” (Dougherty 1999:200)
Taken from a PDF of the Institutes brochure:
El País, lunes 1 de junio de 2009, page 16
“El español y catalán, juntos y en contraste” (Colón 1989:78)
“El español y catalán, juntos y en contraste” (Colón 1989:78)
Definition given in the bibliography of the study: “marques, dans le discours, qui renvoient d’une manière ou d’une autre à la rencontre de deux ou plusieurs systèmes linguistiques (calques, emprunts, transferts lexicaux, alternances codiques, etc.) Page 29
“Breve Diccionario Etimológico de la Lengua Castellana” (Corominas 1973:508) h. 1140. Del gót. Reiks “poderoso)
“Breve Diccionario Etimológico de la Lengua Castellana” (Corominas 1973:353) h. 1140. Del lat. LANCEA