Occitan language
Occitan — also called Lenga d'Òc, Langue d'Oc or Provençal — (in their own language: occitan, lenga d'òc and sometimes provençau) is a Romance language spoken in a territory called Occitania, which comprises southern France, Monaco, part of Italy (the Occitan Valleys) and part of Spain (the Aran Valley).
This minority language has the status of an official language in Spain[1] and of a protected language in Italy.[2] It has no official status in France, nor in Monaco. Its usage is quite limited compared to dominant state languages such as French, Italian and Spanish.
Nowadays, Occitan enjoys a dynamic movement of cultural defense and modern creativity, especially in literature and music. Occitan literature has been famous and uninterrupted since the 10th century,[3] including the troubadours of the Middle Ages, a baroque period, Frederic Mistral's Nobel prize in 1904 and a constant renewal nowadays.[4]
The main Occitan dialects are Provençal (including Niçard), Vivaro-Alpine, Auvernhat, Lemosin, Gascon and Lengadocian.[5] All of them are integrated into and respected in the ongoing standardization process.
Catalan is extremely close to Occitan.
Name
The term Occitan is nowadays the most used for the language. It appeared between 1290 and 1300[6], perhaps as early as 1271[7] in texts written in Latin under forms such as occitanus, lingua occitana, simultaneously with the territory name Occitania (Occitania in Latin and English, Occitània in Occitan). It is thought that Occitania was created from òc (that is lenga d'òc) and the ending of the territory name [Aqu]itania. The terms Occitan and Occitania used to belong to a learned register for a long time but they have gained a wide usage since the second half of the 20th century.
The term Lenga d'Òc, that is 'language of òc', may be said in English Lenga d'Òc as in Occitan or Langue d'Oc as in French. Lenga d'Òc appeared in texts in 1291[8] and is the likely etymology of the term Oc[citan]. Notably, Lenga d'Òc was spread from De vulgari eloquentia (1303-1305), the famous essay of Italian writer Dante Alighieri, where three Romance languages were identified by the affirmation adverb which means 'yes': 'language of òc' (Occitan), 'language of sì' (Italian) and 'language of oïl' (French).
The term Provençal (provençau, provençal in Modern Occitan; proensal in Old Occitan) appeared around 1240.[9] Italians authors, which were influenced by the high prestige of Medieval Occitan, helped the spread of this name since Provence is the closest region of Occitania from an Italian perspective. In traditional Romance linguistics, Provençal was the most used term for the whole language before it was replaced by Occitan in the second half of the 20th century. A large part of Occitan-speaking people do not live in Provence and therefore can hardly identify themselves as 'Provençal-speakers', so the spread of the term 'Occitan' has been viewed as a more neutral naming solution which does not favors any particular region. Nowadays, the term Provençal is mostly used to designate the Occitan dialect of Provence rather than the whole Occitan language.
Footnotes
- ↑ Act no. 16 of 1990 (Regim especiau dera Val d'Aran / Special Regime of Aran Valley) and Act no. 1 of 1998 (Lei de politica linguistica / Language Policy Act), both in the autonomous region of Catalonia; see here.
- ↑ Act no. 482 of 1999 in Italy (Norme in materia di tutela delle minoranze linguistiche storiche / Norms Concerning the Protection of Historical Language Minorities), see here.
- ↑ LAFONT Robert, & ANATOLE Christian (1970) Nouvelle histoire de la littérature occitane, coll. Publications de l’Institut d’Études Occitanes, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 2 vol.
- ↑ KIRSCH F. Peter, & KREMNITZ Georg, & SCHLIEBEN-LANGE Brigitte (2002) Petite histoire sociale de la langue occitane: usages, images, literature, grammaires et dictionnaires, coll. Cap al Sud, 66140 Canet: Trabucaire.
- ↑ BEC Pierre (1973) Manuel pratique d’occitan moderne, coll. Connaissance des langues, Paris: Picard.
- ↑ LAFONT Robèrt (1986) “La nominacion indirècta dels païses”, Revue des langues romanes 2, vol. XC: 161-171
- ↑ LODGE R. A. (1993) French, from dialect to standard, London / New York: Routledge, p. 96 — Quoted in: MULJAČIĆ Žarko (1997) “Perché i glottonimi linguaggio italiano, lingua italiana (e sim.) appaiono per indicare ‘oggetti’ reali e non soltanto auspicati molto più tardi di altri termini analoghi che si riferiscono a varie lingue gallo e ibero-romanze?”, Cuadernos de filología italiana 4: 253-264
- ↑ LODGE R. A. (1993) French, from dialect to standard, London / New York: Routledge, p. 96 — Quoted in: MULJAČIĆ Žarko (1997) “Perché i glottonimi linguaggio italiano, lingua italiana (e sim.) appaiono per indicare ‘oggetti’ reali e non soltanto auspicati molto più tardi di altri termini analoghi che si riferiscono a varie lingue gallo e ibero-romanze?”, Cuadernos de filología italiana 4: 253-264
- ↑ SCHLIEBEN-LANGE Brigitte (1991): "Okzitanisch: Grammatikographie und Lexikographie", Lexikon der Romanistichen Linguistik V, 2: 105-126 (p. 111) — Quoted in: MULJAČIĆ Žarko (1997) “Perché i glottonimi linguaggio italiano, lingua italiana (e sim.) appaiono per indicare ‘oggetti’ reali e non soltanto auspicati molto più tardi di altri termini analoghi che si riferiscono a varie lingue gallo e ibero-romanze?”, Cuadernos de filología italiana 4: 253-264