A multidisciplinary collaboration studies the coexistence between Catalan and Spanish in Catalonia

Nov. 15, 2019

A group formed by physicists Luís F. Seoane (at the Pompeu Fabra University and the Institute for Interdisciplinary Physics and Complex Systems, IFISC, at the University of the Balearic Islands-CSIC) and Jorge Mira (at the Applied Physics department and AeMAT strategic group of the University of Santiago de Compostela) and sociolinguists Xaquín Loredo (Galician Royal Academy) and Henrique Monteagudo (Galician Royal Academy and University of Santiago de Compostela) just released a study published by Palgrave Communications (of the Nature editing group) based on the data of a century of linguistic coexistence between Catalan and Spanish in Catalonia.

This work has combined the most exhaustive and recent data sources (provided by the Statistical Institute of Catalonia) to find out, assisted by mathematical models and techniques, whether the lasting coexistence between both tongues can be stable in a middle- to long-term. The research suggests that such coexistence would be possible under a wide range of circumstances considered. The resulting mathematical models allow the authors to attempt a prediction at how the amount of speakers of each linguistic group (monolinguals in each tongue and bilinguals) will change over the following years. 


Seoane, L.F., Loredo, X., Monteagudo, H. et al. Is the coexistence of Catalan and Spanish possible in Catalonia?Palgrave Commun 5, 139 (2019). doi: 10.1057/s41599-019-0347-1



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