Occitan Revival

Susano

Banned
Some languages, just as Czech and Welsh, experienced a real and drastic revival in the 19th, in the face of lingual assimilation (by German and English in those examples, respectively). Other languages did not manage that and its speakers are nowadays largely assimilated into another language. A prime example for this is Occitan... so the question is, can Occitan see a similar revival in the 19th century?
 

Thande

Donor
Well Czech and Welsh are both 'alien' tongues compared to German and English respectively, whereas Occitan is just another Romance language/dialect, except this one doesn't have an army.

Now granted Catalan did see a revival under persecution and that's very similar to Occitan, but Catalan is associated with a coherent region, people and culture. Occitan by contrast is I think too vaguely distributed across a wide area of France. Also, I get the impression (though I'm not an expert) that because Occitan was never standardised, the various dialects have drifted too far apart to be considered as comparatively coherent as the examples you mention.

I think it would be not dissimilar to trying to revive "Northern English" in the face of cultural imperialism from London - while all the Northern dialects pretty much share certain common features that distinguish them from Southern English (such as short vowels) there are also wide gulfs between them that would be very tricky to bridge with any kind of standardisation that would please everyone, or indeed anyone.
 

Susano

Banned
As far as I understand, the continuum between French and Occitan is definitly blurry, but before French language policies cut into it, most of Southern France (Gacogne, Languedoc, Provence) was a coherent Occitan territory. Now, as for standardisation, I guess thats a problem. One solution could be going at least partially back to ridicously old forms, when Occitan was THE cultural language of Europe in the Middle Ages - after all national romanticism glorifying the past (and of course getting it absolutely wrong) was very en vogue in the 19th century. Though I guess it works better if somebody could just say "you see this dialect of Occitan? Thats now the standard version". But there doesnt seem to be an obvious choice for it in Occitan - then again, there doesnt seem to be an obviosu choice for it in Welsh, either, how did they handle standardisation?

But really, those are technical problems that can be overcome. I would say the main hinderances are gaining a social impetus from soemwhere, and political barriers...
 
Actually, I was told by a friend who traveled in Southern France a few years back that Occitan and Provencal are still strong and widely spoken, something she, as a speaker of standard French, ran into a lot of problems with (apparently in some cases they're almost mutually incomprehensible). However, I was under the impression that they're treated mainly as dialects, and not actual languages
 
Well Czech and Welsh are both 'alien' tongues compared to German and English respectively, whereas Occitan is just another Romance language/dialect, except this one doesn't have an army.

Now granted Catalan did see a revival under persecution and that's very similar to Occitan, but Catalan is associated with a coherent region, people and culture. Occitan by contrast is I think too vaguely distributed across a wide area of France. Also, I get the impression (though I'm not an expert) that because Occitan was never standardised, the various dialects have drifted too far apart to be considered as comparatively coherent as the examples you mention.

I think it would be not dissimilar to trying to revive "Northern English" in the face of cultural imperialism from London - while all the Northern dialects pretty much share certain common features that distinguish them from Southern English (such as short vowels) there are also wide gulfs between them that would be very tricky to bridge with any kind of standardisation that would please everyone, or indeed anyone.

Well, the occitan was a group of dialects wide spread in a large area as you say, but that was the euskara (basque) too (in a smaller area, but it was too a diverse group of dialects sometimes unintelligible among them) and nowadays it's a unified language (batua). It has been possible thanks to a political will led by a nationalist movement. My point is that the normalization of a group of dialects in a single language is often the consequence of a political impulse. In other hand I wouldn't say that the catalan was prosecuted in the XIXth century (it wasn't the francoism) but rather it was marginalized, that it's not exactly the same thing. In the same way, the recuperation of the catalan as a "respectable" language is the consequence of a political will, represented in the movement called "Renaxença" along the XIXth century.

Regarding the occitan, it was more actively prosecuted, as other minoritary languages in France, following a politic known as "la vergonha" (the shame). I think that if we want a future to the occitan language/s (not neccessarily in all Occitania) we need a POD not after 1796, maybe limiting the Jacobin influence in the french national and republican self-conception or a more succesful fate to the absolutist army in La Vendée.

In regard to the revival of Catalan in comparation to the Occitan: In adittion to that said above, I think that the coherent region associated to catalan is a secondary issue (that wasn't so coherent until the Renaxensa and even is not exactly coherent nowadays (ie. the "conflict" between català and valencià, la franja de ponent etc)) In my opinion the key is in the painful spanish XIXth century. Regionalist and separatist movements in Spain gained force after the consummation of Spain as an almost failed nation-state. The legitimacy crisis first, the inopertive adminstration, the continuous decline of power and influence in the international arena, the fail of Liberalism, the inability to conciliate the centralist and peripherical interests, the absent industrialization and finally the 1898 disaster. Maybe If we find some way to make France fails as a functional nation-state the political will to revive the occitan as an active language/s could flourish, but it seems almost ASB.


And my own question: What were the reasons to the revival of Welsh?

Cheers.
 

Susano

Banned
But it seems to me that some cultural/lingual groups "push back" especially when they are pushed, that is, they cling to their language especially when it is persecuted, instead of just being marginalised (in whiche case it often peacefully fades away). I think Czech is a good example of that. It faded in the background in a time when the Habsburg government (except the somewhat outlandish reforms of Joseph II) did not do much to promote German, OTOH, Czech, uh, lingual consciousness lets say was always then highest if people actively pushed for the extension of the role of German.

However, all chances of sucess aside, there seems to not have been much resistance in the Occitan community to begin with, so it seems to me that needs to be changed first. If that is, maybe a PoD after the French Revolution is sufficient.
(And really, what with the often happening regime changes in France - I dont think France could reach the Spanish levels of the 19th century, but there certainly exist possibilities for way weaker central governments...)
 

Skokie

Banned
It's difficult to wank the French once they've made up their minds about something. Islamic Japan? Sure, why not. But a France with an Occitan revival on par with Catalan? Hard to believe.
 
I honestly don't see the "langue d'oc" surviving as a language in common usage without a PoD way back, maybe even pre-1500, but most certainly pre-1791. Revolutionary centralisation and the 25 year long national mobilisation created a national sentiment which increasing spoke a national (Francilien) language, a fact cemented by the various national education laws.

One interesting potential PoD, though, going all the way back to the 14th century, would have been Dante's deciding to write the Divine Comedy in Provençal. IIRC, he had originally planned to do so, since the two "French" languages in the Middle Ages were considered the prestigious vernaculars on a par with Latin among the educated, whereas the various Spanish and Italian vernaculars were frowned upon. In he end, he did decide to write in his native Tuscan, making him as important to the codification of the Italian language as Chaucer would be to the English.
 

Deleted member 5719

Actually, I was told by a friend who traveled in Southern France a few years back that Occitan and Provencal are still strong and widely spoken, something she, as a speaker of standard French, ran into a lot of problems with (apparently in some cases they're almost mutually incomprehensible). However, I was under the impression that they're treated mainly as dialects, and not actual languages


If she's been to the same France I know, I'd say the problem was more likely that her French isn't as good as she thinks it is. :p

I've heard Occitan spoken once in 20 or so visits to southern France.

The problem with an Occitan revival is that the French state in the 19th and 20th centuries was too strong and too French. The much weaker Spanish state never managed to suppress its minority languages, as it lacked the capacity to impose itself at a local level for much of this period.
 
But it seems to me that some cultural/lingual groups "push back" especially when they are pushed, that is, they cling to their language especially when it is persecuted, instead of just being marginalised (in whiche case it often peacefully fades away). I think Czech is a good example of that. It faded in the background in a time when the Habsburg government (except the somewhat outlandish reforms of Joseph II) did not do much to promote German, OTOH, Czech, uh, lingual consciousness lets say was always then highest if people actively pushed for the extension of the role of German.

I agree in part with you. But I think that the linguistcal conflicts are usually the more visible face of deeper problems. A language is not an isolated folklore trait. A language is a communication code, but it is too, specially when minoritary, a easily visible sign of colective self-identification. Thus, in my opinion the revival of certain european languages in the 19th century is related to colective political and economical interests. In other words, you need a previous community of interests to make the people spontaneously feel the necessity of being part of a cultural-political-linguistical excludent community. So, the direct prosecution shouldn't be the only path to make a language "push back" and not all languages push back when they are prosecuted.

In that sense, it seems to me that, mutatis mutandis, one common point between Austia-Hungary and Spain in the 19th century was the décalage between the political centers (Vienna, Madrid -> Austria, Castille) and the peripherical economic centers (Catalonia, Bohemia).



However, all chances of sucess aside, there seems to not have been much resistance in the Occitan community to begin with, so it seems to me that needs to be changed first. If that is, maybe a PoD after the French Revolution is sufficient.
(And really, what with the often happening regime changes in France - I dont think France could reach the Spanish levels of the 19th century, but there certainly exist possibilities for way weaker central governments...)

You are right, I exaggerated with the "not after 1796" PoD. And of course, it's impossible France could reach the spanish levels in the 19th century, even a quarter of the spanish "chaos". Maybe we can also limite the french process of centralization in its begining in the second half of the XVIIth century, but I have no clue of how to do that. Another option could be a different Restauration, or a more succesful one, after the napoelonic wars.

Anyway, following my materialist perspective, the french industrialization has particularities. We don't see great industrial concentrations (except maybe in the Seinne basin and I think that those are from the late XIXth century) and we have a large rural population even in the beginning of the XXth century. Also the main commercial centers are in the north (exception made to Marseille, but the Mediterranian is not the Atlantic), closer to Paris, so there isn't a definite community of interest in the pays d'Oc...If you see, Catalonia, Bohemia or Padania were closer to the industrial bulk of Europe and its markets and dynamics in comparation to the rest of their states, that is not the case in southern France.

The problem with an Occitan revival is that the French state in the 19th and 20th centuries was too strong and too French. The much weaker Spanish state never managed to suppress its minority languages, as it lacked the capacity to impose itself at a local level for much of this period.

That is true. And of course, it is difficult to revive a language if it is completly dead.
But if speaking castilian (spanish) were a clair advantge, the catalan would have dispared as did other spanish languages or would be badly damaged as is the galician without the intervention of the State. The difference between Galicia and Catalonia is that Catalonia has a powerful bourgeoisie, that revived the catalan language as a prestige language, and in the poor and rural Galicia the galician was seen as a bumpkin language.
 

Deleted member 5719

You are right, I exaggerated with the "not after 1796" PoD. And of course, it's impossible France could reach the spanish levels in the 19th century, even a quarter of the spanish "chaos". Maybe we can also limite the french process of centralization in its begining in the second half of the XVIIth century, but I have no clue of how to do that. Another option could be a different Restauration, or a more succesful one, after the napoelonic wars.

I don't think we need to reverse French centralisation in th C17th, we simply stop the revolution. A liberal/Catholic cvil war could easily give power to perpheral regions, and pride to local bourgeoisies. The linguistic aspect of the Revolution was the root of the destruction of the languages of France. At the time of the revolution 70% of Frenchmen couldn't speak French.



That is true. And of course, it is difficult to revive a language if it is completly dead.
But if speaking castilian (spanish) were a clair advantge, the catalan would have dispared as did other spanish languages or would be badly damaged as is the galician without the intervention of the State. The difference between Galicia and Catalonia is that Catalonia has a powerful bourgeoisie, that revived the catalan language as a prestige language, and in the poor and rural Galicia the galician was seen as a bumpkin language.

Catalan was also aided, ironically, by the fact that its educated speakers usually self identified as Occitan (or Provençal) speakers, attracted by the lustre of medieval Occitan's tradition and prestige. Its continuity with the now moribund Occitan fomented its 19th century revival.

Gallego, conversely, suffered from forming part of a pretty obvious dialect chain with Castillian, blending into Castillan seamlessly, through intermediate dialects like Asturian, Cantabrian and Leonese. Its speakers often perceived it as a rough patois of Castillian, and held it in low prestige.
 
Frédéric Mistral's attempts at a Provençal Revival has better success. Maybe have Mirèio successful analogous to the Kalevala in Finland.

I don't think we need to reverse French centralisation in th C17th, we simply stop the revolution. A liberal/Catholic cvil war could easily give power to perpheral regions, and pride to local bourgeoisies. The linguistic aspect of the Revolution was the root of the destruction of the languages of France. At the time of the revolution 70% of Frenchmen couldn't speak French.
I would agree with this.

Another POD much further back is to avoid the Albigensian Crusade.
 

Susano

Banned
Well, I said specificalyl revival, in the 19th century. Simply continuing and surviving is something else, techncially ;)
 
Well, I said specificalyl revival, in the 19th century. Simply continuing and surviving is something else, techncially ;)

I think the biggest problem with this question is that the term "Occitan" is a fairly modern concept for a language that by the beginning of the 19th century was made up of several disparate dialects. A Provençal-speaking peasant would have had nearly as much trouble understanding a Gascon or an Auvergnat as they would a Francilien. How does one create a movement that unites these groups and gives them a united linguistic consciousness, escepially given the nationalising experience of the levée en masse? Between 1792-1815, these would have been a couple million occitan-speaking men who would have gone to war and come home having fought for France and speaking French. The various national education laws passed, culminating in the loi Ferry in the 1880s certainly cemented the demise of occitan, but it couldn't have happened without the national spirit created by the mass mobilisation in those two decades.

Even the two examples you give are conflicting and ambiguous. In the case of Czech, the "Revival" was based around an effort not to save a dying language but in fact to put a healthy, vibrant language spoken by a people from the wealthiest, most industrialised part of the A-H empire on an even playing field with the dominant language, German. As for Welsh, like Irish Gaelic or Louisiana French, its "Revival" just means that it still exists as a source of pride and ethnic identification, not as a language of daily life outside isolated communities (Wales and Louisiana have somewhat similar populations, and in each about 5% still claim to speak the ancestral tongue as their first language). As such, Occitan does still survive to the latter extent, being taught in schools, with an optional section for the Baccalauréat, but rarely heard outside groups of old people in small towns.
 

Deleted member 5719

Seconded. I grew up in southern France and my only exposure to Occitan has been the posters in favor of the Partit Occitan in some local elections.

I heard an old man a bit south of Limoges speak one sentence of something that sounded a bit like Catalan (but nicer) to his wife about 15 years ago, before switching back to French. Apart from that, just street signs in Nice and Villefranche, a monument to Mistral in Marseille, and election publicity for the Partit Nissard. Written, it really is nearly identical to Catalan.

Arabic is much more relevant than Occitan to modern France.
 
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I think the biggest problem with this question is that the term "Occitan" is a fairly modern concept for a language that by the beginning of the 19th century was made up of several disparate dialects. A Provençal-speaking peasant would have had nearly as much trouble understanding a Gascon or an Auvergnat as they would a Francilien. How does one create a movement that unites these groups and gives them a united linguistic consciousness, escepially given the nationalising experience of the levée en masse? Between 1792-1815, these would have been a couple million occitan-speaking men who would have gone to war and come home having fought for France and speaking French. The various national education laws passed, culminating in the loi Ferry in the 1880s certainly cemented the demise of occitan, but it couldn't have happened without the national spirit created by the mass mobilisation in those two decades.
I think you're being overly ... harsh? While the TERM Occitan may (?or may not?) be modern, the historic concept of 'France' being split into the two communities of Langue d'Oc and Langue d'Oïl is historic and real. In fact, in the time of the troubadors, the Langue d'Oc was the higher status, more literary language. Yes, that's a long time back, but you have literature and status to fall back on.

Now... It most certainly is true that the centralizing process from Paris, starting (in a mild form) with Louis XIV and culminating in an overwhelming form with the French Revolution did crush and shatter the southern language. (As you said.) It is also true that Gascon is very close to Catalan, and Provençal proper is more like Italian. (Again, as you said.) I don't think that that would stop a revival, though. The power of Romantic thought in the 19th century is very strong - Heck the British ressurected Druids, even if they had to invent most everything!

I think that given the existing corpus of literature, and with thousands of people still speaking the language (even if they are peasants and its thousands, now, not millions), that given the right charismatic figure, a revival of Occitan would be entirely possible.

Note that TWO charismatic figures might well doom the project <grin> (as then they'd be pushing two different dialects).
 
Successful language creation/recreations:

Hebrew: created in the 19th century extending Biblical Hebrew to everyday speech and the modern era. Huge task, very successful.

Irish Gaelic. It was about as crushed as Occitan, came roaring back with the Irish Nationalist movement. Admittedly, this was far more teaching people an existing language than any recreation.

Norwegian. When Norway was negotiating independence, there was NO Norwegian language (dozens of dialects, yes). THey created TWO Norwegian languages. Again, easier, but very successful.


Creating a modern prose literary Occitan from a poetic literary mediaeval language and a collection of peasant dialects would definitely be a lot of work. Given that we're talking about the 19th century, it might not be well done, either (the modern forms might be borrowed wholesale from Italian or Catalan or, horrors, Castillian). But it sure ought to be possible.
 

Deleted member 5719

Successful language creation/recreations:

Hebrew: created in the 19th century extending Biblical Hebrew to everyday speech and the modern era. Huge task, very successful.

Irish Gaelic. It was about as crushed as Occitan, came roaring back with the Irish Nationalist movement. Admittedly, this was far more teaching people an existing language than any recreation.

Norwegian. When Norway was negotiating independence, there was NO Norwegian language (dozens of dialects, yes). THey created TWO Norwegian languages. Again, easier, but very successful.


Creating a modern prose literary Occitan from a poetic literary mediaeval language and a collection of peasant dialects would definitely be a lot of work. Given that we're talking about the 19th century, it might not be well done, either (the modern forms might be borrowed wholesale from Italian or Catalan or, horrors, Castillian). But it sure ought to be possible.

In general I agree with everyhing you say here, but Irish was actually much more widely spoken as a first language at independence than it is now. We are looking at well below 100,000 native speakers now, probably below 50,000. It is not a community language in many places where it was at independence, and lives on as "Bog Latin", necessary for working in the civil service, but not much else. It has many more second language speakers than 90 years ago, but its revival can only be viewed as a failure.
 
Apparently in the months after the Hundred Days there was noise of establishing a Kingdom of Occitania in Southern France that was only nominally tied to the North. Perhaps this is how the language could be revived.
 
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