Sobre els models de normalització lingüística: una aproximació jurídico-política

Resum

Till now, the fact that no complete theoretical proposals about the models of linguistic standardisation, applicable to the Catalan Countries, have been made prevents us from writing its strict history and from elaborating a solid enough typology about them.  Nevertheless, in the debate about linguistic standardisation in the Catalan Countries, one can sense two models that, starting from de principle of territoriality, clearly propose the standardisation of the Catalan language, although they are essentially in contrast. The main divergent  points between these models are, in  short, the following ones:  1) For model A, the Catalan  Countries are just a linguistic community,  whereas for model B, they  are also a national community and  that is the reason why linguistic  planning (to create a normative of  common language and to extend its  use) has to be carried out by a single  national authority and not through  the coordination of different territorial authorities, which is the proposal  of model A.  2) In the standardisation process, a qualitative change in the linguistic conflict will take place at the moment when, following model A, Catalan will be fully used or else, following B, at the moment when it will be exclusively used.  3) Both models recognise that  Spanish has performed and still performs  functions of bilateral interposition  in relation to Catalan but,  whereas A considers that a future situation  of multilateral interposition  whit other languages (French, Italian  or English) would be desirable,  B proposes the eradication of Spanish  in the Catalan Countries and  that the function of interposition  should be carried out by a distant  language (preferably English).  4) For model A, as long as legal regulation is interpreted in a favourable sense in relation to the principle of territoriality, the present legal and political system in Spain does not prevent the process of standardisation from progressing to its last stages. Instead for model B, this is the main restraint to the process, for its feasibility demands political independence.  From the contrast of the outlines corresponding to both models, one gathers that model B presents a lack of firmness on its statements, procedures and objectives that invalidates it as a model for the linguistic standardisation of Catalan. Instead model A, on which the most reputable scholars of Catalan sociolinguistics base themselves and that inspires the Document of Synthesis of the II International Congress of the Catalan Language, has revealed itself as a productive, soIid and coherent proposal.