The introduction of the concept of official language in the Spanish legal framework (1902-1931)

Abstract

This article attempts to chronologically follow the process of introduction of the concept of official language in the Spanish legal framework. The article explains that although Spanish was de facto the language of government institutions, in the studied period there was no legal order formally stating Spanish as the ‘official language’. The emergence of this concept, first in government representatives’ verbal statements, later in lower rank rules, and its final declaration as the official language in a Constitution were due to political Catalanism’s claims to recognize the Catalan language as official, and therefore it operated as a reactive measure to strengthen the legal dominance of the Spanish language. The chronological framework starts with the first legal rule in which Spanish’s officialness is presupposed and finishes with the first constitutional declaration of Spanish as official language.

Keywords: history of linguistic law, official language, language conflict, Catalan, Spanish.