The Role of Language in Spanish Nation-Building

Abstract

This chapter investigates the role that language plays in defining nationalism and then sees how far it is a salient marker in the nation-building process and nationalist movements of modern Spain. Gellner also sees the importance of language in the modernisation process that has helped create nations. He describes all men as 'clerks' in their relationship to society and stresses how this role and its reliance on literacy has made people less mobile, only able to operate within the areas where the particular national language is spoken. The chapter sketches the context of Spain's conflicting nationalisms insofar as these reflect linguistic issues. It shows how and where the complex relationship between language and politics shapes these nationalisms through language planning, and how this may in fact doom minority groups ultimately to be cast in the image of and controlled by the central majority powers.

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