# Is there a standard in Catalan?



## ernest_

Nota de la moderadora: He mantingut aquesta conversa perquè pot ser interessant però estava fora del tema del fil original. Si us plau, mantingueu-vos en el tema del fil i obriu nou fils per discutir altres temes.



merquiades said:


> It's a very controversial subject as everyone would like to believe their pronunciation is standard.


It's not that controversial. In Valencia there is a standard accent. Fact. In Catalonia there is no standard accent officially. Fact. The only controversy is whether there is a_ de facto_ standard accent in Catalonia. I think there is, but some people disagree.


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## merquiades

ernest_ said:


> It's not that controversial. In Valencia there is a standard accent. Fact. In Catalonia there is no standard accent officially. Fact. The only controversy is whether there is a_ de facto_ standard accent in Catalonia. I think there is, but some people disagree.


  It seems like quite a lot of people get bent out of shape about pronunciation though.  Regarding Spaniards,  I think we could just say they skew the words unconsciously so they sound closer to Spanish.  For example,  la platja blanca/ les platjes blanques  would sound a bit like la playa blanca/ las playas blancas.  Consonants and vowels simplified whenever they don't mirror Spanish.

I have 3 methods for learning Catalan, one in English, one in French, and one in Spanish.  They all seem to teach central Catalan as a standard.

Alan Yates in his preface says, "Standard Catalan is based on the language of Barcelona and it is this which is studied here.  The space available does not allow coverage of the many variations of accent and dialect which Catalan displays.  Suffice it to say, though, that standard Catalan is understood well throughout all these regions."
Monserrat Prudon Moral similarly states, "Selon le territoire où elle est pratiquée, la langue catalane peut présenter quelques différences phonétiques.  Ces variations sont signe de richesesse et de vitalité.  Nous avons choisi de respecter les normes académiques  et c'est donc le catalan central dit standard qui a été adopté et enregistré."
The Spanish method by Joan Dorandeu does not make any mention of norm or standard but in the pronunciation guide he teaches the neutral vowel. He transcribes words in his glossary using Spanish phonetics, with the neutral vowel as @.  For example, "vaig al centre"  as "bach @l sèntr@".
So it is probably true that foreigners assimilate this kind of pronunciation their own way, maybe giving the neutral vowel the sound closest to it in their language.  In the French method they advice people to pronounce the "oeu" in "soeur", "u" in "cut" for the English  but it's probably "a" for Spaniards.


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## germanbz

ernest_ said:


> It's not that controversial. In Valencia there is a standard accent. Fact. In Catalonia there is no standard accent officially. Fact. The only controversy is whether there is a_ de facto_ standard accent in Catalonia. I think there is, but some people disagree.



Yes, there is a standard accent but that's because differents dialectal variations throughout the territory are not so important, as it is said in AVL normative:

*"... encara que la pronunciació del valencià es relativament uniforme en tot el territori valencià i s'ajusta prou bé a les convencions ortogràfique... [ ] es consideren pròpies del valencià estàndard aquelles realitzacions que, son generals en tot el territori valencià o que tenen un prestigi social ampliament reconegut...

*Obviously propousing an oral standard in a dialect that is basically homogeneus (as valencian) is not the same that  unilateraly _decide_? that the standard for all Catalan has to be central catalan. Of course that tendency only can get the rejection of other areas. (Centralism is not only a Madrid defect).


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## ernest_

germanbz said:


> Obviously propousing an oral standard in a dialect that is basically homogeneus (as valencian) is not the same that  unilateraly _decide_? that the standard for all Catalan has to be central catalan. Of course that tendency only can get the rejection of other areas. (Centralism is not only a Madrid defect).


I can't imagine why anyone would reject an oral standard, which native speakers can and are supposed to ignore, when no one rejects the written standard, which is equally inconvenient and everyone has to adhere to it. To be honest, I don't understand your point of view.


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## germanbz

ernest_ said:


> I can't imagine why anyone would reject an oral standard, which native speakers can and are supposed to ignore, when no one rejects the written standard, which is equally inconvenient and everyone has to adhere to it. To be honest, I don't understand your point of view.



Perhaps because such kind of "oral standard" is basically one particular Catalonian dialect or a slightly variation of it? Of course when one belongs to that particular dialect things are normal to be seen from a different perspective.

Does it need English an oral standard?. Not at all. If you learn English in Europe you likely will learn a "BBC English" but if you learn English in America you'll learn any american English. Has anybody ever proposed anything like a "global English standard"?


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## ernest_

germanbz said:


> Perhaps because such kind of "oral standard" is basically one particular Catalonian dialect or a slightly variation of it? Of course when one belongs to that particular dialect things are normal to be seen from a different perspective.


Yes, I understand that it is inconvenient, as I've already said, for instance when I write in Catalan I have to make a distinction between o/u and a/e in unstressed positions which is totally artificial to me because my particular dialect doesn't have this distinction. Do I reject the standard because of this? No I don't. It would be most stupid. Likewise, rejecting an oral standard for the same reason would be even more stupid, because no one has follow it, unlike the written standard.


> Does it need English an oral standard?. Not at all. If you learn English in Europe you likely will learn a "BBC English" but if you learn English in America you'll learn any american English. Has anybody ever proposed anything like a "global English standard"?


Both BBC English and General American are standard pronunciations. Do you know anyone who is bothered by them? I don't. And, yes, standards are useful, otherwise they wouldn't exist.


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## germanbz

ernest_ said:


> Yes, I understand that it is inconvenient, as I've already said, for instance when I write in Catalan I have to make a distinction between o/u and a/e in unstressed positions which is totally artificial to me because my particular dialect doesn't have this distinction. Do I reject the standard because of this? No I don't. It would be most stupid. Likewise, rejecting an oral standard for the same reason would be even more stupid, because no one has follow it, unlike the written standard.
> 
> Both BBC English and General American are standard pronunciations. Do you know anyone who is bothered by them? I don't. And, yes, standards are useful, otherwise they wouldn't exist.



I'm not quite sure that considering "stupid" any other point of view of the matter is a great argument.


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## ernest_

germanbz said:


> I'm not quite sure that considering "stupid" any other point of view of the matter is a great argument.


It is not an argument at all.  My argument is that, knowing that

1) the same reasons for opposing an oral standard apply in the case of a written standard

and

2) written standards are obligatory, oral standards are not

it would be irrational to oppose an oral standard and not oppose a written standard.

Therefore, since there exists no opposition to a written standard and people are, for the most part, rational, we should expect no opposition to an oral standard.


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## germanbz

Is there in fact "one" written standard in Catalan?

You can say "yes" if you consider that there is one _standard _which accepts different ways of conjugating a verb or accepts different pronouns that means the same thing but when talking about pronuntiation if you say that there is "one only  way" of pronouncing a word then the parallelism with alternative written language doesn't work.

In other words, if you consider equally standar to write: jo patisc or jo pateixo, why can't you consider equally standard two different ways of pronouncing the same word?

I don't think that by using parallelisms with writting language is a strong argument to try and decide that there might be one only way to pronounce one word, particularly in a language like Catalan.


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## ernest_

The fact that a particular accent is consiedered standard doesn't mean that there is only one way to pronounce a word or that other accents are wrong.  A standard accent is one that speakers tend to use or expect under certain circumstances, for example, when talking to a foreigner, in dubbed movies, etc.


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## germanbz

ernest_ said:


> The fact that a particular accent is consiedered standard doesn't mean that there is only one way to pronounce a word or that other accents are wrong.  A standard accent is one that speakers tend to use or expect under certain circumstances, for example, when talking to a foreigner, in dubbed movies, etc.



Coming back to the begining the problem is the start point of that standard. I've been reading some points of that "proposal" and is curiously, in general "features of catalan which are common in Valencian Calatan or Balearic Catalan usually are usually considered either "no recomanable" or at least "d'ús restringit", (even particullar conjugation of Valencian) otherwise when there is a particularity of eastern Catalan, usually is considered as "propi de l'àmbit general". For me is something like original grammar from Fabra, absolutely centralized in central eastern Catalan. I see that for a large amount of speakers of Catalan things are barely changed for the last 100 years when considering which have to be the "reference" in Catalan or when considering which is the real "best Catalan". I certainly don't believe in "basc batua system" exported to Catalan.


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