"We are not the 'other' Catalans: we are Catalans."

BarcelonaA hundred years ago Francisco Candel (1925-2007) was born in Cases Altes, a Spanish-speaking region of Valencia. Two years later, he was living in one of the earth-planked shacks at the foot of Montjuïc. The family eventually moved to the Casas Baratas de Can Tunis, there. Where the city changes its number (1957), and later in the Navy, the place where the journalist, writer, and politician developed his life and work. Candel was a child of the first wave of migration and chronicled the second. The other Catalans (Edicions 62) was his most notable book – an unprecedented publishing success in 1964, with 30,000 copies sold in just a few weeks – and over the years it has become almost mythologized as a symbol of "Catalonia, one people", which would drive the PSUC, and later become a motto.

Candel "brought the working-class neighborhoods out of anonymity and gave a voice to the voiceless working class, whatever their origins", states historian Marc Andreu in the prologue to the new edition of the book, to mark Candel Year. The writer's "conciliatory, welcoming, respectful, fraternal and humane" spirit – as he defined himself – made him an optimal figure to bridge the gap between the Catalans Catalans and the new Catalans"Man acclimatizes and ends up loving the land where he lives, especially if that land is not hostile to him; and it is that generosity that, in the end, makes it his own," he wrote. Fifty years later, the volume, composition, and economic situation of immigration have changed completely. migratory wave?

Same challenges, new ways

Osama Damoun Yemlahi (Vilanova i la Geltrú, 1997) is a sociologist and doctoral candidate at the Center for Demographic Studies of Catalonia. The son of Moroccan immigrants who arrived at the end of the last century, he now studies the social change resulting from the demographic renewal that his family, among thousands of others, has undergone. It's evident, with his academic career, that he has met "certain expectations" of family progress, but it's not so common if he thinks about his classmates. At a time of slowing down of the social ladder, "the data is bad for everyone, even for people who twenty years ago you considered to be consolidated middle class," he admits, but for immigrants it is even more flagrant, not only because they will not be able to receive any inheritance, but because of the danger of "pigmentocracy": the risk that the material conditions of immigration are due to immigration.

The problems that Candel described in The other Catalans Some problems persist with new immigrants (substandard housing, poverty, inequality, difficulties in school and access to the language), while others are new (regularization of legal status and the inability to vote). For creative director Ismael El Gharib (Cardedeu, 2000), the underlying problem is "prejudice": "We immigrants face certain barriers in life due to our origins, culture, accent, or surname. If I want to rent an apartment, I'm ruled out. We always have to make twice the effort to get anything." "Catalonia can only contemplate its future as a collective if it resolves the acclimatization of its new inhabitants, placing them on a plan of equality in all areas," wrote Candel.

Catalans and much more

Diana Rahmouni (Mataró, 1993) is the daughter of a Catalan mother and a Syrian father who came to study at the university, fleeing the regime of Hafiz al-Assad. Rahmouni identifies as a "Catalan-Syrian wounded by the situation of war, loss, and destruction of her fatherland." "I no longer have anywhere to return to. The old quarter of Aleppo no longer exists, and my family is a refugee around the world," she explains, so her origins are "a memory." Young children of immigrants reject monolithic identities. "Identity is made up of layers that mix, overlap, and sometimes even clash. There are times when you fit in one place, sometimes in another, sometimes at the top," explains El Gharib, who experiences it as "an internal conflict."

"Is that Catalonia?" Candel asked himself, speaking of the suburbs of Barcelona. "Are its inhabitants Catalan? We don't think so. Could they be Catalan? We can no longer say no," the author posed, refusing to title the book. We, the immigrants as proposed by editor Max Cahner. Rahmouni proposes to continue developing the Candelian title: "We are not the others. Heother part of a contradiction that makes empathy difficult, which is why policies are made to protect us from the others. I'm Catalan, but the traditional Catalan culture I love isn't enough for me; I have many references, and we publish in Catalan, but it would be incomplete if I didn't draw from other sources," she says.

Rahmouni and Aissata M'ballo launched the publishing house Jande this year, which publishes racialized and migrant voices. Like Candel, it's about making reality visible, and making it visible from within. "I, being very Catalan and defending the Catalan school, didn't realize until I was older that I hadn't read any Syrian authors. You grow up with white references of canonical discourses, and that's killing a wealth that we already have here and should amplify, because it gives us things," she observes. "Pure Catalanism is a lie. Everyone has a brutal mix, and laws, institutions, and social policies should move in that direction," says the editor. "Racial purity is a pavement, like blue blood. These dizzying modern times sweep away many things, the stupidest ones, in general," Candel wrote.

Identification with a neighborhood, a name

Ismael Gharib is the son of Moroccan parents. He grew up in Blanes and moved to the Candel neighborhood in La Marina at the age of 20. From there, he created a label, Views, with which he serves as creative director and artist manager, primarily of urban music. He has connected with Catalan identity through "the concrete aspects of everyday life: gastronomy, hearing Catalan spoken, traditions, and Barça," and also through the feeling of belonging to the neighborhood, as Candel pointed out. "I didn't have any Moroccan role models, neither in sports nor in culture. I grew up in a working-class neighborhood, surrounded by hard-working, hard-working people who are your role models and make you feel a certain patriotism for the neighborhood, which I don't know if that's the right word," reflects El Gharib.

The same is true of more famous cases, such as the rapper Morad, who has stated that he feels Moroccan and from the La Florida neighborhood. Or soccer player Lamine Yamal, who identifies with the Rocafonda neighborhood. "Identity is layered, it evolves, it's not fixed, and it's very individual. I didn't hear Catalan until I finished high school and socialized at university," Damoun exemplifies. And despite all efforts, it's ethnic origin or a name that ultimately leaves a mark on the children of immigrants, for better or worse. "My name is Osama; I grew up with jokes and comments. It turns out they gave me a simple and original name, easy to pronounce, but when I was four years old, there was 9/11," he explains. Now, at university, he's also heard "impressed" comments about having earned a doctorate despite being of Moroccan origin.

Integration? A reciprocal relationship

Whose responsibility is it to create "one people"? "The neoliberal discourse that individualizes blame also applies here: 'If you came and haven't integrated, it's your responsibility,' but it doesn't work that way," Damoun points out. Integration depends on the material conditions provided to newcomers (for example, a work permit) and often also depends on the cultural, linguistic, and religious distance between the two communities. Today, society is better prepared to offer a better welcome to immigrants than it was in the 1960s, although there are also political winds blowing in favor of closure and rejection. "The tension over immigration is part of the collapse of the capitalist system. There's a very clear parallel with climate change and climate justice. Everyone is confined to their own walls and doesn't want to let anyone in, but when the flood comes, it will take everything away," says Diana Rahmouni. "We need to help each other and be aware of the value of the social, cultural, and popular fabric. Activism is extremely important because the institutions are ours and should protect people, not capital and lobbyists," she warns.

"It's not about integration but about coexistence, and we can all contribute to that. Immigrants must learn the language and adapt to customs, and local people must be willing to value and understand what immigrants bring," says El Gharib. Rahmouni is following the same path, speaking of "coexistence and exchange." "The tools for reception are few in relation to the available and necessary resources, and it often depends on voluntary participation. There is a lot of structural violence, such as an eight-year-old girl having to interpret her mother's diagnosis because they are unable to schedule Alexa for the consultation," Rahmouni exemplifies.

"Improving economic, social, and cultural expectations is key," Damoun points out. "Social acceptance and grounding through language, being able to learn it, that makes you feel like you belong here," the sociologist argues. Playwright and anti-racist activist Denise Duncan (Costa Rica, 1979) adds another perspective, which is the need to be full citizens and, therefore, active participants. "One problem is that access to culture is not universal. Migrants are not represented, nor are they producers of culture, which is how our roots, histories, realities, and visions would be known and valued," she explains. These are stories that affect many citizens, especially considering how the effect of migration is prolonged: "If you are the child of migrants, you inherit their label; it never goes away. How many generations must pass?" the theater director asks. "Because of the crisis, people said, 'As they came, they will all leave.' They saw immigration as passive objects, who are here. But we want to be part of society and not be identified primarily with being a child of migration; I am Catalan. And I don't want to be a quota either," says Osama Damoun. "These children of non-Catalans have taken root in this land, not their grandparents. They took root there forever. They absorb the sap and leave the seed. They have to love it by force. They have to be admitted, by force": words of Paco Candel.