A nationwide movement is born in defense of the language: "Catalan for all"

BarcelonaFollowing the results of the 2023 Language Usage Survey, which indicates that Only a third of Catalans regularly speak Catalan, civil society has mobilized to raise a grassroots movement in defense of the language with the slogan "Catalan for all. In every neighborhood, in every school, in every job." They claim that there are not enough new arrivals who are learning Catalan to compensate for the demographic growth, but "not due to lack of interest, but rather due to lack of spaces to access it," as a representative of civil society, Maria Maians, stated at the event held this Friday in El Born.

According to has accounted for Òmnium, the offer of Catalan courses does not exceed 120,000 places per year and, according to the survey, there are 2 million people who want to learn or improve their Catalan. "With the current offer, we would need 20 years to respond to the demand of 2025. This is unacceptable," said Mayans. "It is the responsibility of the Government to guarantee it."

From civil society, thirty entities from such different fields as the Chamber of Commerce, the College of Physicians and Nurses, neighborhood associations, Òmnium Cultural, athenaeums, school entities such as Escola Catalana and Rosa Sensat 200,000 annual places for Catalan courses, of which 30,000 are offered directly by the Consortium for Linguistic Normalization.

Of these places, they want 20,000 free places in schools during school hours for the more than 400,000 parents born outside Catalonia. The labour world is also asking for 30,000 places for workers, business owners and self-employed people to learn Catalan in the workplace – courses "that are practically non-existent" – with special emphasis on people who work face to face.

This Thursday the Government already announced the details of his shock plan for learning Catalan, with a total investment of 8.8 million euros According to Language Policy, the Consortium for Linguistic Normalization will expand its courses by 30,000 places. In total there will be 140,000 places in 2026, the executive assures.

The Catalan for All movement has opened a website, Peratothom.cat, to collect signatures to ask the Government to create these 80,000 extra places for Catalan courses. "There is a country that wants Catalan to be fully accessible to any citizen," said another member of civil society, Antonio Suárez, "everyone has the right to learn Catalan in order to be able to exercise their rights." The spokespersons of the movement have also committed to reaching where the administration does not reach and assume their responsibility by making the conversation groups grow with hundreds of places in neighborhoods, educational communities and in the world of work. For this reason they have also asked for the collaboration of society in the organization of these informal spaces and have opened the possibility of making financial donations to create Catalan groups.

"The data cannot leave us indifferent," say the new movement, which will be deployed throughout the country, entities and spaces. "The whole country must be present, with Catalan as the backbone that unites us and makes us stronger," said the spokesperson.