Language will require us to take risks.

At this point, the debate about language and immigration is outdated, because anyone who denies the evidence is deceiving themselves and others: That Catalonia had 4 million inhabitants in 1960 and now has 8 million is an irrefutable fact. That this doubling is due to immigration is a certainty. What is debatable is whether the predominance of Spanish is due to the linguistic zeal of the newcomers, or whether what we are experiencing is a logical consequence of the sociopolitical context.

The waves of migration in the last century arrived in a country where Catalan was the majority language but was absent from public life, schools, and the media. Catalan speakers, defenseless, had to accept that Spanish would be the lingua franca between the natives (bilingual) and the newcomers (monolingual). However, thousands of children from those waves adopted the language of the country, a remarkable success, but not enough. Because subsequent waves, those of this century, from more diverse backgrounds, arrived with Catalan already an official language, but in a situation where Spanish was the primary language of half the population, and the only one for which knowledge was mandatory. Therefore, overall, immigration in the last half-century has done what all newcomers do: choose to do what is essential, rather than what is desirable.

I do not intend to excuse certain neocolonial tendencies that have humiliated many Catalan speakers. Supremacist behaviors that demanded we change our language out of "politeness" or, worse still, because "We are in Spain. But in general, the Castilian saying is accurate. When in Rome, do as the Romans do.A Mohammed settled in the Bas Valley has become in just a few years in Met And he speaks magnificent Garrotxi, while there are thousands of Andalusians or Extremadurans who have lived in Badalona for 40 years and can't even say good morning. We are what we are, and that's the context in which we live. Overly sudden waves of immigration have created closed bubbles. With a more generous birth rate, gradual immigration, and a language not buried during the very long Francoist period, things would have been different. But regret, now, is of no use to us.

What needs to be done is to take stock (two million speakers, a living language in institutions, in the media and in culture, thousands of foreigners studying Catalan for pleasure or due to work requirements) and then a tally of dangers and shortcomings (rise of Castilian as a language of socialization among young people, perception of Catalan as Castilian and an unnecessary leisure language, provincialism of celebrities and social figures who adopt Castilian to make themselves forgiven for their origin in a wider market, etc.).

The third phase is to develop an emergency plan, which for me is based on four measures. First: Unwavering, incorruptible linguistic activism by Catalan speakers. This alone can begin to change the linguistic landscape, and we have proof. Second: Massive investment in the Catalanization of public life—in the social, media, and cultural spheres (this is being done, but insufficiently to correct market inertia). Third: Defining a model for the country that no longer relies on runaway growth and job insecurity. And fourth: Establishing by law the mandatory knowledge of Catalan and its preferential use in all areas. This is key to mitigating the attitude of one segment of the immigrant population and offering an exit route to another, the more hostile segment. This fourth point goes beyond the limits of the Constitution and inevitably leads us to conflict with the State. Again, yes... But we must face our uncomfortable truth: Without taking risks, the future of Catalan is measured in a few decades.