In the endless debate about the state of health of the Catalan language, it happens, as in so many other areas, that we often guide ourselves by our perceptions and impressions rather than by careful analysis of the data. In the case of language, moreover, it seems to be true that every Catalan carries a sociolinguist within. It is evident, in any case, that it is not a debate that we can face with complete coolness, free from worries and even anxieties, because we have the perception that too much is at stake: we project into the uncertain future of the language the uncertain future of all of us as a society.

3Cat's SX3, with funding from Grup Transversal, this week opened the doors of Fantàstix, a new cultural, family, and immersive experience focused on the power of stories, imagination, and the active participation of children. Located in the Sagrada Família neighborhood, the space, which was a former 2,000-square-meter parking lot, has been transformed into a "factory of imagination," where the narrative focuses on the premise of recovering the power of storytelling, which has disappeared from the world. The project's intention is to become a new meeting point for families, the educational world, and Catalan children's and youth culture.

I've been in Andalusia for a few days and I've had a curious feeling of well-being, not new, because it reminds me of a recent stay in Madrid, under totally different circumstances. I soon deduced that the reason for this well-being is the language. More precisely, the absence of linguistic stress that we Catalans suffer in our daily lives. When I move around the territories of monolingual Spain, my brain clicks and frees itself from linguistic unease: here Spanish is spoken, only Spanish, and there's nothing to discuss. Then the relationship with others, with people, is simplified from the outset, the conversation flows and lengthens, and after a short while this linguistic truce translates into physical relaxation; the brain feels it has been freed from a nuisance.No matter how much they tell us that bilingualism is a richness, the truth is that an undisputed lingua franca greatly facilitates human relationships. And in most cities and countries, the language of collective relation is one and sufficient. In Barcelona and a good part of Catalonia, for mental, social, and finally demographic reasons, the lingua franca is Spanish, and we who consider that Catalan needs our firmness as much as the empathy of others, like a good legal umbrella, rebel against this fact. But we Catalan speakers socialize with the certainty that every day we expose ourselves to potentially conflictive situations. If we always speak Catalan – as is our right, and as sociolinguists recommend – we risk not being understood, having to repeat everything twice, enduring scowls and perhaps some exclamation, being labeled as intolerant, xenophobic, and even unsociable. And even if our Spanish-speaking interlocutor is receptive, empathetic, or has understood that life will be better with Catalan (which is what should be), often the conversation that arises is too basic, orthopedic, like tourists, and the linguistic stress remains.If, on the other hand, we switch to the other person's language (out of "politeness", laziness, to avoid unpleasantness, or because simply the future of Catalan doesn't matter to us that much), we are condemned to a second added linguistic stress: the one that comes from guilt, the little voice inside (or outside, for that there are social networks) that tells us we're doing it wrong, that it will be of little use to invest in normalization if Catalan speakers don't always speak it, risking spoiling our day, or catching a cold, or who knows what.I understand very well the frustration of the Pakistani or Honduran citizen who, after taking the relevant Catalan course, cannot practice it because the natives take for granted that he won't understand. But that's usually the case: the vast majority of foreigners do not understand Catalan nor do they speak it (they haven't needed to). And it comes to a moment for all of us when linguistic stress asks for a truce. Or for a little affection: Catalan speakers, in addition to demanding firmness, must also be reminded that the decline of Catalan is not their fault, and they must be thanked for the sum of small and large gestures that have allowed our language to survive centuries of aggression.I'm writing this on the plane that's taking me from Seville to Barcelona. In the boarding queue, a lovely elderly couple approached me with a smile: "You used to be on TV3, right? You're not on now. Let's see if you come back!"

The CRIT Awards, which recognize and promote digital audiovisual projects in Catalan, celebrated their second edition yesterday at the Teatre Coliseum in Barcelona. Presented by Núria Marín, a total of 14 projects were recognized at the gala, with an attendance of 1,200 professionals and creators, including producers, journalists, and members of the Catalan audiovisual industry. This year's edition highlights the highest recognition for best creator of the year, which went to Laura Grau, and the podcast Guarres!, whose characters were interviewed by l'ARA a few weeks ago, as the best independent project.

I telephone – and it’s a rarity to do so – the organizer of a literary festival where I am to "participate" with other colleagues. I had lost the tickets she sent to my mobile and wanted to ask for them again. From the other side of the telephone, and of the sea, she tells me: “Don’t worry, you’ll have them right away.”

After the frustration caused by the end of the Procés, Catalanism has been forced to review its strategy. Someone synthesized the analysis: "In trying to achieve our own state, we have neglected the nation." With the goal of the state out of the immediate radar, the return to concern for national construction has been imposed. And, singularly, for the language, which has historically been its articulating axis.

In a recent interview on TV3, Maria Teresa Cabré (president of the IEC) argued that, for Catalan to become a truly shared language, new approaches are needed. Among the ideas she proposed, one is particularly suggestive from the outset: hybridization. The proposal is clear: if Catalonia wants immigration to embrace Catalan, it is not enough to demand its learning; a good welcome is necessary, fostering a sense of belonging, and making real affection for the language possible.The idea, formulated like this, is difficult to reject. No society can aspire to turn its language into a common space if it is not capable of welcoming, recognizing, and incorporating. The problem, however, is not the goodness of the premise, but its insufficiency. The approach of hybridization emphasizes the relational and social dimension of the bond with the language, but it leaves in the background what is decisive today: the structural conditions in which immigrants, their descendants, and othered groups live.It is not enough to say that Catalan speakers must “permeabilize” themselves for there to be more interaction, more meeting, and, from there, more adherence to Catalan. This may work in some cases. But turning this intuition into a general answer is, at the very least, a simplification. It assumes that the distance between the language and a part of the population is, above all, a problem of lack of contact, when it is often the expression of a much deeper social fracture.In Catalonia, this fracture cannot be understood without racism. Not only in its explicit and xenophobic expression, but also in more diffuse, normalized, and difficult-to-identify forms, embedded in institutional practices, social expectations, collective imaginaries, and daily classifications. It is a racism that continues to operate, often without being recognized as such, even in spaces that think of themselves as committed to social justice. This blindness is not only moral: it is also epistemological, because it prevents understanding what happens with language in contexts of inequality. If immigrant and otherized people live more exposed to school, residential, and labor segregation, to discrimination in access to housing, to symbolic degradation in public representation, or to forms of selective secularism that fall mainly on certain religious groups, then the relationship with language cannot be thought of solely in terms of affective welcome.

La Fundació La Caixa has just inaugurated a center of excellence research in Barcelona, at the foot of Tibidabo. It has invested 100 million euros in 20,000 m², which will host more than 400 scientists who will investigate “in depth the immune system and its relationship with diseases prevalent in society, such as neurological, oncological or infectious ones”. Magnificent news. The name: CaixaResearch Institute. Why not Institut CaixaRecerca?

After a long time pursuing it, I managed a couple of weeks ago to get the original 19th-century edition of Las Papillotos, by Jasmin, in four very well-edited volumes published in 1842, 1843, 1853, and 1863. They arrived on Sant Jordi's Day, and at the end of the article I will explain why it seems like a not very good premonition to me – rather, a bad omen. Jacques – or Jacme – Boé, known literarily as Jasmin or Jansemin (Agen, 1798-1864), was a Gascon barber-poet who turned the old popular speech of Agen, a dialect of Occitan, into a literary instrument of unusual strength in the 19th century. Son of a humble family, self-taught, a great orator, he worked his whole life as a hairdresser while writing and reciting poetry in a dialectal variety that is now dying. His fame as a poet arose mainly from the recitals that took him to many theaters and salons in France. His musical diction and the vivid use of the langue d'oc captivated an audience that was discovering – and here one must choose words carefully to avoid creating illusions or anachronisms – a striking but politically harmless cultural anecdote.He published several volumes under the general title of Las Papillotos, which brought together long verse narratives combining white humor, pathos, and a gentle portrayal of popular life. Sentimental and vehement, Jasmin dignifies humble characters and turns everyday life into poetic material. In the mid-19th century, he was celebrated by Parisian critics and writers, and some consider him a precursor to the Occitan literary renaissance. The passage of time, however, worked against him: the Occitan dialect he wrote in ceased to be transmitted. This linguistic disappearance has led Jasmin to be read both as a creator and as a mere witness to a lost and irrecoverable world. He died in Agen, respected and popular, with a striking bronze statue and all, leaving behind a work that today is perhaps more archaeological than literary. He turned Las Papillotos into one of the most unique literary monuments of the Occitan language with narrative poems such as L’Abuglo de Castel-Cuillé, Françouneto, Maltro l’innoucento, Lous dus frays Bessous, etc. They are extensive tales, full of dramatic and truculent twists, good-naturedness and tenderness, which portray the lives of ordinary people with an emotional intensity that the urban public of 19th-century Paris found, ambiguously, exotic and familiar at the same time. Jasmin's strength lies in an uninhibited, elastic, sentimental language, closely linked to the spirit of Romanticism and, above all, to rural France. His characters are sensible peasants, virtuous maids, artisans, abandoned children. He treats them with dignity, often eliciting a tear from the respectable public. Although it may seem strange, the reception of this work was extraordinary: in the mid-19th century, Jasmin was an editorial phenomenon, as well as a celebrated rhapsode. The 20th century, however, relegated him to oblivion, a victim both of institutional contempt for the "patois" – as some called and still call Occitan – and of discomfort with a popular romanticism that no longer fit modern canons. This weekend, I happened to read a dozen of these poems. It's like hearing a voice that still sparks, but that comes from a landscape that has faded, ghostly and a little depressing.

Our national blue monday is on September 12, 1714. According to chronicles, Barcelona opened its gates to the Franco-Spanish troops and the Duke of Berwick was surprised to see that the Barcelonians were working in the shops and workshops as if it were any other day: a moving example of tenacity. For me, the saddest day of the year is usually the day after Sant Jordi, when the aroma of roses and the bustle of writers and readers fade away, when the banners are folded and put away, and language and culture retreat again after a brilliant day of prominence. On April 24th, we realize that Sant Jordi is a mirage while the dragon continues to wag its tail. This year, despite everything, I have the feeling that something is stirring. Perhaps because of the success of Correllengua, perhaps because Òscar Andreu has conquered the podium with his Manual for the Defense of Catalan, or perhaps because believing is wanting to believe, but I detect a progressive linguistic awareness around me. It is a feeling that exudes anxiety, but also conviction. The emergency situation that Catalan is experiencing has contributed to visualizing the risks of an economic, political, and cultural model that, gradually but constantly, uproots us, dilutes us, and impoverishes us as a community. And it is not only Catalan speakers who notice this, but also many newcomers who, regardless of their linguistic choice, love the country and want it to continue being what it is. We must be smart enough to discern, among the enemies, these possible allies. And be inflexible with the rest. Òscar Andreu says: “Social bilingualism is a trap by those who demand that you be bilingual so that they can continue to be monolingual.”Language must be the battle of our lives. My parents' generation had the challenge of recovering democracy and autonomy, and they succeeded. My generation doubled down with the independence process, and did not have the same success. And the fight for language will be the great challenge for new batches of citizens. A titanic challenge steeped in history, because Catalan has been spoken in this country for a millennium, and it has been language that has forged us as a territory and as a country. The conservation –and expansion– of Catalan is a challenge as difficult as, or more difficult than, the preceding political struggles, because it implies a personal, daily, tenacious commitment. Not only from those who maintain Catalan, but from those who, sooner or later, will have to join it. Everything depends on the firmness of some, the empathy of others, and on policies as demanding with the native language as they are in all the countries of our environment.

Happy coincidence: the two books most sold by Sant Jordi share the fact of being written with a lot of humor. The fiction of Crispetes de matinada is a wisely managed festival of hilarious situations, conversations, and thoughts, and the non-fiction of Manual de defensa del català (yes, unfortunately, it is non-fiction) presents itself to readers with humor that acts like the mustard and ketchup that make a shoe-sole type burger digestible.

“Our way of working is in Catalan and we must protect that. Girona is Catalan, by conviction and roots; it is one of the standard-bearers of our land. We try to ensure that when someone thinks of us, they know clearly that we are Catalan”, defended Ignasi Mas-Bagà, the CEO of the Girona club, at an international symposium on minority languages and football. The Girona entity has ratified its commitment to the country's language and has signed a collaboration agreement with Plataforma per la Llengua to promote and normalize the use of Catalan.

An Arab-origin boy approaches a protester and, worried, asks him: "Are you against Saint George?". The protester does not hesitate for a second and responds with a resounding no. The boy, relieved, approves of the answer. This scene took place just as the demonstration in defense of Catalan, organized by Sant Jordi per la Llengua, was leaving Plaça de la Universitat in Barcelona. A protest that shouted that "without language there is no country", but which defended with tooth and nail, even with insults, a Saint George as a Catalan tradition in the face of voices that wanted to turn it into Book Day. "These imbeciles who want to take away even the saint's day of Saint George can go to hell", shouted Lluís Llach, president of the ANC, during the closing of the protest.

"Don't you have a smaller or thinner one, so it doesn't weigh too much to read in bed?" Beyond literary quality, book format, or other publishing specifics, a book's length can push us towards or against buying it. A study of 2,500 bestsellers from the New York Times revealed a few years ago that the average number of pages had grown from 320 in 1999 to 400 in 2014. Is there a similar pattern with books originally written in Catalan? If we take a look at almost 5,000 narrative and essay books originally published in Catalan in recent decades, the trend is confirmed: books in Catalan (including those released simultaneously in another language) are getting longer.

Thirty years ago, CIEMEN and PEN Català launched the Universal Declaration of Linguistic Rights with the conviction that linguistic diversity is a heritage of humanity. Today, this conviction remains valid, because the situation has gone from worrying to alarming.

1. Sant Jordi has not yet arrived, and the Liceu has already closed its dance season. The four shows this year have received applause and good reviews but, as taste is subjective, they have fallen short of expectations at the time of subscribing. They are good shows –of course– but they haven't stirred our souls in the slightest. They haven't even moved us. I admit that I arrived in a bad mood for the last performance, Nijinsky's. Given that the performance –two and a half hours long– started at half past seven, we decided to grab a bite near the Liceu before the show. The idea, initially, was for a quick, stand-up sandwich. We were looking for a clean, decent place that wasn't a rip-off. After all, with a Rambla under construction that made it difficult to pass, we thought that the pre-prepared trays we saw from the street –labeled in the establishment as "montaditos" and "tapas"– would be a decent option for a two-bite meal. When we entered, they were already surprised that we were locals. Before we sat down, seeing that they weren't going to rip us off, they warned us that we could only pay with bills there. What a surprise! We left with a nagging suspicion and looked for another option.

After demanding the tightening of criteria for the extraordinary regularization of migrants in Spain, Junts goes a step further against the measure approved by the government of Pedro Sánchez and from which half a million people will benefit. Carles Puigdemont's party has announced that it will take the regularization to Europe because it "ignores the requirement of knowing Catalan". The party has commissioned its legal department to prepare "the presentation of a complaint before the European institutions for the violation of various directives and the marginalization of a co-official language as an integration criterion", as detailed this Friday in a statement.

They are a family made up of the mother, a girl with black braids, about six or seven years old, the boy, her brother, perhaps a year younger, and the grandmother, a young, petite woman with short hair, glasses, and wearing jeans. They speak in Spanish with a perhaps Peruvian accent. The young grandmother, it's evident, is the one in charge. The one who knows that all four have to get off at Pallejà and how many stops are left, the one who tells her daughter (or perhaps it's her daughter-in-law) that there is a free seat at the back of the carriage and that she should take it, and the one who entertains the two children, who have sat with her. The girl takes out a book of the kind with magnetic pages where you can stick letters or flowers and animals, which come with the book itself.

On the occasion of the extraordinary regularization announced by the government, autonomous communities such as Catalonia or the Basque Country have proposed that the completion of a certain number of hours for learning the Catalan language or the Basque language be included as a requirement for future renewals.Territories with their own language, such as Catalonia, face the challenge of keeping alive a language whose use is declining, especially in the metropolitan area and among the young population. Faced with this reality, immigration is seen as the main culprit and, consequently, many policies aimed at promoting its learning fall upon it. However, it is worth clarifying several issues here. Firstly, the use of the language decreases because its transmission as a mother tongue also decreases: demographically there are fewer Catalan speakers with an initial language in absolute numbers. Another of the elements to take into account is the difference between knowledge of the language and its social and daily use. According to the Survey of Linguistic Uses, 93% of the population over 15 years of age understands Catalan and 80% can speak it. These data show that Catalan is a living language from the point of view of its knowledge and that the policy of vehicular language in schools guarantees with great success that new generations achieve linguistic competence, and can potentially communicate in Catalan. However, the problems are found in the social and daily use of the language, because only 36% of people have it as their usual language.

Today we will have meatballs with potatoes, which with the basics I have in the freezer are quick to make and ideal for days, like today, when we have a lot to do before lunch.Will the girls give you a hand?