<div dir="ltr"><h1 id="gmail-headline" class="gmail-headline">‘Don’t Erase Us’: French Catalans Fear Losing More Than a Region’s Name</h1>
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<p class="gmail-byline-dateline"><span class="gmail-byline">By <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/by/raphael-minder" title="More Articles by RAPHAEL MINDER"><span class="gmail-byline-author">RAPHAEL MINDER</span></a></span><time class="gmail-dateline" datetime="2016-09-09T09:02:25-04:00">SEPT. 8, 2016</time>
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<figcaption class="gmail-caption">
<span class="gmail-caption-text">A flag representing Catalan
independence hanging outside a shop in Perpignan, France. In the city,
which was once an important military fortress, opponents of the name
Occitanie given to an enlarged region are determined to resist.</span>
<span class="gmail-credit">
<span class="gmail-visually-hidden">Credit</span>
Capucine Granier-Deferre for The New York Times </span>
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<p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">PERPIGNAN,
France — What’s in a name? A lot apparently, at least if you ask French
Catalans who live in the country’s southwest corner, here around
Perpignan.</p><p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">When
the French Parliament approved a plan to consolidate the country’s
regions, in order to increase their clout and cut red tape, it did more
than reduce the number to 13 from 22. It inflamed a crisis of Catalan
identity that has spread like wildfire from across the border with <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/12/world/europe/catalan-independence-bid-looms-over-spains-coalition-efforts.html">Spain</a>, where it is burning hot already.</p><p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">Under
the change, this region, Languedoc-Roussillon, combined with
neighboring Midi-Pyrénées, will take a new name: Occitanie (Occitania in
English), chosen after the regional authorities asked people to vote
online from a list of possibilities.</p><p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">Simple enough. If only.</p><p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">The
450,000 or so French Catalans — or Catalans of the North, as most
people here call themselves — regard the new name as erasing their
presence from the map. In Perpignan, which was once an important
military fortress, opponents of the name Occitania are determined to
resist.</p><figure id="gmail-media-100000004633743" class="gmail-media gmail-photo embedded gmail-layout-large-horizontal gmail-media-100000004633743 gmail-ratio-tall">
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<figcaption class="gmail-caption">
<span class="gmail-caption-text">“A name gives identity, so
this reform has made us a lot more aware of who we really are,
especially since we’re being told that our culture will be buried under a
name that has never been ours,” said Sylvia Andolfo, owner of a pastry
shop in Perpignan.</span>
<span class="gmail-credit">
<span class="gmail-visually-hidden">Credit</span>
Capucine Granier-Deferre for The New York Times </span>
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<p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">As
the Oct. 1 deadline for the formal switch approaches, protests have
intensified. A major street demonstration is planned in Perpignan on
Saturday, as well as an appeal opposing the new name on the grounds of
discrimination before <a href="http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/international/countriesandterritories/france/index.html?inline=nyt-geo" title="More news and information about France." class="gmail-meta-loc">France</a>’s main administrative court, the Council of State.</p><p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">The Catalans also want to at least add two words to the name Occitania: “Pays Catalan,” or Catalan Land.</p>
<p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content" id="gmail-story-continues-1">“A
name gives identity, so this reform has made us a lot more aware of who
we really are, especially since we’re being told that our culture will
be buried under a name that has never been ours,” said Sylvia Andolfo,
who flew a Catalan flag outside her pastry shop here.</p><p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">Occitania
is a cultural rather than political term that dates to the Middle Ages
and refers to a vast area in southern Europe where people speak Occitan,
a Romance language derived from Latin.</p><p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">However,
Occitania “means nothing to us,” said Brice Lafontaine, the president
of a party here called Unitat Catalana. “We are the Catalans of the
North and we want to continue to exist as such.”</p><figure id="gmail-perpignanmap" class="gmail-interactive gmail-interactive-embedded gmail-limit-small gmail-layout-flex-medium">
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<div id="gmail-g-0909-for-PERPIGNANmap-box" class="gmail-ai2html">
<div style="display:block" id="gmail-g-0909-for-PERPIGNANmap-460" class="gmail-g-artboard gmail-g-artboard-v3 gmail-">
<div id="gmail-g-0909-for-PERPIGNANmap-460-graphic">
<img id="gmail-g-ai0-0" class="gmail-g-aiImg" src="https://static01.nyt.com/newsgraphics/2016/09/08/perpignanmap/0ecc50e50e785a0dc4bfd0591190a977f0b56884/0909-for-PERPIGNANmap-460.png">
<div id="gmail-g-ai0-1" class="gmail-g-text gmail-g-aiAbs" style="width:25.0151%">
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle0">FRANCE</p>
</div>
<div id="gmail-g-ai0-2" class="gmail-g-text gmail-g-aiAbs" style="top: 10.9149%; left: 4.1304%;">
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle1">Bay of</p>
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle1">Biscay</p>
</div>
<div id="gmail-g-ai0-3" class="gmail-g-text gmail-g-aiAbs" style="width:14.837%">
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle2">ITALY</p>
</div>
<div id="gmail-g-ai0-4" class="gmail-g-text gmail-g-aiAbs" style="top: 26.0032%; left: 34.2391%;">
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle3">OCCITANIA</p>
</div>
<div id="gmail-g-ai0-5" class="gmail-g-text gmail-g-aiAbs" style="top: 29.5345%; left: 48.3696%;">
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle4">LANGUEDOC-</p>
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle4">ROUSSILLON</p>
</div>
<div id="gmail-g-ai0-6" class="gmail-g-text gmail-g-aiAbs" style="width:22.641%">
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle5">MIDI-</p>
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle5">PYRÉNÉES</p>
</div>
<div id="gmail-g-ai0-7" class="gmail-g-text gmail-g-aiAbs" style="top: 38.8443%; left: 60.6522%;">
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle6">Marseille</p>
</div>
<div id="gmail-g-ai0-8" class="gmail-g-text gmail-g-aiAbs" style="top: 47.512%; left: 46.3043%;">
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle7">Perpignan</p>
</div>
<div id="gmail-g-ai0-9" class="gmail-g-text gmail-g-aiAbs" style="width:28.8387%">
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle2">ANDORRA</p>
</div>
<div id="gmail-g-ai0-10" class="gmail-g-text gmail-g-aiAbs" style="top: 53.2905%; right: 19.993%;">
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle8">CORSICA</p>
</div>
<div id="gmail-g-ai0-11" class="gmail-g-text gmail-g-aiAbs" style="top: 57.1429%; right: 19.993%;">
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle8">France</p>
</div>
<div id="gmail-g-ai0-12" class="gmail-g-text gmail-g-aiAbs" style="width:25.221%">
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle9">CATALONIA</p>
</div>
<div id="gmail-g-ai0-13" class="gmail-g-text gmail-g-aiAbs" style="top: 64.5265%; left: 41.6304%;">
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle6">Barcelona</p>
</div>
<div id="gmail-g-ai0-14" class="gmail-g-text gmail-g-aiAbs" style="width:42.3482%">
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle10">Mediterranean Sea</p>
</div>
<div id="gmail-g-ai0-15" class="gmail-g-text gmail-g-aiAbs" style="width:17.158%">
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle2">SPAIN</p>
</div>
<div id="gmail-g-ai0-16" class="gmail-g-text gmail-g-aiAbs" style="top: 78.6517%; left: 30%;">
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle1">Balearic Sea</p>
</div>
<div id="gmail-g-ai0-17" class="gmail-g-text gmail-g-aiAbs" style="top: 80.8989%; right: 20.2104%;">
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle8">SARDINIA</p>
</div>
<div id="gmail-g-ai0-18" class="gmail-g-text gmail-g-aiAbs" style="top: 85.0722%; right: 20.2102%;">
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle8">Italy</p>
</div>
<div id="gmail-g-ai0-19" class="gmail-g-text gmail-g-aiAbs" style="top: 89.8876%; left: 47.7174%;">
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle11">BALEARIC</p>
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle11">ISLANDS</p>
</div>
<div id="gmail-g-ai0-20" class="gmail-g-text gmail-g-aiAbs" style="top: 91.4928%; left: 1.6118%;">
<p class="gmail-g-aiPstyle12">150 Miles</p>
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</div>
</div>
</div>
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<div class="gmail-interactive-credit">
<p class="gmail-byline-dateline">
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By The New York Times </div>
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<p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">Some here are also upset that <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/11/world/europe/french-premier-presents-new-brand-of-socialism.html">Manuel Valls</a>, the prime minister, has stayed on the sidelines of the debate. Mr. Valls was born in Barcelona and speaks Catalan.</p><p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">In
fact, Mr. Lafontaine called Mr. Valls “a traitor” to the Catalan cause.
“Can you imagine a Frenchman going to Quebec and fighting against the
recognition of French culture there?” Mr. Lafontaine said. “That is just
what Manuel Valls has done here.”</p><p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">The
protests over the name change have received some institutional support.
Some local mayors agreed to add signs that read “the Catalan” below
town names along roads.</p><p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">During <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gPs0H2WQSCk">a recent concert</a>,
the singer Hugues Di Francesco went backstage and emerged with a
Catalan flag. “We have our identity and culture, so don’t erase us from
the map,” he told the crowd before performing a protest song that has
become a summer hit here.</p><p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">The
crowd joined in to sing the chorus: “We’re not Occitans, we’re
Catalans, we’re not going to change our accent nor the color of our
blood.”</p><div class="gmail-newsletter-signup" id="gmail-newsletter-promo">
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<p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">Catalans
in this part of France became subjects of King Louis XIV of France
under a 1659 peace treaty that enlarged the country and created a new
border with Spain along the Pyrenees.</p>
<p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content" id="gmail-story-continues-2">The
latest redrawing of France’s administrative map, and the dispute it has
caused here, coincide with an unrelated territorial conflict on the
southern side of the Pyrenees over whether the Catalan regional
government, based in Barcelona, can split from Spain.</p><p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">Most
people here, however, define their Catalan identity as cultural rather
than political. For instance, Ms. Andolfo, the pastry shop owner, while
feeling sympathy for the Catalans who want to separate from Spain,
expressed no desire to see French Catalans break away from France.</p><p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">Ms.
Andolfo understands the Catalan language but doesn’t speak it, even
though some in her family fled Catalonia for France in 1939. They were
among the nearly 500,000 Spaniards escaping Gen. Francisco Franco, who
rose to power after Spain’s civil war.</p><p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">“My
grandmother never spoke to me in Catalan because she always kept her
fear of Franco, and believed that French was my future, the way for me
to find a job,” Ms. Andolfo said. Still, Ms. Andolfo put her own
daughter in a bilingual school to learn French and Catalan.</p><figure id="gmail-media-100000004633742" class="gmail-media gmail-photo embedded gmail-layout-large-horizontal gmail-media-100000004633742 gmail-ratio-tall">
<span class="gmail-visually-hidden">Photo</span>
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<figcaption class="gmail-caption">
<span class="gmail-caption-text">Players from the Catalan
Dragons, Perpignan’s rugby league club. Some local entrepreneurs say it
is unrealistic to expect the Occitanie region to give full recognition
to Catalan culture.</span>
<span class="gmail-credit">
<span class="gmail-visually-hidden">Credit</span>
Capucine Granier-Deferre for The New York Times </span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">French
Catalans share folkloric dances and other traditions with the Catalans
across the border. But French is the only language heard around town,
except in the district of Saint Jacques, whose Gypsy community speaks
Catalan.</p><p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">There
is also some discontent over the name changes in other regions. In
eastern France, for instance, the historical regional names Alsace,
Lorraine and Champagne-Ardenne are being administratively replaced by
Grand-Est, or Great East, as part of a three-way merger to create a much
larger region bordering Germany.</p><p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">“There
are many people around the country who are unhappy about the new names,
but our case is more serious, because the name has triggered not only a
feeling of exclusion, but also a situation of discrimination,” argued
Hélène Legrais, a Perpignan writer whose historical novels are mostly
about French Catalans.</p>
<p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content" id="gmail-story-continues-3">However,
some Catalan entrepreneurs here believe it was unrealistic to expect
Catalans, who now represent less than one-tenth of the population of the
enlarged region, to persuade other inhabitants to give full recognition
to Catalan culture.</p><p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">Rather
than mentioning either Occitan or Catalan, they say, the enlarged
region could have opted for Pyrénées-Méditérranée, a name that is
culturally neutral but highlights the region’s mountains and sea.</p><p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content">“Occitania
really doesn’t suit me, but also because I believe such a name is hard
to sell as a brand internationally,” said Bernard Guasch, the owner of a
meat company and a rugby league club called the Catalans Dragons. “In
an environment of globalization, we should have taken full advantage of
our two amazing natural assets, for which everybody envies us and nobody
disputes.”</p><p class="gmail-story-body-text gmail-story-content"><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/09/world/europe/occitanie-france-catalans.html?ref=world&_r=0">http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/09/world/europe/occitanie-france-catalans.html?ref=world&_r=0</a><br></p><br clear="all"><br>-- <br><div class="gmail_signature">=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+<br><br> Harold F. Schiffman<br><br>Professor Emeritus of <br> Dravidian Linguistics and Culture <br>Dept. of South Asia Studies <br>University of Pennsylvania<br>Philadelphia, PA 19104-6305<br><br>Phone: (215) 898-7475<br>Fax: (215) 573-2138 <br><br>Email: <a href="mailto:haroldfs@gmail.com" target="_blank">haroldfs@gmail.com</a><br><a href="http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/%7Eharoldfs/" target="_blank">http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/</a> <br><br>-------------------------------------------------</div>
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