Girona uses Catalan more frequently than the average in Catalonia, but a small portion of its speakers maintain it when the conversation switches to Spanish. The first survey on linguistic uses commissioned by the Girona City Council to the University of Girona places the population that uses Catalan alone or combined with Spanish in their social interactions at 60%.
The main gap in the study appears in the continuity of the language. Although 94.3% of the population understands Catalan and 82.4% claim to speak it, only 24.7% maintain it when the other person responds in Spanish. The council considers this figure insufficient, even though it is above the 19% for the demarcation and 13.2% for Catalonia as a whole.
Only 24.7% maintain Catalan when responded to in Spanish
The study was presented this Monday after a process initiated in November and was based on 520 interviews with residents over 15 years old. The Girona City Council defines it as a pioneering initiative in Catalonia for its municipal scale, with a scope comparable only to the surveys conducted by the Generalitat.
Núria Riquelme, councilor for Catalan Language, linked the results to the need to reinforce municipal policies in this area.
"The study demonstrates the importance of her department and confirms that the era of 'a Girona rai' has ended" - Núria Riquelme, councilor for Catalan Language, Girona City Council
Later, the councilor stressed that the favorable comparison with the Catalan average is not enough for the local government. Riquelme pointed out that Girona falls below the Girona counties as a whole and refused to accept the habitual use data as satisfactory.
"Although the data says we are better than in Catalonia, we are worse than in the Girona counties as a whole. We cannot be satisfied with the 60% of people who use Catalan alone or combined as their habitual language" - Núria Riquelme, councilor for Catalan Language, Girona City Council
Use with partner and children exceeds that recorded with father and mother
In the family environment, the presence of Catalan is higher with a partner and with children than with the previous generation. The survey sets this use at 44.5% with a partner and 43% with children, compared to 37.7% with the father and 36.2% with the mother.
Carla Ferrerós, a researcher linked to the study, interpreted these data as an indication of an increase in the intergenerational transmission of Catalan. The pattern points to a recovery within the family nucleus, although it is not translated with the same intensity in social conversations outside the home.
In addition to usage, the work measured knowledge of the language in the city. 94.3% understand Catalan and 82.4% claim to speak it, while 90.2% know how to read it and 74% how to write it. In these four indicators, Girona is slightly above the average for Catalonia recorded in the 2023 Survey of Language Use by the Population.
By origin of the population, 60.15% of those surveyed were born in Catalonia, 10.4% in other areas of the State, and 29.46% abroad. Within this last group, the most frequent origin is Honduras with 20.6%, ahead of Morocco, Colombia, and Romania.
Lluc Salellas, mayor of Girona, argued that the high level of comprehension allows Catalan to be used normally in daily life. The mayor set a goal of raising habitual use to a range between 70% and 80%.
In his speech, Salellas called for maintaining the use of the language, recalling that almost 95% of the population understands it and that the survey was based on 520 interviews with residents over 15 years of age.