Cancer 94

This notion of dying is still lingering in me, partly perhaps due to this immense feeling of tiredness, and partly due to having a cold, which with a hardly functioning immune system is manflu++. I have my aches and pains, common enough but to my neurotic mind, increasing in intensity. I have visual problems, particularly in the early morning and the evening, to the extent that it can be difficult to read.

To change the subject, we are still in the sunshine of southern France, with new overnight snowfall on the mountains nearby. We have toured around, exploring the local Mediterranean areas of France and Spain, and seen a few fortresses, mainly Vauban’s. Living in this climate would probably have real health benefits, especially as I am eating more fish, in obedience to ‘local’ advice.

We are in Roussillon, which is northern Catalonia, ie Catalonia without all the nationalistic fuss of the Spanish Catalans. Here we go again, with my recent media experience of the Welsh and their ‘language’ still vivid in my head, I am again in an area where they have some signs with two languages on them – not as many as in Wales, so it is not such a problem. I do not know how many people speak Catalan in Roussillon, but I imagine it is far fewer than Catalan speakers in Spain. Visit any museum or public place in Spanish Catalonia and the first language is usually Catalan, which is useless for nearly all tourists. Language is primarily about communication, so the Catalonians are doing themselves a serious disservice by alienating tourists who can’t understand a word of their unintelligible language. I only found out the other day that Franco didn’t have a total ban on the use of Catalan – perhaps that was a mistake because by now it might have more or less disappeared like other dead and dying languages.

The French are not as flexible as other countries regarding the use of minority languages within the state. It is assumed everyone speaks French and uses French for all official business. There is none of this nonsense about wasting money putting everything into a minority language as we do with Welsh even though there are relatively few Welsh speakers in Wales (under 20% of the Welsh population as you are asking) and almost none outside Wales. The French just assume – rightly – that everyone will use the main language of the country rather than pander to noisy but misguided minorities (remember Brexit?) who insist on making life more difficult for everyone.

I might have said this before (allow my chemo-fuzzed brain its many failures) but I like to relate languages to the various football leagues. We have the top Premiership languages such as English, Spanish, Russian, Arabic, Hindi, and Mandarin, which are widely spoken around the world and are currently in no danger of dying out. We then have the Championship languages such as German, French (yes, you can argue both of those are Premiership, but leagues have promotion and relegation), Italian, and so on. Then we have the League One languages such as Greek, Serbo-Croat (come on, they are the same language despite the 1990s), Dutch, Danish, and so on. Then we move to the League Two languages that are surviving but may be in danger of leaving the league such as Finnish, Swedish, Czech, and so on, languages that are still ‘proper’ languages but may die out as the population starts speaking more English or another of the Premiership languages. Then we have the effectively dead non-league languages such as Welsh or Catalan, that are effectively moribund and only held together with a bit of old baling twine and lots of government money.

With globalisation there is an inevitable drift towards fewer languages because, as I already said, language is primarily about communication. English is still the dominant cross-country language in the EU despite our leaving because it is the most common second language in Europe. Languages will drift down the league tables and become effectively moribund or extinct as the big boys take over. Whatever the linguistic culturalists might desire, there are going to be fewer and fewer languages. This is not to say English will be the final dominant language, though at the moment it looks that way. It depends to some extent on political and cultural power and, as we have seen throughout history, that can change at any point. In Europe it is not long since French was dominant, and before that Latin.

I make no apologies for being Eurocentric. First, I am European, second, the world is Eurocentric.

Anyway, it makes a change from talking about cancer, though I am very tired….