Subway in Toulouse (Tolosa) to start speaking Occitan from September 2009

Tuesday, August 11, 2009

From a site here in Catalan, which has quite a bit of information on smaller languages. It's from a longer article originally in French here though. The comments below that article are especially numerous, with a lot of heated discussion - depending on which comment you read Occitan is either a regional dialect that nobody speaks, or it's an awesome cultured language that was around when French was still a "Germanic patois". A lot of the comments are written in Occitan too.

The city has a festival called Occitania that goes from 25 to 28 September, which is when the announcements in Occitan in addition to French will begin. The metro has a total of 37 stations.

5 comments:

Godilhaire said...

After six years of manifestations !
So the frenchies are not nationalists ? I laught.

Costello said...

A surprising development given how hostile the French state is towards the other languages and dialects of France.

Anonymous said...

This has nothing to do with the central French government but with the local authorities, which are competent for the local transportation networks. A few stupid may say that adding text in Occitan will cost more to the tax-payer....

Olivier
http://sambahsa.pbworks.com/

Costello said...

We have similar complaints in Scotland whenever there are attempts to have the original Gaelic names for various places put onto roadsigns alongside the mis-spelt, anglicized versions of these Gaelic names used by English speakers.

Anonymous said...

This has nothing to do with the central French government but with the local authorities, which are competent for the local transportation networks. A few stupid may say that adding text in Occitan will cost more to the tax-payer....

Olivier
http://sambahsa.pbworks.com/

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