Occitan language

Not to be confused with Ossetian language.

Occitan
occitan, lenga d'òc, provençal / provençau
Geographic range of the Occitan language around 1900
Native toFrance, Spain, Italy, Monaco
RegionOccitania
EthnicityOccitans
Native speakers
(c. 200,000 cited 1990–2012)[1]
Estimates range from 100,000 to 800,000 total speakers (2007–2012),[2][3] with 68,000 in Italy (2005 survey),[4] 4,000 in Spain (Val d'Aran)[5]
Early forms
Standard forms
Dialects
Latin alphabet (Occitan alphabet)
Official status
Official language in
Spain
Recognised minority
language in
Regulated byConselh de la Lenga Occitana;[7] Congrès Permanent de la Lenga Occitana;[8] Institut d'Estudis Aranesi[9]
Language codes
ISO 639-1oc
ISO 639-2oci
ISO 639-3oci – inclusive code
Individual code:
sdt – Judeo-Occitan
Glottologocci1239
Linguasphere& 51-AAA-f 51-AAA-g & 51-AAA-f
Provençal, Auvergnat, Limousin, and Languedocien Occitan are classified as Severely Endangered by the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger.[10]
Gascon and Vivaro-Alpine Occitan are classified as Definitely Endangered by the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger.[11]
This article contains IPA phonetic symbols. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Unicode characters. For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA.

Occitan (English: /ˈɒksɪtən, -tæn, -tɑːn/;[12][13] Occitan pronunciation: [utsiˈta, uksiˈta]),[b] also known as lenga d'òc (Occitan: [ˈleŋɡɒ ˈðɔ(k)] ⓘ; French: langue d'oc) by its native speakers, sometimes also referred to as Provençal, is a Romance language spoken in Southern France, Monaco, Italy's Occitan Valleys, as well as Spain's Val d'Aran in Catalonia; collectively, these regions are sometimes referred to as Occitania. It is also spoken in Calabria (Southern Italy) in a linguistic enclave of Cosenza area (mostly Guardia Piemontese). Some include Catalan in Occitan, as the linguistic distance ("distance") between this language and some Occitan dialects (such as the Gascon language) is similar to the distance between different Occitan dialects. Catalan was considered a dialect of Occitan until the end of the 19th century[14] and still today remains its closest relative.[15]

Occitan is an official language of Catalonia, Spain, where a subdialect of Gascon known as Aranese is spoken (in the Val d'Aran).[16] Since September 2010, the Parliament of Catalonia has considered Aranese Occitan to be the officially preferred language for use in the Val d'Aran.

Across history, the terms Limousin (Lemosin), Languedocien (Lengadocian), Gascon, in addition to Provençal (Provençal, Provençau or Prouvençau) later have been used as synonyms for the whole of Occitan; nowadays, the term "Provençal" is understood mainly as the Occitan dialect spoken in Provence, in southeast France.[17]

Unlike other Romance languages such as French or Spanish, Occitan does not have a single written standard form, nor does it have official status in France, home to most of its speakers. Instead, there are competing norms for writing Occitan, some of which attempt to be pan-dialectal, whereas others are based on a particular dialect. These efforts are hindered by the rapidly declining use of Occitan as a spoken language in much of southern France, as well as by the significant differences in phonology and vocabulary among different Occitan dialects.

According to the UNESCO Red Book of Endangered Languages,[18] four of the six major dialects of Occitan (Provençal, Auvergnat, Limousin and Languedocien) are considered severely endangered, whereas the remaining two (Gascon and Vivaro-Alpine) are considered definitely endangered.

  1. ^ Occitan at Ethnologue (25th ed., 2022) Closed access icon
    Judeo-Occitan at Ethnologue (25th ed., 2022) Closed access icon
  2. ^ Bernissan, Fabrice (2012). "Combien l'occitan compte de locuteurs en 2012?". Revue de Linguistique Romane (in French). 76: 467–512.
  3. ^ Martel, Philippe (December 2007). "Qui parle occitan ?". Langues et cité (in French). No. 10. Observation des pratiques linguistiques. p. 3. Archived from the original on 14 September 2018. Retrieved 14 September 2018. De fait, le nombre des locuteurs de l'occitan a pu être estimé par l'INED dans un premier temps à 526 000 personnes, puis à 789 000 ("In fact, the number of Occitan speakers was estimated by the French Demographics Institute at 526,000 people, then 789,000")
  4. ^ Enrico Allasino; Consuelo Ferrier; Sergio Scamuzzi; Tullio Telmon (2005). "Le Lingue del Piemonte" (PDF). IRES. 113: 71. Archived (PDF) from the original on 16 February 2022. Retrieved 4 March 2020 – via Gioventura Piemontèisa.
  5. ^ Enquesta d'usos lingüístics de la població 2008 [Survey of Language Use of the Population 2008] (in Catalan), Statistical Institute of Catalonia, 2009, archived from the original on 17 October 2020, retrieved 4 March 2020
  6. ^ Norme in materia di tutela delle minoranze linguistiche storiche, Italian parliament, archived from the original on 2 May 2012, retrieved 18 June 2014
  7. ^ CLO's statements in Lingüistica Occitana (online review of Occitan linguistics).Lingüistica Occitana: Preconizacions del Conselh de la Lenga Occitana (PDF), 2007, archived (PDF) from the original on 16 February 2020, retrieved 17 March 2020
  8. ^ "Page d'accueil". Région Nouvelle-Aquitaine – Aquitaine Limousin Poitou-Charentes. Archived from the original on 27 January 2012. Retrieved 25 December 2011.
  9. ^ "Reconeishença der Institut d'Estudis Aranesi coma academia e autoritat lingüistica der occitan, aranés en Aran" [Recognition of the Institute of Aranese Studies as an academy and linguistic authority of Occitan, Aranese in Aran]. Conselh Generau d'Aran (in Occitan). 2 April 2014. Archived from the original on 26 February 2020. Retrieved 5 May 2015.
  10. ^ 18
  11. ^ 18
  12. ^ "Occitan". Oxford English Dictionary (Online ed.). Oxford University Press. (Subscription or participating institution membership required.)
  13. ^ "Occitan". Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary (7th ed.). 2005.
  14. ^ Friend, Julius W. (2012). Stateless Nations: Western European Regional Nationalisms and the Old Nations. Palgrave Macmillan. p. 80. ISBN 978-0-230-36179-9. Retrieved 5 March 2016.[permanent dead link]
  15. ^ Smith & Bergin 1984, p. 9
  16. ^ As stated in its Statute of Autonomy approved. See Article 6.5 in the Parlament-cat.net Archived 26 August 2013 at the Wayback Machine, text of the 2006 Statute of Catalonia (PDF)
  17. ^ Dalby, Andrew (1998). "Occitan". Dictionary of Languages (1st ed.). Bloomsbury Publishing plc. p. 468. ISBN 0-7475-3117-X. Archived from the original on 25 July 2012. Retrieved 8 November 2006.
  18. ^ "UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in danger". UNESCO. Archived from the original on 27 June 2012. Retrieved 18 July 2011.


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