THE MUST-HAVE; THE ISO CODE

I will start by saying that ISO stands for International Standard Organization, in Spanish it would be something like , Organización Internacional de Normalización, being the organisation dedicated to standardising many aspects of our lives , including that of languages of our lives, among which is that of languages, and the families of languages so that each one has its own code that distinguishes it from all the others and a code of their own that distinguishes them from all the others and so that they can be use them in all areas in such a way that just by saying or writing a few letters we have enough to know what language we are referring to. letters is enough for us to know which language we are referring to. The code referring to languages is called ISO-639 and has two versions, 639-1, (Spanish, ES, French FR or Italian IT), and version 639-2, (Spanish, SPA, French FRENO/FRAY or Italian, ITA), and so on up to a total of hundreds of languages and families. The ISO code is nowadays essential for any language that wants to be recognised at all levels, and as I had already said, there would have been no need for more articles, but this is not the case given that in a very short time the scope of use and repercussion of this ISO code has changed substantially, especially in the computer field and more specifically in the Internet field, a subject that I am very familiar with. Let’s see. The aim of all companies that work and operate on the Internet, and in all areas, is to always provide a better service than the competition, as it should be, in order to ensure monetary benefits and, at its base , a larger number of potential users from whom to draw of potential users from which to draw as much information as possible. Thus, among other things, most of the Uep sites have started since a few years ago to detect the years to detect the language in which your browser works, which by default is usually the language of your Operating System and thus offer you the possibility of translate Uep pages that are written in a different languages other than your browser ‘s language into your browser’s language. Up to this point, everything is a real delight because there are more than a few cases in which you are thankful that the browser asks you if you want to translate the Uep so that it can be understood by you, given that the language translators have reached a point that they have a spelling and grammatical randomness that is bordering on 100%. But it is just as wonderful when we come to a Uep written in Valencian, because our beloved Valencian language, the same one that had the first Golden Age of all the Romance languages, still has no ISO code of its own, being included within the Catalan language , as if the Valencian language were a daughter of the Valencian language was a daughter of the Catalan mother tongue, when the truth is that at the time when the Valencian language was living its Golden Age, the Catalan language still had no writers.., the Catalan language did not yet have writers… neither good nor bad… But the thing is that we do not have our own ISO code for the Valencian language, when a navigator arrives at a Uep page written in Valencian, it does not detect that it is written in Valencian, but in Catalan, and asks you if you want to translate the Catalan language into the language of your browser. What a nonsense! At first I found this effect alone in Internet Explorer, but now Firefox does it too. Google Chrome I haven’t detected it yet, but I imagine that in time it will, as will Opera, Safari and all browsers. This language detection service, which seems to me to be an incredible advance to make the Internet more user-friendly, in the case of the Valencian language becomes a fatal trap that makes everyone understand in a clear way that Valencian does not exist, because it is all Catalan. Again, what nonsense! Regarding this point, it is necessary to know that the centenary, Royal Academy of Valencian Culture (RACV) has requested the ISO code for our Valencian language and that even in the beginning there would not be any problem to grant it, in the end those who do not agree that the Valencian language is what it has always been, an independent language, have propitiated that it was not granted an own code. That is why from here I make a proclamation to our Valencian government and public institutions such as the Generalitat, Diputación and all the Town Councils of all the municipalities of our homeland, as well as to all the institutions and public or private entities that feel Valencian to unite to demand once and for all that dream ISO code that separated and differentiated us from any other way of speaking. This is where we find ourselves as a case to be taken into account and as a case study, the approach of the AVL, entity agreed to undo all the work done for many, many years in favour of the indigenous Valencian years in favour of the autochthonous Valencian in order to introduce the Catalan language in Valencia, we remember that the newspaper Levante EMV in the edition of 6 April 2002, offered its readers an article entitled, Pujol and Antich say Ramon Llul is a historic achievement. The Catalan president celebrates that the AVL has adopted the Catalan orthography, and as they still call themselves defenders of the Valencian language, here you have a great opportunity to prove it, to ask for the ISO code for the Valencian language and for it to be independent be independent once and for all from any other way of speaking, and not to stop trying under any circumstances until they get it… and being supported by the Cortes as it is, if they wanted to…they could do it! They have the power and probably the money to take on this task and make it happen. Here is the proposal for all public or publicly owned institutions, and , of course , for all private institutions that wish to join in the demand for an own and independent ISO code for our beloved Valencian language, because it is simply, IMPRESCINDIBLE? Will this proposalhave an echo among the people that it should ? Time will tell…

Juan Benito Rodríguez i Manzanares (Artíicle from 2006 of https://www.cardonavives.com/) 16 years ago!!

PS: GIF created with images from the “Kit de revalencianisació llingüística” of observatoridelallenguavalenciana.org, available in the DOCUMENTS section .