The Brazilian writer Joao Guimaraes Rosa said that “all languages are remains of the ancient mystery.” This beautiful phrase seems to be written to refer to the falamother tongue of approximately 4,500 inhabitants who reside in three municipalities in the north of the province of Cáceres and whose origin is uncertain.
The fala It has its own name in each of the towns: valverdeñu in Valverde del Fresno; lagarteiru in Eljas; and mañeguin San Martín de Trevejo. On the part of its speakers, the use of the terminology is infrequent “a fala”, which is rather reserved to the linguistic field and the need to label the three varieties at the same time.
To define more precisely what is fala and if a reliable origin can be determined, we spoke with Miroslav Vales, a Czech linguist and university professor who, by chance, is one of the people who has studied it the most: “It is a language from the Ibero-Romance subgroup of languages. romances and their more exact classification is subject to linguistic discussion. Research on the language includes an infinite number of hypotheses about its origin, but none of them are proven. The story of how it came about remains a mystery. For me, it is a Romance language.”
According to Vales, its speakers do not like it when their language is labeled as being of Galician, Portuguese or Asturias origin. Theories about its origin lead to one of those three languages, based on various historical episodes that have not been clearly demonstrated. “Furthermore, these people feel deeply valverdeñus, mañegus and lagarteirusand their native language helps them express their unique identity,” he adds.
“I thought, wrote, dreamed and identified myself in lagarteiro” (I think, write, dream and identify myself in lagarteiru), says María Luisa Domínguez, resident of Eljas and member of the Cultural Association U green lizardan entity that was born to preserve and promote this little linguistic gem.
For Domínguez, the fala It is very important from a sentimental and cultural point of view: “It is the essence of our roots, the treasure that our ancestors have preserved and transmitted to us from generation to generation and that we continue to bequeath to our children: we continue fighting to ensure that preserve.”
Transmitted purely orally, the fala It is one of the most vital minority languages in Europe, and around 80% of the inhabitants of all generations of the three municipalities use it in their daily lives: with their family, neighbors, in commerce, in bars…
However, this vitality is seriously threatened by the demographic situation (aging population and very low birth rate), by the intensive contact with Spanish and by the economic factors that limit the possibilities of young people to settle in the area.
The scarcity of written documents adds to the difficulties of preserving this language in the long term. Paradoxically, new platforms like WhatsApp are leading to the generation of more written testimonies: “As it is a bit of a mix of oral and written, there are people who are communicating in fala by this means,” says Vales.
Save a threatened language
In the fight for its conservation, the Czech researcher published a dictionary in 2021, after three years interviewing people from the three towns and doing almost archaeological work to find texts available in the three varieties.
“In lagarteiru It was easier because there is a cultural magazine, Anduriñawhich is published annually, and there are the occasional plays. In the other two varieties it was quite complicated. In mañeguthe writer Domingo Frades, now deceased, was the only person who published anything. and in valverdeñuthere is a little book of stories that was published in 2019 and little else,” explains Vales.
Miguel Ramos, president of the Cultural Association U green lizardbelieves that the fala It can be a pole of tourist attraction and, in this way, add another option to preserve it: “That a language of oral transmission is maintained here for nine or ten centuries, in three towns so close and with three different varieties, is not the case. none of the minority languages of Europe.”
U green lizard is in charge of publishing the annual magazine Anduriña, in addition to representing traditional theater plays in which people of all ages perform, which serves to encourage citizen participation and cultural transmission from the elderly to new generations.
Until now, the fala It has not achieved official language status, since the Statute of Autonomy of Extremadura does not mention any minority language. The only recognition it has received from institutions is the declaration of “Asset of Cultural Interest” in 2001.
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