Questione Ladina

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Questione Ladina ( Italian: Ladin question ) is the question of whether there is a close linguistic relationship between the Graubünden Romansh spoken in Graubünden , the Ladin spoken in the Dolomite valleys and the Furlan spoken in Friuli Italy , and whether it is therefore justified to use these three To summarize languages ​​under one generic term, Romansh or Alpine Romansh.

Since the beginning of the 20th century and until today, this question has been controversial among two groups of linguists . The problem became explosive outside the small circle of scholars because of the conclusions that politics drew from it.

View of the Ascolians

The first group is based on a work published in 1873 by the linguist Graziadio Ascoli (1829–1907). The view represented therein was significantly expanded in the following years by Theodor Gartner (1843–1925).

Both researchers postulate that there are so many similarities between (Graubünden) Romanic and Ladin - although they classify the dialect of the Non Valley (Nones) and Sulzberg Valley (Solander) as Ladin in addition to the Dolomite Ladin - and Furlanic that one of a kind of Rhaeto-Romanic " original language " in the area between Oberalppass in Switzerland and Friuli in Italy .

This unity would have been broken up into dialects as a result of the geographical conditions ; the expansion of German to the south and Italian to the north tore the original unity apart.

View of the Battistians

The second group - based on Carlo Battisti and Carlo Salvioni (1858–1920) -, on the other hand, understands Rhaeto-Romance to mean only the Romansh spoken in Graubünden with its five idioms. A further unity with the Dolomite Ladin and the Friulian is a mere linguistic construct without any reference to reality.

The features common to Romansh, Ladin and Friulian can be found to varying degrees in many Galloital dialects on the southern slopes of the Alps from Lombardy to Veneto , which are commonly counted as Italian ; some of these peculiarities are also common in the Po Valley. The alleged commonalities of "Rhaeto-Romanic" are recognized as typical features of linguistic retreat areas of a formerly different northern Italian dialect.

Political Impact

The dispute between Ascolians and Battistians was initially purely scientific. Since the beginning of the 20th century, however, Battisti's positions were also taken over by representatives of Italian irredentism . They saw in Battisti's views a support for their theory, according to which Graubünden Romanians, Dolomite Ladins and Friulians actually speak Italian and are therefore Italians who should be united in an Italian state. This meant that the Swiss canton of Ticino and most of Graubünden (according to the logic of the nationalists) should have been attached to Italy.

From today's point of view, the basic problem consists in the fact that politics cannot use the knowledge of historical linguistics to assess current problems: Regardless of whether Romansh, Ladin and Furlan are historically actually "Northern Italian" dialects or not, this is the case with most speakers today Dialects no such awareness.

Apart from that, from a linguistic point of view, those northern Italian varieties north of the La Spezia-Rimini line (i.e. in the entire Po Valley ), which border the Ladin varieties to the south, are also not "Italian" in the true sense, but part of Western Romanic ; this did not play a role in the political discussion of the 19th and early 20th centuries, but nowadays the independence of the " Padan " language and culture is under certain circumstances . a. Loudly represented by the Lega Nord .

Recent discussion

Since the introduction of the language group membership declaration in Trentino on the occasion of the 2001 census, numerous Nonsbergers and Sulzbergers have declared themselves to be Ladins. The idioms Nones and Solander are traditionally not classified as Ladin, but simply referred to as semi-Ladin or Ladino-Anaunic, and have so far not enjoyed any legal recognition within the framework of the autonomy of Trentino , unlike the Ladin dialects of the Fassa Valley .

Recently, therefore, a heated debate about the official recognition of the Ananuni-Ladin dialects has developed.

In the 2011 census, 23.19% of the Nonsbergers declared themselves to be Ladins, in 2001 it was 17.54%. This means that more Ladins live in the Nonsberg and Sulzberg than in the Fassa Valley.

According to a recent study, neither the classification of some of the north-west Trentino dialects (Noce Valley: Sulzberg and Nonsberg) as "semi-Radical", nor the assignment of some of these dialects (upper Sulzberg) to Alpine Lombardic can be justified. The varieties mentioned, on the other hand, appear to be clearly linked to the Central Trentino system, which is now increasingly influenced by Venetian . In addition, the study showed that the three Romansh subgroups (Grisons Romansh, Dolomite Ladin, Friulian) appear as a language family that is completely different from Northern Italian, and thus cannot be assigned to the Italian language type, but that their independence is justified.

Individual evidence

  1. Ladinità noneja: la Dominici contra i fascegn (The Ladinity of the Non Valley: Caterina Dominici against the Fassa Ladins), La Usc di Ladins nr 50, from December 21, 2012, page 6: Instead of the long process of recognizing the Anaunic as one's own Regional Councilor Dominici prefers the abbreviation to go to the language group: she likes the Ladin “tram”, as this minority is already recognized. And it is clear that the intention is not only cultural, since the request for political recognition was submitted during the discussion of the balance sheet budget when it came to financing the Ladins in the Fassa Valley. The request was not accepted.
  2. Ladin: The Nonsbergers overtake the Fassataler ( Memento of the original from February 3, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Trentino Corriere delle Alpi, June 30th 2012 (in Italian) @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / trentinocorrierealpi.gelocal.it
  3. [1]  ( Page no longer available , search in web archivesInfo: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF; 67 kB) Dialectometric analysis of the language atlas of Dolomite Ladin and neighboring dialects , 2003, Univ. Prof. Dr. Roland Bauer (University of Salzburg, Department of Romance Studies)@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / www.uni-salzburg.at