The Language Diversity Forum brings together over 200 participants from all over the world in Barcelona

From 17 to 20 June, Barcelona hosted the Language Diversity Forum, an international meeting organised by Linguapax International within the framework of the European project FOSTERLANG, which brought together over 200 participants, including registered participants and speakers from various countries, linguistic communities and social contexts from all over the world, to strengthen the revitalization of minority languages.

For four days, the Forum became a space for dialogue and shared work between academia, institutions, activists, representatives of linguistic communities and civil society to exchange experiences, strategies and tools for the revitalization of minority languages. The programme combined panels, round tables, discussion groups, workshops and conferences, as well as parallel activities such as the exhibition “Languages ​​don’t die, they kill them” and the Music for Linguistic Diversity session.

The sessions focused on key issues for the future of minority languages, such as linguistic rights, social justice, community activism, collaboration between academia and communities, the role of languages of migration, public policies, self-empowerment of speakers and digital strategies for revitalization.

Sharing workspaces

One of the most outstanding elements of the Forum has been the attention paid to Catalonia and the role of Catalan in an increasingly multilingual society. The interventions have coincided in pointing out the importance of strengthening Catalan as a language of social cohesion, while recognizing and making visible the languages ​​of diverse origins present in the country.

The meeting has also served to consolidate a network of collaboration between organizations, institutions, researchers, activists and linguistic communities. Beyond the exchange of knowledge, the Forum has opened shared workspaces that should facilitate the promotion of future alliances, projects, and actions in favour of linguistic diversity and linguistic rights.

Throughout the conference, the idea that language revitalization should not be understood only as a technical or educational issue, but as a social, cultural, political and relational process linked to dignity, memory, territory and community continuity, has emerged strongly. Shared experiences have highlighted that languages remain alive when the relationships that sustain them are also kept alive: between generations, between communities and territory, and between knowledge and daily life.

The participants’ contributions have also highlighted that the effective defence of linguistic rights cannot fall solely on speakers but requires institutional commitments and active public policies. In this sense, the Forum has insisted on the need to avoid setbacks in rights already achieved and to strengthen the mechanisms for the protection and promotion of minority languages.

Another central theme has been the role of community participation, especially in contexts marked by histories of colonization, assimilation and discrimination. The experiences presented have claimed that communities must be able to define their own priorities, institutions and futures, and that any action to support languages ​​must be based on respect for this autonomy.

The Forum was held with the collaboration of the Institute of Catalan Studies and the Faculty of Philology and Communication of the University of Barcelona, ​​the venues of the sessions, as well as the Palau Robert i Scribal, with the support of the European Union and the Barcelona Provincial Council, within the framework of the European project FOSTERLANG, aimed at strengthening European linguistic capital.

Here you can find the document with the main conclusions of the Forum, which collects the main contributions, recommendations and lines of work shared throughout the conference.