Sa Pobla town hall, Mallorca

Sa Pobla - Who uses La Puebla nowadays? | Archive

Andrew EdePalma24/12/2023 14:25
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In 1936, a British writer on matters Mallorcan would have taken Spanish (Castellano) usage as having been standard. British maps from that time would have used Spanish because official sources and official documents in Spain would themselves have used Spanish and only Spanish. Regional variations were by the by, even though this was the 1936 of the Second Republic and before the Civil War. The Republic was minded to embrace regionalism, even autonomy, but nothing came of this for obvious reasons.

It was the April 1936 edition of The Railway Magazine. An article was about the proposed extension of the railway to Alcudia - yes, they were talking about this some ninety years ago. This would not have been an extension from Sa Pobla but, because of the Spanish, from La Puebla.

This usage sounds as archaic as some of the report, which included references to "steamships" and "comfortable railcars". Yet it wasn't so archaic when one considers that it was only a matter of five years ago that political intervention was required to get Facebook to change La Puebla to Sa Pobla. Old usage dies hard, especially if usage is taken from sources that are themselves out of date and which fail to accommodate current and popular usage.

It was the Més councillor for culture in Sa Pobla, Toni Simó, who demanded that Facebook adopt Sa Pobla. He was successful. And so he should have been. La Puebla is nowadays most odd, a usage that largely seems to be reserved for foreign residents of far greater vintage than myself or Mallorcans when talking to foreigners and assuming that these foreigners will use the Spanish name. It's an incorrect assumption - mostly anyway; this is no longer 1936 or indeed 1976 and post-Franco Year One.

I have never used anything but Sa Pobla. It's never occurred to me to not use Sa Pobla. That's the name. But, and as one delves into the controversial world of Mallorca's linguistic socio-politics, there was something curious about a Més councillor defending the name. That's because, courtesy of the 'sa' article, Sa Pobla is Mallorquí rather than Catalan. There again, when does one ever encounter La Pobla? Rarely.

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In February this year, Més took the matter of place names in Spanish to the Balearic parliament. A motion was passed calling for the promotion of names in Catalan in the Spanish versions of Google Maps. La Puebla was one example given. Another was Lluchmayor (rather than Llucmajor). Joan Mas of Més argued that this usage had no justification and showed a lack of respect towards the culture and citizens of the Balearics as well as of Catalan-speaking territories.

Yes, but then not all citizens might agree. Ciudadanos (Citizens) voted against the motion and so did Vox. The Cs are no longer of any relevance in parliament or in politics generally. But Vox most certainly are.

In 2020, the national leader of Vox, Santiago Abascal, raised a proposal in Congress for legislative regulation of place names in order to ensure that they were officially in Spanish. In the Balearics, under the agreement with the Partido Popular government, Vox will be establishing an office of linguistic freedom. The party has secured twenty million euros of next year's budget for "free choice of language" in education. It's all about the advocacy of Spanish. And so are we once more about to experience a drive to, for example, having signs saying La Puebla or both La Puebla and Sa Pobla? It would seem that we are.

I say once more because this happened twelve years ago. Unlike the PP of today, the PP then were determined to press the use of Spanish for street names and place names. Castellano names would coexist alongside the Catalan names. Which may have seemed reasonable enough. But why was it necessary, other than for political reasons? It was hardly a case of defending Spanish as a minority language - and still isn't - while the generally accepted usage was Catalan or Mallorquí.

Ideology undoubtedly intrudes from both sides of the debate, but what is culturally accepted, irrespective of ideology, holds true in a case such as Sa Pobla. A right (far-right) argument is that the islands' languages are somehow discriminated against as much as Castellano because of "pan-Catalan regulation". These languages are viewed as being part of a Spanish heritage rather than a Catalan one. In this respect, a Més councillor defending Sa Pobla seems a bit odd. But it isn't if one accepts that the name is what is culturally accepted and has ceased to have anything (or very little) to do with individuals' language preference. And where do Vox sit on this name, given that 50% of it (Pobla) is essentially Catalan? What would they like? Sa Puebla?

People do of course get very worked up about all this, but the great majority, one suspects, consider these arguments to be a complete waste of time. Names are what are they are; what they are generally taken to be. Andratx, Felanitx, Llucmajor, Sa Pobla, Sant Llorenç, Santa Margalida - not a Castellano version to be seen. Old habits, I do understand, die hard - I have one re Pollensa rather than Pollença - but that's really what they are. Habits.