When I was little (around 25 years ago) people already said how nice it would be to be able to see all TV channels in Catalan language; not only our TV but also the TV from Valencia and the Balearic islands.
In the Netherlands, around 30 or 40 years ago they already could see the TV of their southern Flemish neighbours, who also speak the same language. To have the same mother tongue creates an emotional bond and it facilitates collaboration between both territories. Singers, writers, students and workers go back and forth and work in both territories and feel perfectly integrated without any effort. There are even possibilities to go to a Flemish hospital when Dutch hospitals have long waiting lists. All of this because we speak the same language. We all know how that in the Catalan countries (Països Catalans) singers from Mallorca or Valencia can become stars in Catalonia and that students come to Barcelona and can study in Catalan and feel perfectly ‘at home’ among the Catalans.
So, what’s wrong? Why, after 30 years of ‘democracy’ in Spain it is still not possible to arrange something as easy as to allow all Catalan speaking territories to see the TV channels of their neighbours? Well, this is Spain, and Spain is still different. Yes, we are in the European Union, yes we do have a kind of ‘democracy’. But in Spain, just like in Russia, the media are controlled by politicians. And they are Spanish nationalists who are at the power and whose interest is to ensure that the Catalan countries remain as separated as possible. They do this in different ways. One of them is by redirecting all possibilities of transport to Madrid and impoverishing the trans-Catalan connections (as they have been doing the last 15 years with all ways of transportation, train, highways and flight routes).
Another is by impeding that the Catalan territories talk or listen to each other by avoiding the development of a Pan Catalan confederation of communications (TV, radio). The last steps in this direction were to ban Catalan TV from Valencia (until last year Valencians could watch Catalan TV) and also to ban Catalan TV from North Catalonia (France).
But now the Spanish nationalists have a new tool to ensure that we don’t mingle much with our Catalan speaking neighbours: TDT.
TDT is the new digital TV, which soon will substitute the old analog system. It seems that this will give the Spanish nationalists even more power to avoid us watch the TV channels of our Catalan speaking neighbours.
The territories in which Catalan is being spoken is quite big. Most of them with own TV channels. Valencia, Catalonia, Balearic Islands, North Catalonia (France), Andorra and even Alghero in Italy has an own TV channel in Catalan language. With more than 9 million inhabitants who speak it, it is not the smallest language in Europe.
I am afraid that, here again I will be right: only the independence of Catalonia will give us the power to realise this.
Can you imagine how many TV channels we will have the day we are an independent country? We will have the tools to get all TV channels in Catalan language in the world without the interference of any anti Catalan politician.
For now we will have to go on the activist way, which is a lot of work and unfortunately it does not work very often. But this is the only tool we have.
If you agree with having as many as possible TV channels in Catalan here is a link in which you can send a letter to the Spanish minister of industry asking him to make it possible (only in Catalan).
http://www.indexcat.cat/somdeumilions/campanya.htm
To be honest, I don’t expect anything, but I just can’t sit and see how they keep applying all sorts of limitations to us and do nothing about it. I think it is important to let them know what we want, and that we are not happy with what they are doing. We also give them a chance to do something about it, to take away another reason to wish independence.
They don’t seem to be aware of the fact that by giving us the freedom to develop ourselves we would not see any benefits in becoming independent. Their wish to transform us into Spaniards is what feeds our wish to become independent.
Articles on this theme (in Catalan):
*http://www.directe.cat/article/obra-cultural-balear-adverteix-que-larribada-de-la-tdt-pot-significar-un-retroces-de-la-ll-12132
*http://www.directe.cat/article/lestat-frances-tanca-la-tdt-nordcatalana
*http://www.directe.cat/article/el-govern-intercedeix-perque-tvc-pugui-emetre-en-digital-a-la-catalunya-del-nord-12855
4 comentaris:
Any doubts about whether in Spain there still is censorship or not?
Check this out, it happened yesterday 13th of May 2009.
Spain cutting away the sound of the public that made it almost impossible to hear the Spanish anthem and pasting the Spanish anthem and manipulating the images so it seems that Catalans and Basques enjoy listening to this beautiful Spanish 'national song'.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=48hMsM1Hrp0
Another video (in catalan):
http://www.vilaweb.tv/?video=5705
We have a similar problem in Finland. Since digital tv, it is has been harder to receive Sweden's television here in Finland. For those of us with Swedish as our mother tongue (nearly 300 000 in Finland - a bilingual country like Belgium or Canada), it's vital that we can see tv in our own language. Since digital tv, we now have to pay extra to see "SVT World", Sweden's tv's international channel. And we have to pay a horribly large extra fee to receive normal channels of Sweden (i.e. SVT1, SVT2, TV3, TV4, Kanal 5).
Yet, in Sweden, Finnish-speaking expatriots of Finland in the greater Stockholm area are allowed to watch Finnish TV without paying extra even though Finnish is not a native language of that region of Sweden!
I reject any political interference in access to any media.
That's why I love the internet.
Unfortunately regular TV and radio are still mainly watched through the traditional cable, TDT or digital sources, which are controlled by big companies and politicians.
Obviously the Finish authorities do not think it is in their interest to let you watch Swedish TV in Finland. This is something that worries me sometimes. When Catalonia becomes an independent country, we have to let Spanish speakers to have their own TV channels. Even though THE official language will be Catalan.
In this sense technology is not going fast enough and this frustrates me a bit. I think everybody should be able to buy the rights to watch a certain amount of channels and he or she should be free to choose what channels to watch from all channels in the world. I live in Amsterdam, and I am Catalan. Why do I have to have the Turkish TV and not the Catalan TV on my TV set?
This is so old fashioned!
I should be able to choose the channels I want to have, rather than to get default channels according to the bigger minorities such as Arabs and Turkish immigrants. Technology! Faster please!
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