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- Identity: the
building blocks of
2. Literature
and philosophy
3. Art and
architecture
4. Performing
arts
5. Cinema
and fashion
6. Media and
communications
7. Food and drink 8. Living culture:
the details of
Fewer than 40 per cent
of Spaniards speak a
second language. Only
the British, Irish and
Portuguese fare worse.
Mobile phones?
Just whistle
Silbo Gomero is a
language of whistling
unique to the Canary
Island of La Gomera.
Having evolved over
centuries as a way of
communicating across
the island’s yawning
ravines, the unique
sounds were in danger
of dying out in an age of
telephones and email.
Then, in 1999, the local
authorities put whistling
on the school curriculum.
28 million people in the
USA speak Spanish as
their first language.
Royal protector
The Real Academia
Española, which traces
its roots back to 1713
and King Felipe V, is a
governmental body
charged with preserving
and recording the
Spanish language,
ruminating on any
evolution or suggested
amendments. ‘Limpia,
fija y da esplendor’
(clean, fix and give
splendour) reads the
motto. Every decade or
so they produce a new
dictionary.
Your mother is a
#*$* ¡*$#
The Spanish swear a lot.
The rather casual use of
foul, abusive language
doesn’t carry quite the
same consequences that
it might in other countries.
The connotation is often
sexual, occasionally
washed down with a
splash of blasphemy,
but usually taken lightly.
Camilo José Cela, a
giant of 20thcentury
Spanish literature, even
published a double
volume book of commonly
used obscenities, the
Diccionario Secreto
(1968/71), as remarkable
for its scale as its
lewdness.
The right tone of voice
When the Spanish talk,
often the only variation
between a statement and a
question or exclamation is
in the tone of voice used –
there’s no grammatical
change. Therefore, written
Spanish uses inverted
question and exclamation
marks at the start of a
sentence, as dictated by
the Real Academia
Española since the 18th
century, to clarify the
speaker’s intent for the
reader. For example: ¿We
are going to the beach?
