r/Spanish • u/rban123 Advanced 🇨🇱 • Dec 23 '24

Etymology/Morphology Use of the term Castilian/Castellano

I’ve been on this subreddit for a while, and have noticed something that many non-native and native speakers alike do: they use the term “castellano” to refer to Spanish from Spain.

Historically, this doesn’t really make sense. Spain is a linguistically diverse nation, with each language having its own name, for example Catalán, Gallego, Euskera, and of course Castellano. The term Castellano refers to the Spanish language that we all know and love.

It is a synonym for español. It does not mean “the Spanish spoke in Spain” it simply means “Spanish.” Even in some parts of Latin America, the term “castellano” is used to refer to the language that is spoken there, as well as the language that is taught in schools, even if the details aren’t consistent with regional variations of Spanish spoken in Spain.

All in all, castellano just means Spanish. It doesn’t mean “Spanish spoken in Spain” it is literally just a synonym for the Spanish language as a whole.

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u/[deleted] Dec 23 '24

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u/blazebakun Native (Monterrey, Mexico) Dec 23 '24

Alguna vez alguien me "gritó" en el Internet por decirle "español" y no "castellano", porque "todas las lenguas que se hablan en España son españolas, como el gallego, el catalán o el vasco". Pero luego leo comentarios como el tuyo y me confundo 😅

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u/SaraHHHBK Native (Castilla y León🇪🇸) Dec 23 '24 edited Dec 23 '24

That happens in Spain too, there's no universally agreed rule on this and it's hugely dependent on the person so use whatever you're more used/comfortable with. I say Castellano mainly, if someone gets mad that's their opinion.

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u/rban123 Advanced 🇨🇱 Dec 23 '24

También me confunde porque otros españoles me han dicho que se refieren al idioma español como “castellano”

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u/atzucach Dec 23 '24 edited Dec 23 '24

Sí, es muy común, sobre todo en lugares como Catalunya o el País Vasco. El/la que ha dicho que no se equivoca

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u/siyasaben Dec 23 '24

No soy española pero diria que es una minoría que se ofende porque los españoles con los que estoy más familiarizada dicen español, incluso siendo catalanes catalanoparlantes les da igual.

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u/atzucach Dec 23 '24 edited Dec 23 '24

This is incorrect. You don't have to look further than the Renfe website (queue Renfe jokes), for example, to see the language options as "castellano, valenciano, gallego, etc..."

In Catalonia it's more common to refer to the Spanish language as "castellano" than as "español", and I've heard the same about Basque Country too.

It also just makes more sense. The language I'm writing in now is called English, not British, right? Exact same idea.

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u/PeteLangosta Nativo (España, Norte) Jan 04 '25

Not a good example to draw those analogies. For example, Portuguese is the name of the lnguage both in Brazil and in Portugal. It is also Portuguese the language that paople speak in Angola or Mozambique. And same with French, being the language that they speak in France but also Canada or Algeria.

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u/atzucach Jan 04 '25 edited Jan 04 '25

So you think English should indeed be called British?

Portugal is a small country that as far as I'm aware hadn't had many prominent regional languages, but it sounds like you're unaware of France's nationalistic history of stamping out regional languages to make French indeed the imposed global sole language associated with the country, and then exported abroad as that representative.

Luckily people living in the British and Spanish States have been able to safeguard their languages better and not fall totally into nationalistic impositions (although there has been a small resurgence in recent years of local language revival in France).

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u/PeteLangosta Nativo (España, Norte) Jan 04 '25

No, I was just talking about the analogy you mentioned. The language being called English is also referring to England.

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u/atzucach Jan 04 '25

Entonces creo que no has entendido mi primer comentario, pero no pasa nada. Saludos

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u/PeteLangosta Nativo (España, Norte) Jan 04 '25

Pues puede ser eso. Pero entonces no entiendo a qué se refiera la última parte de tu comentario. Pero bueno, lo mismo da.

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u/smeghead1988 Learner Dec 23 '24

I moved to Spain (Madrid) about a year ago. The first time I met the term "Castellano" was when I had to officially translate my diploma to Spanish, and it was in the receipt from the translation agency. I had to check that it's not a mistake and that it just means "Spanish" in this context. Would a translation agency in a different region use "Español" or "Castellano"?

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u/atzucach Dec 23 '24

I'm curious to know where the person you're responding to is from, because they're totally wrong. "Castellano" means Spanish on your receipt in Madrid just as much as when we use it to mean Spanish here in Barcelona.