Protestors claim new Spanish dictionary promotes prejudice and racism

From The Australian: ‘Spanish worded up on how to offend minorities’ | “Jews, Gypsies, gays, feminists and even people from Galicia are up in arms over the latest edition of the authoritative dictionary of the Spanish language, claiming it promotes prejudice and racism.

Critics say definitions relating to minority groups in the dictionary of the Royal Spanish Academy are outdated and demeaning. Their complaints have created a heated dispute with the compilers of the Diccionario de la Real Academia Espanola - equivalent to the Oxford English Dictionary - who have dismissed the concerns as political correctness. The Spanish Federation of Jewish Communities protested against the dictionary's refusal to withdraw negative references to Judaism, while Pilar Heredia, the president of Yerba-buena, a Gypsy women's association, told the Spanish daily El Pais that the definition of gitano (gypsy) was disgraceful and could encourage racism.

"We would like this definition to be removed from the dictionary," Ms Heredia said.

Homosexual groups have taken offence at a slang reference that means "effeminate, weak man". Myriam Navas, of the Madrid Gay, Lesbian and Transsexual Collective, said: "I don't like the way homosexuality is often associated with effeminacy, when everybody knows how diverse the gay world is."

Ms Navas said the dictionary prided itself on being "clean, correct and splendorous" and yet used offensive definitions.

Women's groups have said the dictionary should indicate sexist terms. As an example, Eulalia Lledo, a co-author of the book Of Women and Dictionaries, pointed to the word ajamonarse, "to become like a ham", which is used for pregnant women.”

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“But Jose Antonio Pascual, a Spanish language specialist, defended the dictionary. "We simply photograph the landscape, we don't create it," he said. "We seem to have lost the ability to laugh at ourselves. Uniformity of language frightens me. We are losing our sense of irony."”

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