Lenguas e identidades en los comienzos de la Europa moderna

Abstract

This article is concerned with the relation between language and collective identities. Since 1789, language has been associated more and more closely with national identity. Before the French Revolution, on the other hand, the identities expressed by language were more likely to be religious, regional, occupational or sexual. All the same, a concern with national pride is revealed in early modern treatises in praise of particular vernaculars (Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese, etc.), while attempts to purify different languages from the "contamination" of foreign words express a form of xenophobia.