European Year of Languages

European Year of Languages 2001

The year 2001 was declared by the Council of Europe as the European Year of Languages in collaboration with the European Commission and was a success due to the participation of millions of people in 45 countries. Subsequently, every year September 26 is celebrated as the European Day of Languages.

The schools of Galicia and Catalonia belonging to the ASP-UNESCO Network, with the collaboration of Portuguese schools, organized a joint festival in 2001 under the title "From the Atlantic to the Mediterranean". Students from Galicia and Portugal presented poems, songs, plays and other texts in the original languages of the Atlantic countries. All texts were presented with international gestures at the same time, as a kind of added communicative value.

This event took place on the Paseo de Gracia (in front of Gaudí's famous La Pedrera house) in September, during the great Mercè festivities in Barcelona.

The program began with a greeting song in several languages. The students made the same gestures in all languages and the music (whose author is Fernando Fernández Picos, a primary school teacher in Galicia) was performed by a local band.

You can watch a video with some of the greetings:

Then came the presentation of the event, made by a teacher of Galicia in Catalan, the language of Catalonia. He also made the signs of the main ideas to prepare the audience for a better understanding of the texts in different languages.