To fully understand Spain's cultural and political heritage, it is key to have a look at the different languages spoken in the land.
Spanish
Spanish or Castilian is the most widely spoken language in Spain with over 45 million speakers. It is sometimes referred to as Castilian (Castellano) to distinguish it from its South American derivative, Spanish (espanol).
Catalan
Catalan is the second most spoken language in Spain. It is spoken in Catalonia, and the small landlocked country Andorra in the Pyrenees. It is also spoken in the Community of Valencia, also the Valencians proudly refer to their dialect of Catalan as Valenciano, and consider it a separate language. Catalan bears influence from both French and Italian. Altogether, close to 5 million people speak Catalan as their native language.
Galician
Galician is in many ways more similar to Portuguese than Spanish. A lot of the vocabulary is similar to Portuguese, albeit spelled with the Spanish alphabet and adhering to Spanish rules of pronunciation. Approximately 2.6 million people speak Galician as their native language.
Basque
Whereas it is easy to understand why Galician bears resemblance to Portuguese, and Catalan to French, it is a lot more difficult to explain the origin of Basque. There is no consensus amongst linguists as to where this language, seemingly unrelated to other Indo-European languages comes from. It bears no resemblance to Romance languages (Portuguese, French, Spanish, etc.) whatsoever. It is spoken in the Basque country and parts of Navarra. It is also called Euskara, the Basque word for its language. About 900,000 people claim to speak it.
Aranese
Aranese is the least common language. It is only spoken in a mountainous region between Aragon and Catalonia, the Val d'Aran region.
English
English is spoke amongst staff in hotels, but is not widely spoken across the country. Most Spaniards, especially the young generation, know some English, but are reticent and uncomfortable speaking it. Many amongst the older generation are more comfortable communicating in French than in English.
Learn more:
Have a link to Udemy, and maybe educational material, books, dvd's, etc. Also a link to Angela's Dynamic Spanish.
