The Costa Rican Language Academy turns 100 years old and highlights its contributions and challenges

2023-10-13 10:55:59

The ACL, founded on October 12, 1923, was the ninth in America and the third in Central America, but it has the particularity that it was the first created in the 20th century at a time when intellectual currents were debating between purism and evolution. from language.

“It is the first of the academies founded in the 20th century and that makes it a little alien to the linguistically negative 19th century principles, for example the linguistic purism with which the 19th century academies were created,” the secretary general told EFE. of the Association of Spanish Language Academies, Francisco Javier Pérez.

Pérez described it as a “happy historical coincidence” that the Costa Rican Academy was born “without the old prejudices” of the 19th century, and stressed that since then it has been “pioneer” and “very outstanding” with the contributions it made to grammar, spelling and dictionary.

Among Costa Rica’s contributions to the language, Pérez also cited the 1892 dictionary of barbarisms and provincialisms written by the philologist, writer and teacher Carlos Gagini, as well as The literary categoriesby Roberto Brenes Mesén, from 1923.

For his part, the president of the ACL, Víctor Manuel Sánchez, expressed the joy of celebrating the centenary of the academy and highlighted challenges such as establishing alliances with various institutions, getting closer to the people and continuing to work for the conservation of the language and adaptation to new times.

“Academies do not regulate from a desk, but language is a historical and social construction, it changes in line with life and culture itself,” Sánchez commented.

For this reason, he assured that the mission of the academies is to get closer to people to “keep pace” with the “daily construction of the language.”

Sánchez commented that there is a perception in the general population that language academies are limited to writing a dictionary or that they are made up of intellectuals who meet to dictate rules on how to speak or write.

However, he assured that these perceptions are “far from reality”, since the main task of language academies is to protect, cultivate and study the linguistic and literary heritage of each country where one is established.

In the case of the Costa Rican Language Academy, its functions also include stimulating knowledge of local indigenous languages ​​and Creole English.

As part of the celebration of the 100th anniversary of the Costa Rican Academy, the bibliographic exhibition “First editions of language academics” is exhibited at the National Library.

In addition, 3 books were presented: academic pages, by Jorge Sáenz Carbonell; an edition of The literary categoriesby Roberto Brenes Mesén, and the facsimile edition of the Dictionary of barbarisms and provincialisms of Costa Ricaby Carlos Gagini.