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Official regulator for the Spanish language From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Royal Spanish Academy (Spanish: Real Academia Española [reˈal akaˈðemja espaˈɲola], generally abbreviated as RAE) is Spain's official royal institution with a mission to ensure the stability of the Spanish language. It is based in Madrid, Spain, and is affiliated with national language academies in 22 other Hispanophone nations through the Association of Academies of the Spanish Language.[1]
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Real Academia Española | |
Arms of the Royal Spanish Academy | |
.jpg) Headquarters of the Royal Spanish Academy on Felipe IV Street, 4, in the Jerónimos neighborhood of Madrid. | |
| Abbreviation | RAE |
|---|---|
| Formation | 1713 |
| Founder | The Duke of Escalona |
| Purpose | Linguistic prescription and research |
| Headquarters | Madrid, Spain |
Region served | Hispanophone regions and populations |
Official language | Spanish |
Protector | Felipe VI (as King of Spain) |
Director | Santiago Muñoz Machado |
Main organ | Governing Board |
| Affiliations | Association of Spanish Language Academies |
| Website | www |
The RAE dedicates itself to language planning by applying linguistic prescription aimed at promoting linguistic unity within and between various territories, to ensure a common standard. The proposed language guidelines are shown in a number of works.
In 1711, Spain, unlike France, Italy and Portugal, did not have a large dictionary with a comprehensive and collegially elaborated lexicographical repertoire. The initial nucleus of the future Academy was formed that same year by the eight novatores who met in the library of the palace of Juan Manuel Fernández Pacheco, Duke of Escalona and Marquess of Villena, located in the Plaza de las Descalzas Reales in Madrid.[2]
The Spanish Academy was founded in 3 August 1713 on the initiative of Pacheco, with the purpose of "fixing the voices and words of the Castilian language in their greatest propriety, elegance and purity".[3] The objective was to fix the language in the state of fullness that it had reached during the 16th century and that had been consolidated in the 17th century. The Italian Accademia della Crusca founded in 1582 and the Académie Française founded in 1635 were taken as models.[4]
The first official session of the new corporation was held at the residence of Pacheco on 6 July 1713, an event that is recorded in the book of minutes, begun on 3 August 1713.[5]
Its creation, with twenty-four elected members[6] was approved on 3 October 1714 by Royal Decree of Philip V, that gave the academy the right to be called the "Royal Spanish Academy".[7] This meant that the academicians enjoyed the preeminences and exemptions granted to the servants of the Royal Household.[3] It had its first seat at number 26 Valverde Street, from where it moved to Alarcón Street, corner of Felipe IV, its definitive seat.[8]
The emblem chosen was a fiery crucible placed on the fire, with the legend Limpia, fija y da esplendor ("cleans, fixes and gives splendor").[9] [10] Collective utility became the main hallmark of the Spanish Academy, differentiating itself from other academies that had proliferated in the golden centuries and that were conceived as mere occasional literary gatherings.
The RAE began establishing rules for the orthography of Spanish beginning in 1741 with the first edition of the Ortographía (spelled Ortografía from the second edition onwards). The proposals of the Academy became the official norm in Spain by royal decree in 1844, and they were also gradually adopted by the Spanish-speaking countries in the Americas. Several reforms were introduced in the Nuevas Normas de Prosodia y Ortografía (1959, New Norms of Prosody and Orthography). Since the establishment of the Association of Academies of the Spanish Language in 1951, the Spanish academy works in close consultation with the other Spanish language academies in its various works and projects. The 1999 Orthography was the first to be edited by the twenty two academies together.[11] The current rules and practical recommendations on spelling are presented in the latest edition of the Ortografía (2010).
The headquarters, opened in 1894, is located at Calle Felipe IV, 4, in the ward of Jerónimos, next to the Museo del Prado. The Center for the Studies of the Royal Spanish Academy, opened in 2007, is located at Calle Serrano 187–189.
According to Salvador Gutiérrez, an academic numerary of the institution, the Academy does not dictate the rules but studies the language, collects information and presents it. The rules of the language are simply the continued use of expressions, some of which are collected by the Academy. Although he also says that it is important to read and write correctly.[12] Article 1 of the statutes of the Royal Spanish Academy, translated from Spanish, says the following:[13]
The Academy is an institution with legal personality whose main mission is to ensure that the changes experienced by the Spanish language in its constant adaptation to the needs of its speakers do not break the essential unity it maintains throughout the Hispanic world. It must equally ensure that this evolution preserves the characteristic nature of the language, as gradually consolidated over the centuries, as well as establishing and disseminating the criteria for its proper and correct use, and contributing to its splendor.
To achieve these ends, it shall study and promote the study of the history and present of Spanish, it shall disseminate the writings, literary—especially classics—and non-literary, that it deems important for the knowledge of such matters, and will seek to keep alive the memory of those who, in Spain or in the Americas, have cultivated our language with glory.
As a member of the Association of Academies of the Spanish Language, it shall maintain a special relation with the corresponding and associated academies.
Members of the Academy are known as Académicos de número (English: Academic Numerary), chosen from among prestigious people within the arts and sciences, including several Spanish-language authors, known as The Immortals (Spanish: Los Inmortales), similarly to their French Academy counterparts. The numeraries (Spanish: Números) are elected for life by the other academicians. Each academician holds a seat labeled with a letter from the Spanish alphabet, with upper and lower case letters denoting separate seats. Only eight letters of the alphabet do not have—nor have they had in the past—representation in the seats of the RAE: v, w, x, y, z, Ñ, W, Y.[14]
The Academy has included Latin American members from the time of Rafael María Baralt, although some Spanish-speaking countries have their own academies of the language.
| Seat | Member | Year |
|---|---|---|
| O | Pere Gimferrer Torrens | 1985 |
| p | Francisco Rico Manrique (pending renewal)[15] | 1987 |
| c | Víctor García de la Concha | 1992 |
| l | Emilio Lledó Íñigo | 1994 |
| C | Luis Goytisolo Gay | 1995 |
| L | Mario Vargas Llosa | 1996 |
| u | Antonio Muñoz Molina | 1996 |
| V | Juan Luis Cebrián Echarri | 1997 |
| t | Ignacio Bosque Muñoz | 1997 |
| ñ | Luis María Anson Oliart | 1998 |
| I | Luis Mateo Díez Rodríguez | 2001 |
| N | Guillermo Rojo Sánchez | 2001 |
| k | José Antonio Pascual Rodríguez | 2002 |
| E | Carmen Iglesias Cano | 2002 |
| T | Arturo Pérez-Reverte Gutiérrez | 2003 |
| G | José Manuel Sánchez Ron | 2003 |
| j | Álvaro Pombo García de los Ríos | 2004 |
| o | Antonio Fernández Alba (pending renewal)[16] | 2006 |
| h | José Manuel Blecua Perdices | 2006 |
| a | Pedro García Barreno | 2006 |
| S | Salvador Gutiérrez Ordóñez | 2008 |
| D | Darío Villanueva Prieto | 2008 |
| m | José María Merino Sánchez | 2009 |
| g | Soledad Puértolas Villanueva | 2010 |
| P | Inés Fernández-Ordóñez Hernández | 2011 |
| Q | Pedro Álvarez de Miranda de la Gándara | 2011 |
| e | Juan Gil Fernández | 2011 |
| f | José B. Terceiro Lomba | 2012 |
| r | Santiago Muñoz Machado | 2013 |
| b | Miguel Sáenz Sagaseta de Ilúrdoz | 2013 |
| n | Carme Riera Guilera | 2013 |
| Z | José Luis Gómez García | 2014 |
| B | Aurora Egido Martínez | 2014 |
| F | Manuel Gutiérrez Aragón | 2016 |
| H | Félix de Azúa Comella | 2016 |
| U | Clara Janés Nadal | 2016 |
| s | María Paz Battaner Arias | 2017 |
| J | Carlos García Gual | 2019 |
| M | Juan Antonio Mayorga Ruano | 2019 |
| K | José María Bermúdez de Castro Risueño | 2022 |
| i | Paloma Díaz-Mas | 2022 |
| d | Dolores Corbella Díaz | 2023 |
| q | Asunción Gómez Pérez | 2023 |
| X | Clara Sánchez | 2023 |
| A | Pedro Cátedra García | 2024 |
| R | Javier Cercas | TBA[a] |
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