Spain’s Instituto Cervantes and the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM) have launched the Observatorio del Español para América Latina y el Caribe (OEALC) in Mexico City.
The Observatory will be based at UNAM’s Centro de Enseñanza para Extranjeros, from which it will manage analysis and research projects on Spanish throughout Latin America and the Caribbean. The main goal of the center will be to analyze the use, teaching, and study of the language in Spanish-speaking America, with particular attention to its coexistence with other languages on the continent.
This new center is part of the Observatorio Global del Español (OGE) network and will serve as the “coordinator” for several observatories dedicated to the same mission. This network already includes the Observatory of the Spanish Language and Hispanic Cultures at Harvard and the Observatory of Spanish in Eastern Contexts, which has branches in Tokyo, Beijing, and New Delhi.
Furthermore, the Cervantes Institute is working toward the launch of an Observatory of Spanish in African Contexts, with offices located in several countries across the continent.
Studies on the Spanish Language
Among the activities planned is the production of studies on the Spanish language in its various facets (usage, knowledge, learning, and research), specifically related to demolinguistics—an interdisciplinary field that combines geography, sociology, and linguistics to quantitatively analyze the number of speakers, the usage, and the distribution of a language—both in Spanish-speaking and non-Spanish-speaking countries within the region.
The center will also study the status of the Spanish language across Latin America and the Caribbean in fields such as teaching, translation, media, and science. It will examine the position of Spanish within new technologies in the Americas.
The objective of this new Observatory is to project the image and identity of Spanish-speaking countries, as well as the Spanish language and culture, on an international level, particularly in non-Spanish-speaking areas of the Americas. Furthermore, it will convey values of coexistence and respect for identities, as well as humanism and ethics within Hispanic culture, in both physical and digital environments.
A Network of Observatories
This research center was created with the aim of fostering knowledge of Spanish and enhancing its prestige from the Latin American perspective, while promoting its value in coexistence with the other languages of Latin America and the Caribbean.
According to the director of the Instituto Cervantes, Luis García Montero, this new observatory will play a “decisive role” in the field by “reflecting on the meaning of culture in Spanish.” He added that “this center is very important because it is not just about strengthening relations between Mexico and Spain, but also boosting all possible collaboration in Spanish between Spain, Europe, Latin America, and the Caribbean.”
For his part, the new director of the Global Observatory of the Spanish Language, Francisco Moreno, emphasized the importance of collaboration between these centers to obtain an “international vision.” He asserted: “The epicenter of Spanish is here, and this is the best place to observe Latin America and the Caribbean: we want to coordinate our perspectives and look in the same direction.
The rector of UNAM, Leonardo Lomelí, highlighted that the purpose of the observatory will be to analyze, document, and interpret methods of teaching and learning Spanish. “Studying Spanish in depth and disseminating it responsibly is part of the contribution toward generating more informed, democratic, and just societies,” he stated.