Recently, the so-called “Organic Law of the University System (LOSU)” has been introduced in Spain, which, among other changes, requires that university job positions are assigned to specific areas of knowledge (“ámbitos de conocimiento”) that, at the time the law was introduced (22/03/2023), were still in need of being defined. Their concrete definition was published on 10/04/2023 as a “Proyecto de Real Decreto” which, to many academics’ surprise, reduces 190 areas of academic specialization currently recognized by law to 42 insofar job positions are concerned. The proposal does not include any mention of “Linguistics” or “General Linguistics” as a separate area. In fact, the only arguably connected areas mentioned are “XXXVII. Lenguas modernas y sus literaturas” (“Modern languages and their literatures”) and “XXXVIII. Filologías hispánica, clásicas y del mundo antiguo” (“Hispanic philology, classic philology and philology of antiquity”) which exclude vast swathes of knowledge concerning language and languages (ranging from language acquisition to linguistic diversity and language evolution, from the neurobiological and genetic foundation of language to computational linguistics, and from language pathologies to sociolinguistics and language policy, to mention just a few). 

Besides reflecting debatable views of 21st century science, this classification, allegedly intended to promote professional careers and interdisciplinarity, disregards an indispensable specialization to teach at university level and has real-life negative consequences for hiring, promotion, and the training of both students and next generations of scholars. It risks making it very hard to specify the right requirements when opening new positions or to decline teaching subjects that fall outside one’s competence. 

As a reaction, we propose the inclusion of “Linguistics” among the list of areas (“ámbitos de conocimiento”) and we plan to include the signatures of this petition among the supporting documents to be submitted before the government. 

Thank you for your support!

Linguists affiliated to the Red nacional de lingüistas in Spain