One Country, Three National Days: Nations, Citizenship and Media Discourses in Valencia

Spain is one of the countries in the European Union which has most linguistic, cultural and national diversity within its borders. Catalonia, the Basque Country and Galicia are often cited as the communities without a state that comprise the most visible facet of this diversity. The Valencian Country, Pais Valencia, is a Spanish autonomous community with its own language and culture. It originated as a medieval state and for almost 500 years (1238-1707) possessed its own laws and institutions, called els Furs and la Generalitat, respectively. Yet, Valencia is one of the regions with the highest recorded levels of national sentiment towards Spain in the whole of the Iberian peninsular. One of the reasons is because, unlike Catalonia or the Basque Country, the existing Valencian identity is not turned into a political nationalist action competing with Spanish nationalism: 30 per cent of the population of Valencia consider themselves exclusively Spanish or more Spanish than Valencian, compared with 15 per cent who feel exclusively Valencian or more Valencian than Spanish. In between are the nearly 55 per cent of people who feel equally Spanish and Valencian.1