By Julien Pretot
CORTINA D’AMPEZZO, Italy, Feb 2 (Reuters) – As the Winter Olympics return to Cortina d’Ampezzo, blue, white and green Ladin flags hang from balconies and windows across the Alpine resort, outnumbering Italy’s green, white and red tricolour and signalling a push for visibility by a minority community that says it has long been overlooked.
For Ladins in Cortina, the Milano Cortina Games offer a rare chance to assert their identity in a region where they feel sidelined compared with fellow Ladin speakers across the provincial border in South Tyrol.
Ladin, a Rhaeto-Romance language spoken by about 30,000 people in parts of northern Italy’s Dolomites, enjoys extensive legal protection and public visibility in South Tyrol, where the autonomous province embeds minority languages in schools, public administration and public broadcasting.
In neighbouring Veneto, where Cortina is located, Ladin representatives say the recognition is far weaker.
“This (the flags) was not meant only as a protest, but also as a sign of welcome to the Olympic public,” Roland Verra, president of the Union Generala di Ladins in Ortisei, South Tyrol, referring to initiatives launched to highlight Ladin culture during the Games, told Reuters.
Local activists are rolling out an information campaign timed with the Olympics, producing material aimed at journalists and visitors, including a mini dictionary of around 300 sports-related terms in Ladin, translated into Italian, German, English, French and Spanish.
“The Foundation Milano Cortina did not include us, did not say anything about our identity,” Elsa Zardini, president of the Union de i Ladis de Anpezo (Union of the Ladins of Ampezzo), told Reuters.
“So, we distributed about 500 flags to those who wanted to put on their house.”
LADIN AND ENGLISH PLACARDS
Placards in Ladin and English will also appear in central Cortina, near the municipal offices, featuring QR codes that link to a short film in Ladin, with English subtitles, outlining the history, traditions and challenges of the community. The displays are set to remain in place throughout the Games.
Ladin representatives say the drive for exposure reflects long-standing frustration over political and legal recognition.
“The region of Veneto does not finance us; we get our money from South Tyrol. There is no possibility to have Ladin in school here, contrary to South Tyrol,” said Zardini.
In 2007, Cortina, a winter salon for jet-setting skiers from Italy and around the world, voted to switch from one Italian region to another.
Locals voted overwhelmingly in favour of breaking away from the northeastern Veneto region and becoming part of the largely autonomous Trentino-Alto Adige (South Tyrol) region, on which Cortina borders.
The result, however, was never implemented.
Ladins in South Tyrol benefit from provincial autonomy that guarantees language rights in education, public administration and media, as well as cultural funding and political representation.
Veneto, which has ordinary regional status, has no specific laws protecting Ladins whose leaders say that national reforms have not been translated into meaningful regional measures.
Following the 1956 Winter Olympics, many immigrants moved to Cortina to work in the building industry and later wealthy buyers from cities such as Milan and Venice were attracted by the resort’s Alpine reputation.
Half of the 5,700 population of Cortina still speak Ladin.
As organisers promote the Dolomites’ heritage alongside Olympic venues, Ladins in Veneto say the Games shine a light on the disparities.
“We see how Ladin culture is protected and visible just across the border in South Tyrol,” Verra said. “The Olympics give us a chance to ask why the same recognition does not exist here.”
(Reporting by Julien Pretot, editing by Ed Osmond)
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