This study aims to address the issue of the existence and preservation of different languages in regions of Spain that carry their own different cultural identity and to highlight the role of machine translation in the preservation of these languages. More specifically, this research will focus on three regions of Spain: Catalonia, Galicia, and the Basque region. These regions have strong cultural characteristics and have at times expressed strong separatist sentiments. They also have a second official language in addition to Spanish.

With the adoption of the Constitution in 1978, Spain created a unique system of regional autonomy. The second article of the Constitution proclaimed the "indivisible unity of the Spanish nation", while recognizing the right of "regions" and "nationalities" to have self-government and to retain their own particular cultural characteristics. One of the most important cultural elements of communities designated as historical nationalities with a unique historical identity is language. For this reason, they not only have Spanish as their official language, but also their local language. The aim of this study is to investigate the regions that have as co-official languages Catalan (a romance language spoken in the Mediterranean regions of Spain), Galician (also a romance language close to Portuguese and spoken in Galicia) and Basque (an ancient language spoken in the Basque Country).

The question we are called upon to answer is whether the development and use of machine translation can contribute to the preservation and dissemination of these languages. The goal is to seek whether existing machine translation is sufficient to facilitate communication between individuals who speak only the local language and official government agencies that use only Spanish. Also, the aim is to highlight the challenges of developing these tools and examine the frequency of the residents of these regions that use machine translation.

In this context, an analysis is presented based both on literature research on the particularity of Spain as a country that is called upon to include culturally heterogeneous nationalities under one nation, and on primary research on the use and contribution of machine translation to the preservation of local languages. For data collection and dissemination of the survey, we used the data collection platform Prolific.co. This research aims to capture the dynamic of local languages in Spain and the interest of citizens of these regions in using technology and machine translation as a means of assistance. It also explores the possibility of using technology to preserve languages as valuable cultural assets.

Keywords: Machine translation, Spain, regional languages, culture, cultural diversity.