Pilar García Negro

Pilar García Negro (born 1953) is a Galician/Spanish politician, writer, sociolinguist, teacher, and campaigner in support of Galego, the Galician language, which is spoken in the northwest of Spain and the extreme north of Portugal.

Early life and education María del Pilar García Negro was born on 9 October 1953 in Lugo in Spain and went to primary and secondary school in that town. She studied Hispanic philology and Galician philology at the University of Santiago de Compostela, receiving a doctorate in January 1991. The title of her thesis was Galician language and legislation (1975-1986).

Career Negro taught Spanish at the Instituto Eusebio da Guarda in A Coruña between 1976 and 1985 and in A Sardiñeira in the same city between 1985 and 1990. She always taught in Galician, which led to a disciplinary case in 1983. Since 1991 she has been a professor at the University of A Coruña, becoming a full professor in the Department of Galician-Portuguese, French and Linguistics in 1995. Negro published a section called "The language" in the weekly Galician newspaper, A Nosa Terra, from March 1978 to August 1979, followed by a section called "Literature and Language Lessons" with Xosé María Dobarro from 1979 to 1980. A Nosa Terra was written only in Galego.

Negro retired from teaching in 2016 although she continues to teach at the Senior University.

Political career Negro was a member of the Parliament of Galicia for the Bloque Nacionalista Galego (Galician Nationalist Bloc), between 1989 and 2003, the Bloc's first woman deputy. During that time, she stood out as being one of the main defenders of the legality of the Galician place name of the city of A Coruña. She resigned from parliament in 2003 to return to her profession. In 2006 she was tried and convicted, along with Xosé Manuel Carril and Francisco Xosé Rei, for insulting behaviour and public disorder after a plenary session, held in 2004, in the María Pita Palace in A Coruña, because the mayor, Francisco Vázquez Vázquez, intended to make official both the Galician and Spanish place names for the city.

Publications Negro's publications have included: