Romansh people language for the first time as one of Switzerland's four national languages, though only for use within the canton, not at the federal level. The Romansh people appeared to be mostly satisfied with this status until the 1980s when debate arose over Switzerland's relationship with the greater European continent and the concept of the European Union began to form. The Romansh people advocated heavily for Switzerland's membership in the Union, but the referendum to join it was narrowly defeated in 1992 by the German majority and Switzerland remained a nation apart with the Romansh people a nation apart within it
Romansh language or , as seen in Latin "muru(m)" ("wall"), which is or in Romansh. The main features distinguishing Romansh from the Gallo-Italic languages to the south, and placing it closer to French, are: Another defining feature of the Romansh language is the use of unstressed vowels. All unstressed vowels (except /a/) disappeared. Whether or not Romansh, Friulan and Ladin should compose a separate "Rhaeto-Romance" subgroup within Gallo-Romance is an unresolved issue, known as the "Questione ladina". Some linguists posit that these languages are descended from a common language, which was fractured geographically through the spread of German and Italian. The Italian