Dr Paul Bilbao Sarria, who participated in the workshop "Towards a solution in mother tongue education, possibilities, obstacles, suggestions" organised by the Amed (Diyarbakır) branches of the Education and Science Workers' Union (Eğitim Sen), made a presentation titled "The Experience of the Basque Autonomous Region of Spain". Answering the questions of Mezopotamya Agency (MA) about this experience and the pressures that Kurdish and Basque are subjected to and the steps to be taken against these pressures, Sarria stated that both languages are subjected to minoritisation policies.

 

Stating that children in the Basque Autonomous Region learn Basque in schools and become fluent in Basque, Sarria said, "Children learn Basque at the school, they become Basque speakers. But then when they are in the street, or in the leisure time they speak in Spanish or in French. Nowadays they are in the screens all the time. Everything is in Spanish, is in French, also in English. But there is not a lot of things in Basque in the socio-economical. Some steps have been down, but nowadays, it's a Spanish or French world. If you go to a supermarket, if you go to a shop maybe everything is bilingual, both Spanish and Basque. But it's not a real bilingualism. The spot in the Spanish State, the Spanish is dominant, and the French state, the French is dominant. 

"

EDUCATION MODEL

 

Sarria stated that the "Model D", which includes bilingual education, is being implemented in schools, and that they have established their own system against this system that does not work. Stating that they have started to do the model of education in Basque, which they call Ikastolak, Sarria noted that this model is very healthy. Sarria said, "We are 115 centers throughout the territory, more than 55,000 students. We have our own Curriculum project. We create our textbooks and so on. And the Basque language and the Basque culture is on the center of our pedagogical project."

 

Pointing to the importance of the initiative of civil society in the construction of their model, Sarria said: "The most important thing is to have a strong civil society. This is the way we have built. We have created Ikastolak, we have created newspaper etc. Because what the public institutions are not going to do, the civil society must do." 

 

Emphasising that Basque region under the sovereignty of France does not have any legal recognition, Sarria noted that the United Nations (UN) condemned France twice for this reason. Stating that France denies the existence of minorities, Sarria said, "There are two states in the United Nations treaties, they deny the existence of minorities; France and Turkey." In addition to the UN condemnation of France, the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights also condemned France for the same reasons, Sarria stated that international condemnations are important. 

 

Stating that Kurds and Basques were subjected to similar processes of minoritisation, Sarria said: "We are both minoritised languages and have been subjected to processes of substitution and minoritisation. Another point is that we have very strong communities. Thanks to these communities, our languages are alive."

 

OFFICIAL RECOGNITION

 

Stating that providing the possibilities for the official recognition of the Kurdish language would be an important stage, Sarria stressed: "The most important thing is to ensure that the language is officially recognised. The recognition of Kurdish as an official language in the Kurdish region is only the first step towards legal recognition. Because if Kurdish is legally recognised, then the public authorities will have obligations. It is therefore very important to have legal recognition first. The negotiations will be with the legal recognition of the language. Then we will talk about language policy, we will talk about obligations. But the most important thing is to have legal recognition."

 

Pointing to the conditions of language revitalisation, Sarrıa said: "Language revitalisation is not a socio-political process. You need a legal recognition, an official recognition policy. Even if you have the best language policy, if you do not have social support, the language will not be revitalised. You have to strengthen civil society to create a real community and then fight to get official recognition. In this new context it is very important to demand official recognition of the Kurdish language."

 

MA / Müjdat Can