Qamishlo Intellectuals: Ministry of Education decision doesn't meet our aspirations

Reactions to Syrian Ministry of Education Decision No. 964/2068, which allocates only three weekly classes for teaching the Kurdish language, continue to emerge amid demands for Kurdish to be adopted alongside Arabic as a language of instruction, rather than being limited to three optional classes.

In the context of the decision, intellectuals from the Jazira region spoke to our agency about the importance of the mother tongue and the need to officially incorporate it into educational curricula and enshrine it in the new constitution. They considered that limiting its teaching to three optional classes does not reflect the scale of the sacrifices and aspirations of the Kurdish people in a new Syria following the fall of the former Baath regime.

Learning in the mother tongue is a natural right of all peoples

Hassina Ahmed, a member of al-Jazira Union of Intellectuals, said that “the mother tongue is of great importance to peoples. It begins with a person from birth and is therefore of great importance to all nationalities and peoples.” She added that the Kurdish people also have the right to speak their language, attend schools, and study curricula and university programs in their own language, like other peoples.

She continued by saying that Kurdish children have historically lived in a state of contradiction: they begin their education without knowing the language in which they are being taught, since they speak their mother tongue, Kurdish, at home, in the street, and everywhere else. When they go to school, however, they study in a different language, which, she noted, affects students both psychologically and educationally.

Hassina pointed out that, despite all of this, Kurdish children also learn other languages. She explained that their grandparents did not know other languages because they spoke Kurdish, which was one of the reasons they were able to preserve their language despite studying in schools and universities in Arabic.

At the same time, she emphasized that demanding the right to the Kurdish language does not mean excluding the Arabic language.

The decision falls short of the hopes and aspirations of the Kurdish people and their children

Hassina stressed that “a people without a language is a people without an identity and existence,” considering that the sacrifices made by the Kurdish people during the revolution were made for the sake of the language. Therefore, she said, three weekly Kurdish classes cannot be accepted because they do not meet the hopes and aspirations of the Kurdish people and Kurdish children.

During her remarks, Hassina called for all subjects to be taught in Kurdish, since these subjects were originally taught in other languages and can be taught in Kurdish just as they are taught in Arabic. She stressed: “This is our right.”

Hassina criticized the Ministry of Education’s latest decision, saying that they are not opposed to the Arabic language, but want to learn in their Kurdish language and for Kurdish to be recognized as an official language alongside Arabic in the new Syria.

Call to reconsider the decision

Hassina also called on the government to reconsider the decision by granting peoples the right to education in their mother tongue. She noted that birds communicate in their own languages, asking: “So how can a human being not speak their own language?”

She concluded her remarks by saying: “Today, as the Kurdish people, we will struggle with all our strength to demand our right to learn in the Kurdish language, which is a natural right.” She pointed to the rejection of the Ministry of Education’s decision by the Kurdish people in all their components and said: “We and our children are determined to learn in the Kurdish language.”

“My language represents my truth and my history”

For his part, Alan Abdullah, a member of the Jazira Union of Intellectuals, began his remarks by citing a saying attributed to Jaladat Bedirkhan about language: “The language of others is a person’s clothing, while a person’s own language is their skin.”

He continued by asking: “Where will we be without our language? And if the question is repeated: If the language of others is your arteries, then where is your language? I say: It is in our brains.”

Abdullah stressed: “Whatever is imposed on us, I will choose my mother tongue,” drawing on his personal experience and saying that he failed in his studies when educated in a language other than his own.

He added that “after my service in the Training Authority, and despite having studied in Arabic before the revolution, I did not succeed. But during the revolution, I achieved accomplishments that I had not achieved through studying in Arabic, because [the Kurdish language] represented my truth and my history.”

“The decisions issued by the government are harsh decisions”

He continued by saying that the Ministry of Education’s decision under the transitional government “is misplaced and is not a solution.” He pointed to the Kurdish people’s flexibility in coexistence within a new Syria, as well as the Kurds’ commitment to the peace process for the sake of a new Syria, referring to the stage of integration with the transitional government.

He considered the decisions issued by the government to be “harsh decisions against the Kurdish people.”

He noted that the language decision is not a simple matter, stressing that a decision to go to war would be easier than a decision to reduce the Kurdish language to three classes or treat it as an optional subject while other subjects are taught in Arabic.

He continued by asking: “Why are you alone entitled to learn in your own language? Why do you study scientific subjects in your language while we cannot? Why do you have the right to learn in your language while we do not? Who are we and who are you? Through what lens do you look at us?”

He said that the scientist who contributed to physics, Galileo, presented his work in Latin, not Arabic, and likewise with chemistry and mathematics, asking: “Why can they be translated into Arabic but not into Kurdish?”

He also noted that during the period of the Autonomous Administration, Arab students in the region studied in Arabic-language schools because learning in one’s mother tongue is a natural right, stressing: “This is what we want.”

“Written in the blood of the martyr… my language comes first”

Abdullah called for correspondence among Kurds to be conducted in Kurdish, so that it would serve as a general language of correspondence rather than being restricted to use in the home and everyday conversation. He also called for Kurdish to be incorporated into the core educational curricula and into the new Syrian Constitution.

He further stressed that teaching in Kurdish in schools is a fundamental demand that requires no explanation, noting that it is a fundamental demand of all Kurds in the region.

He continued: “We have two paths ahead of us: either we begin with war or with the pen. But as long as we have agreed on peace through the process of integration, then you must not break our pens.”

Alan Abdullah concluded his remarks by saying that during the first demonstration at the beginning of the revolution, they carried a banner that read: “Written in the blood of the martyr, my language comes first.”

ANHA