Kurds have the right to speak Kurdish
Hugo Van Rompaey
Kurdish Institute Brussels
In Kurds have die right la speak Kurdish Hugo Van Rompaey asks attention for one of the important aspeets of people's nationalism: language. It is a basie element of the operational factor of people's nationalism: “culture" and “identity”.
Those who classify nationalism to the domain of imagination or of mythology, or consider it as purely subjective or artificial or as an unhealthy ascription to an ethnic group are, according to Van Rompaey, not right at all. Nationalism is a manifestation of the reality. It has a past, a present and a future. It is not static, but dynamic. It generates itself continuously through the power of at least eigth significant operational factors.
Fascist governments, as the regime in Turkey, do not have the right to kill these operational factors and to commit genocide, nor linguicide, nor onomatocide.
The author makes a convincing analysis of the relevance of people’s nationalism, of the relevance of language for people’s nationalism, of the relevance of the linguistics and of the relevance of Kurdish. The conclusion is clear: Kurds have the right to speak and use Kurdish.
Hugo Van Rompaey (21/02/1943) has been engaged in polities during his professional career (12 years mayor, 18 years member of the Belgian parliament). He studied at the Catholic University of Louvain, Belgium, and got following degrees master in classical philology, philosophy, anthropology, religion science, theology and bachelor in arts science. He is preparing a doctorate in theology about the issue Has a people the right to speak its own language? An ethical evaluation of the Kurdish situation in Turkey. The promoter is the ethicus Prof. Dr. Johan De Tavernier. Van Rompaey published several articles in newspapers and reviews and two books: De onderdrukking van de Koerden in Turkije, een misdaad? (2003) and Kruitvat Kaukasus (2004)
Contents
Introduction / 1
1. What is the relevance of people’s nationalism? / 4
2. The relevance of language for people’s nationalism / 16
3. The relevance of the linguistics / 23
4. The relevance of Kurdish / 29
Conclusion / 36
INTRODUCTION
During the two study visits to Moscow and the Caucasia in preparation for our doctorate1, in the fall of 2003 and the summer of 2004, many Kurdish intellectuals called for attention and brought to light their concern about the Kurdish communities and their chances of survival in the former Soviet Republics. People complained about the fact that the Kurds would probably be granted a passport, but that they would not have an equal participation in the economic activities and that there would not be any room for practising their own culture, language and religion.
Already for a long time, there are Kurdish communities in Caucasia, just like in many other former Soviet Republics. It is extremely difficult to come to a consensus as to the number of Kurds, mostly because the Kurds are not registered as Kurds, but as citizens of the country in which they presently live. These are mostly estimates based on a rather sound foundation.2
In this book we want to pay attention to the deep concern of the Kurds regarding their future. The total of approximately 30 million Kurds have no country of their own. After the First World War, there was a promise of a country for themselves, through the Treaty of Sevres in 1920. This promise of a bright future was denied to them through the Treaty of Lausanne in 1923, through the political manoeuvres of England, France and Turkey. They were scattered over five countries: Turkey, Iran, Iraq, Syria and Armenia.
Many Kurds fled to the Diaspora and to the different parts of the then Soviet Republics, in order to escape assimilation and exploitation. Now we would like to analyse the grounds and reasons to flee to another country and to come up for their own people’s identity. An analysis of people’s nationalism is very apt in this framework. Can we ascribe a value to people’s nationalism? We shall try to make this clear in the following part.
Language seems to play a very important role in people’s nationalism. In the second paragraph we will examine which interesting insights will be given regarding this especially from philosophy and anthropology. The third paragraph is also very closely connected to this. In this part we will come to know about philology and in a special way about linguistics and what it has got to say about the origin of language and the affinity between languages, which will not only reveal to us the secrets of the past, but also can function as a responsible basis for judging the value of language as it is understood now. This will enable us to search for the relevance of Kurdish language in the fourth part. This will in turn show us if it is really worth to have such a great concern about the Kurdish identity, culture and language.
Many investigators have emphasized the importance of fieldwork in dealing with social issues, especially in connection with the Kurdish issue. The renowned Dutch specialist Martin van Bruinessen travelled from June 1975 to August 1976 in Turkey, Syria and Iran to make a direct inquiry into the Kurdish problem. He emphasizes in this process the importance of interviews.3 Christopher Houston spent two years (from October 1994 to December 1996) for his research in Istanbul. 4 Our interest for the Kurdish issue was emotionally aroused through the television images of the aftermaths of the bombardment with the use of chemical bombs in the North Iraqi village Halabja in 1998, ordered by Saddam Hussein: more than five thousand burned bodies of men, women and children were found. Out of this experience, the Kurdish issue became for us a top priority of parliamentary work concerning human rights, on the basis of literature (see the attached bibliography selected for this book), field study and parliamentary initiatives.5 Our insights are based on the reality. The experience of the harsh reality on the field has led to refined insights and urged us to formulate a more resolute expression of the positions.
..…
1 This doctoral project (2003-2007) was submitted and approved at the theological faculty of the Catholic University of Louvain, Belgium. The subject is Has a People the Right to Use Its Own Language? An Ethical Evaluation of the Kurdish Situation in Turkey. The Louvain moralist and the Chair of the Department of Moral Theology, Prof. Dr. Johan De Tavernier is the promoter.
2 In this way I came across in my earlier study (see my book De Onderdrukking van de Koerden in Turkije, een misdaad? Berchem, 2003, p. 17-18.) about the spread of the Kurds over the five known countries: or according to Dr. Ismet Cheriff Vanly, the then president of the Kurdish National Congress (The Kurdish Parliament in Exile, with its seat in Brussels), in an address on the occasion of the Congress on Universal Justice, Human Rights and Protection of the Individual (Madrid, 1-3 March,2001), or according to the general information folder of the Kurdish Institute of Brussels, or according to the most careful, minimal spread on the basis of a wide collection of information gathered personally, to the following figures, given in millions: for Turkey 21-14-12; for Iran 10-6-6; for Iraq 5,8-3,5-3; for Syria 1,8-1-0,8; for Armenia---0,2. We also noted varied figures regarding the spread of the Kurds in the Diaspora. According to a Kurdish-German source (1991), we found for the West-European countries (Germany, France, Netherlands, Austria, Switzerland, Sweden, Denmark, Belgium, Great Britain and Norway) a total figure of 653,000. According to an estimate of the University of Stockholm (1994) 566,000 and according to the Kurdish Institute in Brussels (1995) 904,000.
We want to accept that our above cited estimates are extremely low, especially keeping in mind the strong growth in population, and that there are in total at least 30 million Kurds. We would like to just point out that this is the total of the population of Belgium, Portugal and Greece put together. Apart from that, according to the treaty of Sevres (1920), the Kurds would have been granted a country in Mesopotamia that has almost the double size of the surface of the territories of the three countries mentioned above.
3 M. Van Bruinissen, Agha, Shaikh and State. The Social and Political Structures of Kurdistan, London-New Jersey, 1992, p. 5.
4 C. Houston, Islam, Kurds and the Turkish Nation State, Oxford-New York, 2001, p.
Hugo Van Rompaey
Kurds have the right to speak Kurdish
Kurdish Institute
Kurdish Institute Brussels
Kurds have the right to speak Kurdish
Hugo Van Rompaey
Book designed by
BW Nevelland
2005
Hugo Van Rompaey
Translated by Francis Kadaplackal
Edition of the Kurdish Institute Brussels
Kurdish Institute Brussels
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