With the start of the new academic year, schools and educational complexes in the Kurdish-majority areas in northeastern Syria have transformed from a mere educational place into an arena of confrontation that tests the limits of the relationship and integration between the Kurds and the central Syrian government, after years of Kurdish autonomy for the region, and at a time when Damascus seeks to reunify state institutions and educational curricula and accelerate the integration process. The Kurds adhere to a "different" educational system, with full study of their mother tongue at all levels, including university.
The Syrian Ministry of Education specified that three lessons be taught in the Kurdish language per week, including social and humanitarian subjects only. Scientific subjects, such as science, mathematics, and physics, remain taught in Arabic, which sparked protests from students and teachers who have been educated in Kurdish for years, and who believe that this decision takes away their basic right to study and learn in their mother tongue.
"Incomplete confession"...
These decisions come as a translation of Presidential Decree (13) issued by the Transitional President Ahmed Al-Sharaa at the beginning of this year, the first article of which stipulates: “Kurdish citizens are an integral part of the Syrian people, and their cultural and linguistic identity is part of the unified national identity,” and to recognize the Kurdish language “as a national language and allow it to be taught in public and private schools.” However, the Kurds considered it “incomplete recognition,” which threatens to turn schools into the spark of a new confrontation that hinders the course of the “fragile” integration process.
The teacher, Satira Ayo, who comes from the town of Al-Darariyya, located about 45 kilometers east of the city of Qamishli, participated in many protests and said in her interview with DW that learning in the mother tongue is a “fundamental right” approved by the Sharia decree and the decisions of the Ministry of Education: “But previously the student studied Kurdish and his curriculum was printed in Kurdish and the teacher gave the lessons in Kurdish, and at home the guardians spoke to their children in Kurdish,” referring to the years of control. (Syrian Democratic Forces), its self-administration, and the recovery of the Kurdish language.
Today, according to this teacher, who spent about 10 years teaching Kurdish, she expressed her feelings of disappointment, saying: “This sudden transition and adherence to Arabic threatens the future of thousands of students who learned in Kurdish.”
Fears of a return to prevention and marginalization
This controversy over the language of the curricula makes the integration process that has been being negotiated for months not only related to military, security, or administrative arrangements, but rather extends to the identity of the region and the daily details of its residents, most notably the language in which their children learn. The Kurds initially welcomed the presidential decree but were quickly shocked by the translation of its decisions, which created a state of distrust and sensitivity to returning to decades of prevention, marginalization, and deprivation of their national and cultural rights.
The students’ families and guardians reported that many of the schools that were within the scope of the “Autonomous Administration” before its dissolution at the end of last August taught the Kurdish language. It was almost empty, its students were absent from its seats, and even the teachers who had spent years learning and teaching Kurdish refrained from attending.
Teacher Rizkar Muhammad (38 years old) told DW that he participated in a protest in Qamishli (September 22), that the decree on the Kurdish language and the integration process: “They were seen as a historic transformation in our country after decades of denial and deprivation during the rule of the Assad family, father and son, as the Kurdish language, the circulation of its books, and cultural celebrations were banned, but the practical application of the decree contradicts the text and reality,” noting that the goal of these decisions is “marginalizing the Kurdish people.” And his language,” he said.
"A problem for an entire generation"
The 17-year-old student, Nirqaz Hakki, who hails from Qamishli, tells how she studied Kurdish from the beginning of her educational career. She moved between the primary, preparatory, and then high school levels, but she was shocked by the recent decisions. She considered this sudden transition to Arabic: “It represents a problem for an entire generation that studied a different educational system. This is unacceptable.”
This Kurdish student, who was supposed to study the third year of secondary school, but refrained from attending school, pointed out the reason: “They told us that they would allocate 3 classes only to the Kurdish language. How will I study part of the curriculum in Kurdish while the second part I learn in Arabic? We cannot study in Arabic,” referring to the difficulty of learning and studying the Arabic language after years and passing educational stages in Kurdish.
As for the student Shilan (15 years old), who is studying first secondary school, she said that she wants to become a teacher to continue teaching in the Kurdish language, and she told that since her first grades she has loved writing and reading in her mother tongue. “My dream was to become a teacher so that I could teach my students the language of our people, our civilization, and our history, but today they prevent us from completing my educational career in a language that I have practiced since my childhood.”
The case is before the Syrian Parliament
turn; The Minister of Education, Muhammad Abd al-Rahman Turko, mentioned in front of the parliament on September 14 that there are two opinions to resolve the differences regarding learning Kurdish. One of them calls for teaching the Kurdish language along with other subjects, and the other calls for translating the entire official curriculum into the Kurdish language. He settled the controversy by saying: “Translating the entire curriculum into the Kurdish language is very difficult because of the necessity of providing teachers for all specializations, and the most important thing is how the student will complete his university studies,” in exceptional circumstances and an integration phase and the distribution of government curriculum books. Official.
While the Kurds considered it a formal recognition and considered it a disregard for the popular and political demands to adopt Kurdish as the primary official language in all curricula, it represented a real test of Damascus’s promises to protect the rights of minorities, which prompted a wide segment of the population to demand that it be installed as the second official language after Arabic in the country’s permanent constitution.
The administration of Rojava University, which is located in the city of Qamishli and was established in the summer of 2016 under the dissolved “self-administration,” criticized the statements of the Minister of Education and this university, which produced dozens of defenses from students in various specializations, most notably the Kurdish Language Institute. The government Ministry of Higher Education approved full recognition of the certificates issued by it at the beginning of September, and stated in its statement that “protecting the academic system and the right to education in the mother tongue is fundamental and an unchangeable principle for it.”
The Kurdish University stressed the need to take the social, cultural, linguistic and geographical characteristics of the region’s population into consideration, “preserving the future and fate of thousands of students and teachers who learned and graduated from this university, and preserving the university’s privacy in a way that is compatible with the nature and characteristics of the region.”
Between the government's desire and the Kurds' fears
Kurdish linguistic experts and academics believe that partial recognition may be a transitional step according to a timetable, translating curricula into Kurdish, and training and preparing teachers, so that it is not understood that it is a prelude to the policy of Arabization and assimilation. Kurdish writer and linguist Mezgin Hajo told DW that the main demand raised by students, teachers, and families is clear: “Recognizing Kurdish as the basic language of education, or at least preserving the previous gains achieved during (self-administration), and not converting the mother tongue into Secondary subject with limited hours.
Over the years, Kurdish students and teaching staff have received their education in the mother tongue almost entirely since 2012, and they objected to these decisions because they limit the teaching of Kurdish to three lessons per week. Linguist Hajo attributes the state of popular tension and tension, on the one hand, to Damascus’s central desire to unify the curricula after the political change in Syria, and on the other hand, Kurdish fears of a political return that will melt identity and undermine the linguistic and cultural gains throughout its years of struggle.
The Syrian Kurds, who constitute between 12 and 15 percent of the general population (24 million people), were deprived of their national and linguistic rights during the era of the “Baath” Party regime in the 1970s and 1980s. The peak of its racist policies reached when former President Hafez al-Assad, the father of former President Bashar al-Assad, banned Kurds are able to speak their mother tongue in schools and government departments.
The linguist Hajo pointed out that the strength of popular rejection gives the demand rapid media and political momentum: “Because students are the most prominent face of the issue, so if they refuse to go to school and refrain from learning in the Arabic language, it will put the government in front of a difficult equation: either retract the decision or bear responsibility for disrupting the educational course.” He concluded his speech by saying: “The state of popular pressure is more effective and effective than mere party statements, because it emanates directly from the street and popular circles and reflects real concern for the future of these generations who have learned and studied.” in her mother tongue.
