ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – A Turkish education ministry official has announced the unprecedented launch of state-funded Zazaki dialect courses in Kurdish-majority southeastern Turkey, with lessons expected to begin in mid-February. “Zazaki Reading and Writing courses will be opened by our institution. Citizens who wish to attend…can apply by visiting our institution in person or through our Institution's Online Course application site,” read a statement from education ministry-affiliated Bingol People’s Education Centre on Thursday. State-funded Zazaki courses already take place in Istanbul, but it is the first time such courses are being opened in a Kurdish-majority provinces like Bingol, known by Kurds as Cewlik, in southeast Turkey. They have been opened to cater to the large Zazaki-speaking population of the province, education centre manager Omer Sahin explained. The centre did not provide a start date for the courses, but Sahin told the Turkish service of the Independent on Sunday that the classes, expected to be taught by instructors from Bingol University’s Zazaki Language and Literature department, could start as early as mid-February. Zazaki is the language of Zazas, an ethnic group from eastern Turkey who are widely recognised as Kurdish. However, Turkish state officials handle Zazaki not as a dialect of Kurdish, but as a language of its own - angering some Kurds, who view the government’s strategy as a move against the ethnic minority group’s unity. Murat Varol is a Zaza academic who teaches the dialect at Bingol University and edits Zazaki textbooks for the Turkish government. He said back in September 2019 that he had submitted textbooks to the education ministry to be taught at schools, which the ministry approved. “The textbooks of Zazaki 5-8, which we have prepared for the National Education Ministry, have been approved and published [by the ministry],” tweeted the academic, attaching the images of the textbooks. It is not clear when use of the textbooks at schools will begin, but they will be used for optional courses, where student performance will not affect their overall marks. Varol called on the teachers of Zazaki and other Kurdish dialects to open up courses and kill two birds with one stone, telling the Independent “you will own a business and teach your language.” The exact number of Zazas living in Turkey is not known but unofficial figures estimate they are at least two million. The most well-known Zaza is jailed politician and former co-leader of the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), Selahattin Demirtas. Turkey’s 15 million or so Kurds, including Zazas, have suffered from language bans for decades. When the Justice and Development Party (AKP) came to power in 2002, language bans were somewhat alleviated - especially during the short-lived, 2013-2015 peace process between the Turkish state and Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) fighters. The right to use the Kurdish language for defense in Turkish courtrooms was one of the achievements of the process. However, this constitutional right was again limited when the peace process broke down in July 2015. Kurdish, the mother tongue of millions of people in Turkey, is banned in formal settings such as parliament and other public institutions. In November, a Turkish TV host came under fire for cutting off a caller who was speaking a Kurdish dialect during a recent live programme who was speaking a Kurdish dialect. Courses in the Kurdish dialect of Kurmanji have already been opened in the region by the private sector. The government provides optional Kurmanji dialect courses at schools and universities - for which few students show interest, as they do not count towards school grades. However, Kurmanji learning courses are increasing in Kurdish-populated areas, with some trying to perfect their formal use of the dialect.
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