The language departments of Kurdish, English and Arabic of University of Halabja organized a special and international workshop on International Mother Language Day, 21st of February, 2022.

The first seminar was presented by Ms Jessica Frechette from SIL International on “Education in the Mother Tongue: Why and How”. She explained the crucial role of mother tongue in education and especially during early childhood. According to the data she showed to the audience provided by World Bank Group, research encourages the full acquisition of the first language in order for children to succeed instead of teaching them in a language they don’t understand. Teaching children only in a language they do not understand at an early age decreases the process of educational success.

The following seminar was on “Iran’s Cultural Policy against the Kurds in light of Law” which was presented by Dr. Hardi Mahdi Mika. His presentation explained the century long policy by Iranian authorities to promote the national Persian and demote the regional Kurdish. “Iranian government from early 20th century succeeded in implanting in the memory of Kurdish people that they all belong to the same ethnicity as Persians.” He stated. “The idea was to blend Kurds into Persian ethnic backgrounds so they forget their ethnicity which ultimately leads to the demise of their language”. He added.

Dr. Yadolla Pashabadi, Head of Kurdish Department of University of Kurdistan in Sanandaj presented a seminar entitled “Learning Mother Tongue in the Eyes of Contemporary Kurdish Poets”. He briefly read out and explained the extracts he took from the poems of these Kurdish poets. Such poets were Sayfulquzat, Fayaq Bekas, Qani’, Hazhar and Zewar. For each poet, learning one’s mother tongue, Kurdish in this case, has been given special attention. They additionally highlighted the essential role of mother tongue in learning sciences.

Next seminar was presented by Dr. Hisham Ahmed Khalaf which was on “Competition of Survival” (تحدیات البقاء). He put a special emphasis on the concept of Language Death.
“A language dies when the last speaker of that language dies.” He said. “On 16th February 2022 which happened to be last Wednesday, a language called Yamama died when its only and last speaker, Cristina Calderón aged 93 died”, he illustrated. He also mentioned Latin as a clear example of language death and compared Arabic to Latin which is going through a similar process since no one speaks Modern Standard Arabic (Known as العربية الفصحى in Arabic) and the regional varieties used each region’s people is different in grammatical structure, phonology and other linguistic distinctive features that distinguish a language from another.

The last seminar was presented by Dr. Saman Salah, a lecturer from the Arabic Department of UoH. His presentation entitled “Mother Tongue and Identity” (لغة الام و عنوان الهوية). He touched upon the fact that mother tongue and one’s identity complete each other. “In today’s globalization phenomenon, languages are changing rapidly”, He said. “If we want to keep our identities as they are, it is imperative we keep our languages, if not, we will all face identity issues”. He elaborated.
The workshop ended with a Q&A session between the attendees and the speakers.