Mother-tongue educated in Kirkuk face hard time

KIRKUK / IraqiNews.com: With the world celebrating the International Mother Tongue Day, the issue of mother-tongue education is still causing problems for many people around the world. In the northern Kirkuk, a mixed city of Kurds, Turkmen, Christians and Arabs, many members of the multi-ethnic society have expressed their fears about problems resulting from language barriers. Speaking to IraqiNews.com news agency, Dr. Abdulkareem Khaleefa, an educational researcher, said that all people, regardless of race or ethnicity, have the right to study in their own native language. “The situation in Kirkuk is a blow to attempts to establish peaceful coexistence and social peace,” Khaleefa explained. Khaleefa has criticized the existence of separated schools in the city, which he said widen the cultural gap in society. Meanwhile, Fawziya Abdullah Awanees, an assistant director in the educational department in the city, said that after the collapse of the former regime, the Iraqi Ministry of Education opened Kurdish-, Turkmen– and Syriac- language schools to enable people of different ethnicities to study in their mother tongue. “There are 400 Kurdish-language schools and 175 Turkmen-language schools, according to statistics,” she added. Awanees pointed out that due to ethnic issues, some children who study in their native tongue are actually learning in a language they do not speak at home. “If the parents or the older siblings do not speak this language (their mother tongue), it will be difficult for them to help with the children’s homework. It is for this reason that they (the parents) prefer not to enroll them in these schools,” she indicated. 21 February was proclaimed the International Mother Language Day by the United National Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) on 17 November 1999. Its observance was also formally recognized by the United Nations General Assembly in its resolution establishing 2008 as the International Year of Languages. SS (S) 1