Language and Minorities

...One of the arguments of the English-only proponents is that all should be able to communicate with each other through a common language...

...These days, one hardly ever reads of Sri Lanka in the world press except when there has been an especially grisly event: a passenger plane downed, abductions by security forces followed by disappearances, a massacre that wiped out an entire village, or a bank blown up at the height of the business day...

...These parallel institutions were organized in Kosovo following the June 1990 decision by Serbia's legislature, under the leadership of Slobodan Milosevic, to revoke the autonomy that Kosovo had enjoyed constitutionally since 1974, and the accompanying purge of ethnic Albanians from public service...

...There is, of course, nothing new about discrimination on grounds of language...

...Until a few years ago, members of the Kurdish minority of about ten million were forbidden to identify themselves as Kurds and many were imprisoned for speaking the Kurdish language...

...It was developed by the German poet and philosopher Johann Gottfried von Herder in his Treatise On the Origin of Language (1772...

...Denying them the right to vote is simply a means to obstruct their ability to protect those interests...

...A much disputed question, of course, is whether the state itself should be required to provide opportunities for bilingual education where substantial numbers of children begin their school years knowing only a minority language...

...In Latvia, noncitizens, who constitute close to 30 percent of the population, are also kept out of certain categories of private employment and receive reduced pensions and social benefits...

...A number of European agreements also include provisions intended to protect the linguistic rights of minorities...

...In her lawsuit, she pointed out that she was forbidden to do this by the English-only amendment to the Arizona Constitution...

...At various times, efforts have been made in international law to protect the rights of linguistic minorities...

...There, ethnic Albanians, constituting about 90 percent of the population, have organized a parallel society...

...Among the other ethnic groups in Eastern and Central Europe engaged in disputes over linguistic rights are Albanians in Kosovo and Macedonia and Hungarians in Romania, Slovakia, and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (inVojvodina, an ethnically mixed area where Serbs are the majority and Hungarians are the largest minority...

...The concept of language as the distillation of the experience of a particular group of people that may be called a nation is far more recent, however...

...and provided one of the foundation stones of the right to privacy...

...Failing to provide bilingual education 34 • DISSENT Language and Minorities may condemn minority children to falling behind...

...During the half century of Soviet rule that preceded independence, Russians, Ukrainians, and members of other ethnic groups in Latvia and Estonia had little need to learn what are now the official languages of their countries...

...In its wording, Article 27 elegantly overcomes the difficulty of determining whether the rights of minorities are individual or collective...

...The OSCE has been particularly effective, in large part because of its appointment of an unusually effective diplomat, Max van der Stoel, former foreign minister of the Netherlands, as its high commissioner for minorities...

...andArticle 27 asserts that: "In those States in which ethnic, religious or linguistic minorities exist, persons belonging to such minorities shall not be denied the right, in community with the other members of their group, to enjoy their own culture, to profess and practice their own religion, or to use their own language...

...That case, however, avoided broad constitutional issues such as those dealt with in Meyer v. Nebraska and those that might have to be considered if the Supreme Court deals with Arizona's English-only amendment on its merits...

...Indeed, one wonders how important those questions remain to the perpetrators of the violence...

...In Fichte's view, all whose language is German are part of the German nation (the Volk), regardless of whether they are divided by political boundaries...

...In such a situation, it can hardly be contended that a language test is needed to establish that the individual is capable of making intelligent choices...

...When dealing with Spanish-speaking claimants, she spoke Spanish to them...

...Missing from virtually all the press coverage of Sri Lanka is any mention of the grievances that led to the conflict...

...Depriving minorities of public or private employment opportunities because of language requirements that are unrelated to their duties is obviously unfair...

...The efforts of the English-only lobby are supported by such prominent political figures as House Speaker Newt Gringrich...

...Language played an important role in the purges...

...Today, those Russians suffer various forms of discrimination of which the most important is eligibility for citizenship...

...During the two centuries of British rule preceding Ceylon's independence in 1948, the language of government and business was English...

...Albanian children boycott state-sponsored schools in favor of classes conducted in their own language in private homes...

...As in Sri Lanka, it is far from clear that changing such policies would SUMMER • 1996 • 31 Language and Minorities bring an end to armed struggle...

...However, it will not be the first time that the Supreme Court has dealt with language laws...

...Yet a good place to start is by upholding the right of individuals— "in community with the other members of their group"—to use their own language...

...After independence, members of the Sinhalese majority—constituting roughly three quarters of the population—sought to end the dominance of English speakers by demanding a "Sinhala-only" policy in the schools and in government administration...

...Unfortunately, it is difficult to discern the impact of these provisions on many states that have agreed to be bound by them...

...Knowledge of the Russian language sufficed...

...Article 26 guarantees "equal and effective protection against discrimination" on various grounds, including language...

...So, of course, is conditioning property holding or social benefits on linguistic proficiency, or on citizenship that is itself dependent on the ability to pass a language test...

...According to government information, nearly two-thirds of the noncitizens in Latvia themselves believe that they lack the proficiency in the Latvian language needed to pass the language test required by the citizenship law...

...The court dealt with an attempt to impose linguistic uniformity as far back as 1923 when it considered a Nebraska law that prohibited the teaching of foreign languages in public or private elementary schools...

...If the court does confront directly the question of whether English-only laws violate the federal Constitution, the decision will probably be of landmark significance...

...And they should be able to establish schools at all levels of education that offer courses in the language of their choice so long as they also fulfill the state's compulsory education requirements, including instruction in a common language...

...and there is a current of opinion among German nationalists that considers that those who live among Germans while speaking other tongues endanger the German nation by sullying its language...

...In thirteen years of civil war, a country with no external enemies, a prosperous, literate population, and a long history of peaceful relations between different ethnic groups has become a symbol of uncontrollable violence...

...Yet the situation is obviously different when the language of a state is changed to assert the preeminence of a particular ethnic group, or when a new state is created through the breakup of another state or through the rearrangement of national boundaries...

...More ominously, it is possible to hear echoes of the thought of some of the German Romantic philosophers and their followers in other countries in the rhetoric of contemporary apostles of ethnic cleansing...

...What is objectionable, however, is when promotion of a common language is pursued in a manner that asserts ethnic dominance...

...At this writing, some twenty-one states have adopted laws declaring English to be the official language...

...There is little doubt that the chances for such children to succeed in school are greatly enhanced if bilingual education is provided, at least until the point where they master another language...

...Nor may the Kurdish language be spoken on radio or television broadcasts...

...The court also dealt with language questions a half century later, in 1974, wheri it upheld bilingual educational assistance to non-English speaking Chinese students in San Francisco...

...A generation later, the concept was endowed with heightened nationalist fervor by Johann Gottlieb Fichte in his Addresses to the German Nation (1807-1808), in which he proclaimed the superiority of an original language, 32 • DISSENT Language and Minorities such as German, to composite or derivative languages such as English or French...

...Or are they too preoccupied with exacting revenge for the other side's most recent brutalities to pay much mind to the conflict's origins...

...Nor can there be a quarrel with those in newly created or newly reborn states if they take measures to make it possible for all to read, write, and speak the language in which the affairs of state are transacted...

...An organization called U.S...

...As the case of Sri Lanka demonstrates, the stakes can be high when a state develops its language policy...

...q SUMMER • 1996 • 35...

...The United States is also engaged in a dispute over linguistic rights...

...Language is the principal factor on which citizenship is denied even to ethnic Russians who were born in Latvia or Estonia and who have lived there all their lives...

...Language policy has been particularly significant in recent struggles over minority rights in the countries of the former Soviet empire...

...The Supreme Court's ruling in the Arizona case may not provide a clear-cut decision on the merits...

...Herodotus divided humanity into Greeks (that is, all who spoke Greek, whether they were Athenians, Lacedaemonians or Trojans) and barbarians (everyone else...

...The United States Supreme Court recently agreed to review a case in which the constitutionality of an English-only amendment to the Arizona Constitution was challenged...

...Minorities should enjoy a right to use their own language in newspapers, magazines, books, radio, television, and other media...

...Each is a potential flash point for conflict, but by far the most explosive is the situation in Kosovo...

...There are procedural difficulties with the case that may sidetrack the court...

...Not only does this bar them from voting, but they are also denied government employment and the right to own land...

...Indeed, one of the latter, Radovan Karadzic, takes pride in pointing out that he is from the same family as Vuk Karadzic (1787-1864), the codifier and purifier of the Serbian language...

...and Albanian families stay away from the state's health care system, including its hospitals, making do with such medical treatment as they can obtain at clinics from doctors and nurses who speak their own language...

...In the post—World War II era, the main provision of international law dealing with this question is the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which 130 countries worldwide are state parties...

...Among them were a significant number of Tamils...

...It proceeds from the assumption that cultural, religious, and linguistic rights are individual but recognizes that the manner in which they are exercised is "in community with the other members of their group...

...As to citizenship itself, it does not seem objectionable for a state to insist that immigrants should pass a minimal test in the language in which public officeholders communicate and political campaigns are conducted before obtaining eligibility to vote...

...The dark side of the modernizing and unifying legacy of Kemal Mustafa Ataturk, builder of the modern Turkish state, has been the government's unwillingness to acknowledge ethnic differences in the population...

...An example was the firing of doctors for refusing to write prescriptions and medical reports in the Cyrillic script used by Serbs...

...Yet only a relatively small part of the population spoke the language of the colonial rulers...

...Though it took more than a quarter of a century, and many missteps in public policy along the way, adoption of the Official Language Act was a major milestone on the long path to civil war...

...Many thorny issues may arise that have not been considered here, and determining the best way to deal with them will not be easy...

...For a period, the government of President Boris Yeltsin justified the presence of Russian troops in the Baltic countries by pointing to the need to protect the rights of the Russian minority...

...As a condition for membership, the League of Nations required some countries, newly established following World War I, to sign treaties guaranteeing respect for the rights of minorities, including their linguistic rights...

...In our time, Latvians and Estonians who advocate restrictions on the rights of ethnic Russians cite the German example in justification...

...Many in those Baltic countries resent all ethnic Russians who live there, considering them Soviet colonizers...

...Efforts are being made by the English-only movement to secure federal legislation along the same lines...

...They are still not permitted to study in Kurdish in the schools, however...

...Purported mistreatment of the Sudeten Germans was, of course, Hitler's claimed rationale for invading Czechoslovakia...

...The English speakers held the country's key civil service posts and were prominent in commerce...

...This conflict too has acquired a life of its own...

...The principal reason is that some of the small states that emerged out of the dissolution of the Soviet empire are eager to gain full acceptance in the institutions of Europe and, therefore, are sensitive to efforts by representatives of those bodies to get them to comply with European standards on minority rights...

...protected family autonomy by asserting the rights of parents to direct the upbringing of their children...

...The case they considered was brought by a bilingual state employee who processed medical malpractice claims...

...Prime Minister Bandaranaike took up the Sinhala-only cause and, in 1956, Parliament adopted an Official Language Act...

...Its interest in unity, its tolerance for diversity, its commitment to equality of opportunity, its sense of national identity and its prospects for peace may all be involved...

...It is a focal point of strife in Latvia and Estonia, which have large minorities of ethnic Russians...

...If one does look back, it appears that the quarrel that started the troubles—which have led to more than fifty thousand deaths and the forced displacement of hundreds of thousands—was over language...

...There can be no quarrel with this...

...This view shaped the German approach to citizenship, which, as Rogers Brubaker has pointed out, is founded on the idea of "a community of descent, restrictive towards non-German immigrants yet remarkably expansive toward ethnic Germans from Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, reflect[ing] the pronounced ethno-cultural inflection in German self-understanding...

...English Inc., which includes the names of Jacques Barzun, Saul Bellow, and Arnold Schwarzenegger on its letterhead, has promoted this cause with mass mailings arguing that practices such as instruction in SUMMER • 1996 • 33 Language and Minorities the schools in languages other than English is a cause of "strife, divisiveness and chaos in our society...

...There can be no justification for state policies that prohibit minorities from communicating with each other in their own language through their own educational, cultural, religious, business, or civic associations, or to speak their own language in public...

...When changed political circumstances suddenly transform such persons as the ethnic Russians in Latvia into a minority, a language test is of no relevance in determining whether they know where their interests lie...

...Today, largely as a consequence of international pressure, the Kurds may speak Kurdish, buy and sell tapes of Kurdish music, and give their children Kurdish names...

...In protest, a general strike was called in Tamil areas, leading to riots and scores of deaths...

...Adopted in 1988 in a referendum in which it was approved by 50.5 percent of the voters, theArizona amendment has been held to violate the United States Constitution's First Amendment by lower federal courts...

...Fortunately, those troops have been withdrawn, and tensions over the rights of Russian speakers have eased somewhat in the last two years as a consequence of legal and administrative reforms undertaken in response to prodding by the High Commission for Minorities of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE...

...Yet if a strongly nationalist regime should come to power in Moscow, continuing discrimination against Russian speakers in Latvia and Estonia could provide a pretext for a renewed threat against Baltic independence...

...There is little need to spell out the historical consequences of ethno-linguistic nationalism...

...Indeed, language is involved in disputes over minority rights in many countries, including our own...

...Turkey is another country where language policy played a leading role in fomenting a protracted civil war...

...Accordingly, it is appropriate for any government to require that schools should fulfill the state's compulsory education requirements by providing instruction in that language, that students may be tested to demonstrate that they have met those requirements, and that state employment may be conditioned on possession of the language skills needed to perform the duties of the post...

...Justice James C. McReynolds's decision for the Court in Meyer v. Nebraska, in which a teacher appealed his conviction for teaching German in a parochial school, has long been regarded as a classic of civil liberties jurisprudence as it not only invalidated a particularly pernicious attempt to legislate xenophobia, but also helped to define the limits on state power...

...Do they themselves recall how they got to this point...

...Even in recent times, when Germany has been relatively permissive in its immigration and asylum policies, it has made the acquisition of citizenship difficult for those lacking German ethnolinguistic ancestry...

...A number of countries that have legislated discrimination against linguistic minorities are among those that have ratified the covenant...

...Though these are not sufficiently comprehensive or detailed to deal adequately with many of the issues that have arisen, and most do not constitute binding international law, they have been helpful in easing disputes over language in several countries...