Sum Up: Committee on Culture and Education (CULT)

With respect for diversity as a founding principle of the EU: to what extend should minority languages be recognised by the Member States and how can the EU play supportive roles for this interest group?

Following the credo of United in Diversity the EU is preparing to increase its number of official languages to twenty-three and consequently increase translation costs further, to an estimated 1,5 billion. This due to the resent addition of Croatia to the EU and therewith the addition of Croatian to EU's languages. All languages spoken within the EU are not however added to the languages spoken within the EU institutions. This however only applies to the official languages of member states. What languages any given member state acknowledges as official is decided by the individual countries. That is why there are language minorities that haven't been recognised even though they constitute a much higher percentile of the population than some official languages of other countries. With many regional and minority languages in Europe found on UNESCO's list of endangered languages it is clear that unless action is taken to preserve these languages they may well go extinct. When a language goes extinct it is not only the language that we loose. We also loose both knowledge and a unique piece of cultural heritage. Putting that aside, we also need to consider the implications of simply being part of a language minority. Since there are so many different language minorities in Europe. Some minority language being unique for the region and others being the majority language of another country. There is not one common situation in which all minority languages are. Some minorities have been recognised as official languages and are well integrated into the society whereas others do not have access to education and public services in their own language nor do they have much other use for it in their everyday lives. As an attempt to combat the process of decreasing numbers of minority language speakers and in order to safeguard their rights the Council of Europe issued the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. The charter has however not yet been ratified or even signed by all member states. The Charter was preceded by the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities which entered into force in 1998 already and was also drafted by the Council of Europe. There are many reasons for the resistance towards extending minority language groups further rights within a country. Some countries want to preserve their own cultural heritage or they fear that this might only lead to further isolation of the minorities instead of integration. In some cases it is less about the fact that it is a minority language and more about the history between the country and minority group's country of origin, as be the case with some former Soviet Union states. Of course not everyone agrees that minority languages are something that should be preserved. The members of some language minorities have shown resilience and pride in their linguistic heritage whereas others; perhaps affected by the dominating language users of the region or by the bad prospects for the usefulness they see in their own language; are prone to self criticism and often choose to use another language in their everyday life. Sometimes passing this on to their children as well. Since teaching the language to the next generation of minority language speakers is the basis of a language's survival it is crucial that the people who speak minority languages pass it on. Should the member states be encouraged to make more languages official state languages or is there a better way of ensuring the future of these languages?

Copies of Links for further reading and watching:

Articles and other texts:

www.migrationeducation.org/17.2.html?&rid=30&cHash=ffea973476a4502878869d5ff10a88fb (framework convention) www.coe.int/t/dg4/education/minlang/aboutcharter/ (charter) www.mercator-research.eu/minority-languages/facts-figures/ (figures) www.eyp.de/data/EYP-DE_Guide_The-European-Union.pdf (Another (shorter) guide to the EU.)

www.presseurop.eu/en/content/article/2163511-minority-languages-getting-their-voices-heard (Article about articles)

Pictures: (for when words just aren't enough)

www.eurominority.eu/version/maps/map-european-languages-eu.asp (a colourful map that ought to make things more clear)

www.unesco.org/culture/languages-atlas/en/atlasmap.html (an interactive map of endangered languages)

www.eurominority.eu/version/eng/maps.asp

(a copy of a link to more maps)

Videos: (for when pictures just aren't enough)

www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-5HDuhEaDM (the newsroom)

www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCVWltWfbBA (a cautiously optimistic man) www.youtube.com/watch?v=5PkSsrB9ftw (more news) www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNbm53Lm3T4 (on endangered languages)

Podcast: (for when you've looked at too many pages) hub.coe.int/press/podcasts/supporting-minority-languages (no there is no www.)