Language, Ethnicity, and the State: Minority Languages in the EU Ch2: Many Tongues but One Voice By Donall O Riagain

Post WWII: how did minorities fare? Post-War Europe was not friendly to minorities (it was claimed they did not contribute to stability, were collaborators) 1948 UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights censured discrimination based on language International Labor Organization (under UN) promoted education in mother tongue for indigenous peoples UNESCO supported minorities’ rights to maintain schools for their languages

Expansion of official EU languages EU precursor organization initially chose French, but had to add more and more due to protests & requests 1979 Gaetano Arfe (member of European Parliament) called for a Charter of Ethnic Minorities, and similar efforts soon followed, leading to 1982 establishment of European Bureau for Lesser Used Languages 1992 European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages

“Minority”, “lesser used”, etc. – how are these terms defined? It is hard to define a minority language, since it might be an official language (Irish) or a majority language elsewhere (German in Belgium) What is a language & what is a dialect? –Yes, the most important criteria is self- identification of the speakers

European Bureau for Lesser Used Languages Coordinates joint efforts among minorities across Europe Lobbies governments to sign the Charter and enact policies that promote minority languages Reports, publications, conferences Funds visits to other minority groups to see what measures do and don’t work

More Detail on the Charter for Regional or Minority Languages Minority language is –1) used by a numerically smaller # of citizens in a given territory of the state –2) distinct from state language Minority language is not –1) language of immigrants –2) dialect of majority language –3) non-territorial (Romany, Yiddish) -- but these are included in part II of Charter

Charter for Regional or Minority Languages Has been signed by most EU countries (plus Norway, Switzerland & others), and is under consideration by Russia Has achieved widespread recognition of importance of linguistic human rights and linguistic diversity as a resource