ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Nearly 200 village entrance signs in the Marivan district of Kurdistan province have been updated to include Kurdish, replacing the previous practice of displaying them exclusively in Persian. This initiative was carried out under the management of local academies and institutions, locals said on Monday.
“We started a project that took two years to complete. We believe that the names of the villages and areas in our region should be written in Kurdish, in our own language, because it is our right. Everywhere else has the right to write in their own language, and so do we,” Ayub Haghbin from the Marivan Cultural and Literacy Council told Rudaw.
The project updated entrance signs for nearly 192 villages in Marivan, adding Kurdish alongside Persian, as the area's population is predominantly Kurdish.
The project has been carried out ”with the collaboration of the Marivan Literary Council and the governor's Office,” Yangijeh village chieftain Saadi Amani told Rudaw.
Villagers and officials welcomed the project and voluntarily attempted to help carry on the project.
Each entrance sign costs 5 million tomans (around 65$) which the district mayor Danial Fattahi, has agreed to fund.
The activists and cultural councils in other cities of Iran’s western Kurdish areas (Rojhelat), such as Kermanshah and Sanandaj, are now seeking approval to implement the same project.
Iran’s official language is Persian, but the many different ethnic groups also speak a variety of languages.
In Rojhelat, many volunteers have opened centers for the Kurdish language. They call on Kurds to use their mother tongue in their daily life.
Article 15 of the 1979 constitution of Iran states that “the official language and script of Iran, the lingua franca of its people, is Persian. Official documents, correspondence, and texts, as well as textbooks, must be in this language and script. However, the use of regional and tribal languages in the press and mass media, as well as for teaching of their literature in schools, is allowed in addition to Persian.”
“We started a project that took two years to complete. We believe that the names of the villages and areas in our region should be written in Kurdish, in our own language, because it is our right. Everywhere else has the right to write in their own language, and so do we,” Ayub Haghbin from the Marivan Cultural and Literacy Council told Rudaw.
The project updated entrance signs for nearly 192 villages in Marivan, adding Kurdish alongside Persian, as the area's population is predominantly Kurdish.
The project has been carried out ”with the collaboration of the Marivan Literary Council and the governor's Office,” Yangijeh village chieftain Saadi Amani told Rudaw.
Villagers and officials welcomed the project and voluntarily attempted to help carry on the project.
Each entrance sign costs 5 million tomans (around 65$) which the district mayor Danial Fattahi, has agreed to fund.
The activists and cultural councils in other cities of Iran’s western Kurdish areas (Rojhelat), such as Kermanshah and Sanandaj, are now seeking approval to implement the same project.
Iran’s official language is Persian, but the many different ethnic groups also speak a variety of languages.
In Rojhelat, many volunteers have opened centers for the Kurdish language. They call on Kurds to use their mother tongue in their daily life.
Article 15 of the 1979 constitution of Iran states that “the official language and script of Iran, the lingua franca of its people, is Persian. Official documents, correspondence, and texts, as well as textbooks, must be in this language and script. However, the use of regional and tribal languages in the press and mass media, as well as for teaching of their literature in schools, is allowed in addition to Persian.”
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