ANKARA, Turkey – NGOs and trade associations in the Kurdish city of Diyarbakir in Turkey are launching a project to standardize business terminology across the four Kurdish dialects, in order to narrow linguistic differences and boost commercial relations among Kurds.
They intend to publish a dictionary of economic and commercial terminology to standardize words used in Sorani, Kurmanji, Zazaki and Gorani, dialects spoken by the millions of Kurds who remain scattered over Iraq, Turkey, Iran and Syria.
“We would like to achieve the linguistic union of Kurds in four parts of Kurdistan in those sectors,” said Hasip Yanlic, spokesperson of the “workshop” that is preparing the dictionary, who explained that Kurds have been separated from one another with artificial boundaries.
“Due to those boundaries, Kurds have been uninformed of -- and away from -- one another. Those artificial boundaries aim at assimilating Kurds to foreign cultures even more, and alienating them from each other,” he said at a press conference.
He said a commission comprising public accountants, economists, tradesmen and craftsmen would work on collecting and preparing the dictionary with the help of academics, experts and linguists.
“We want the Kurds living in those four countries to be able to use the same terms in economics, trade and accounting, and understand one another even if they use their own dialects,” Yanlic said. “We want to standardize this language in those fields so that an economist or businessman in Diyarbakir will be able to understand an article written in Sorani and Zazaki. We would like to help strengthen the relations among the Kurds living in different parts of Kurdistan.
“We will also go to the Kurdistan Region and meet with the officials at the ministries, chambers of commerce and trade unions there and cooperate with them on this project,” Yanlic added, saying the book also would help university lecturers and researchers with their Kurdish academic studies.
Several Kurdish associations and NGOs in Diyarbakir are involved in the project.
The Kurds have faced bans or restrictions on use of their language in the Middle Eastern countries where they live in large numbers.
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