DONOSTIA FORUM: LANGUAGE DIVERSITY IN ACTION

Claire Fontaine in Donostia, Euskadi

Claire Fontaine is in Donostia, Euskadi. She has participated in the Donostia Forum called Language Diversity in Action. 

Claire wants to share her experiences about this forum and invites you to read a Tamari Bulia's post about this event. 

Donostia is a venue for the European Language Diversity Forum and for the official launch of the Protocol to Ensure Language Rights. 

For the last two days, Donostia, San Sebastian is a hub of experts on language policies. UNESCO Etxea, in collaboration with the Donostia-San Sebastián Foundation 2016 organised the European Language Diversity Forum to reflect on and debate the different aspects of the development of minority languages in Europe.

More information: Protokoloa.eus

ECMI Director Prof. Tove Malloy was among the participants of the event discussing EU language policies at the panel. The event featured prominent experts on linguistic diversity who discussed topics such as multilingual education with a minority language, the European Charter of Regional or Minority Languages and European Language Policy, good practices, achievement, and challenges.

In addition to the 24 official languages of the EU member states, linguistic diversity in the European Union comprises a further 90 languages which are spoken by 50 million people. 

Claire Fontaine in Donostia, Euskadi

The current and future vitality of many of these languages is not guaranteed, and around 30 are in danger of extinction. The challenge we face is precisely to create the necessary conditions for all of this cultural richness to endure and develop equally. 

It is therefore urgent that linguistic diversity is included as a key theme in the debates about the construction of Europe, in order to guarantee the rights of all its citizens, and as an essential element for a model in which communities live together in the richness of diversity.

The European Forum on Linguistic Diversity aspires to generate debate on this issue and to offer a large-scale opportunity to establish strategies and agreements among the different parties involved, thus enabling the revitalisation and normalisation of vulnerable and minoritized languages. 

The Language Diversity Forum seeks to place linguistic rights on the agenda from a new perspective.

 Every two weeks, a language dies. The world is diminished 

when it loses its human sayings, just as 

when it loses its diversity of plants and beasts.

Eduardo Galeano