Opinions Diverge Over Ottoman Language Classes

A recommendatory decision to bring compulsory Ottoman language classes in high schools stirred discussion in Turkey, President Erdoğan also stepped in to the debate, saying that “people would learn Ottoman in this land no matter what some would want”. 

The aforementioned decision was taken in the 19th Educational Committee (Eğitim Şurası) under Education Ministry. 

While the decision included all high schools initially, it was later on amended compulsory to only religious-education schools [Anadolu İmam Hatip Lisesi] and elective in all other high schools. 

Drafted by the commissions, the reports will be put into vote on December around a general council and the approved decision will be submitted to the government as recommendations.

“People will learn Ottoman in this land no matter who”

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan held a speech in one of the committees yesterday, saying that“people will learn and teach Ottoman in this land no matter what some would want”. 

On the government side, Education Minister Nabi Avcı also said the current debate over Ottoman classes was not the first one in Turkey.

“This topic has been discussed in Turkey several times previously. We need to create a common reference framework in order to discuss this in a healthy manner,” he said. 

“Learning Ottoman is useful” 

Linguist Necmiye Alpay, on the other hand, told bianet that it was useful for all people who could read and write to learn the parts of Ottoman that still lived inside today’s Turkish with the current latin script. 

She also added that this could be possible by creating an introduction class to Ottoman under Turkish classes. 

“For those who want to know further,” she continued, “advanced classes can be introduced as well.” 

“Students already meet a lot of words with Ottoman background during the high school literature classes. However, they don’t create any relation with these words. In order to establish this, Ottoman classes can be useful.” 

“You can’t do this”

People’s Democratic Party (HDP) Co-Chairperson Selahattin Demirtaş, on the other hand, reacted Erdoğan’s words: “You can’t do this.”

Emphasizing that they are not against the teaching of Ottoman Turkish, Demirtaş said that they were against the formation of Ottoman by force. He also added that the society reacted against the decision for similar reasons.

“You are [Turkish state] banning people to learn their mother language. You are saying that there won’t be education in mother language. Then you are saying that children can’t read gravestone in Ottoman. OK, let them learn. But let them learn Persian, Chinese and other languages as well. (BM)

* This article has been compiled by several articles in bianet Turkish.