Kurdish communities announced that they have come together under the Coordination of Kurdish Language, Culture and Arts University Communities (Tevgera Komaleyên Xwendekaran a Çand û Zimanê Kurdî – TEV-KOM).
TEV-KOM confirmed its establishment with a declaration event held at the Yaşar Kemal Cultural Center in Maltepe, Istanbul. In the hall where the declaration was made, banners reading “Em derikî ji xwebuna xwe re vekin” and “Cejna zimanê Kurdî pîroz be” were hung.
The Kurmanji version of the declaration was read by Zeynep Taş and the Kirmançki version by Ömer Bayraktar.
The declaration reads as follows: “We, as students and young people coming together from different universities in Turkey and Kurdistan, see the protection and development of the language and culture of the Kurdish people as a historical and social responsibility. For this purpose, we announce that we have established the Coordination of Kurdish Language, Culture and Arts University Communities (TEV-KOM). This declaration is not only an announcement of unity; it is also an expression of a collective stance against the systematic assimilation policies directed at our memory, language, and identity.
Language is not only a means of communication for a people; it is also the memory of that people and the foundation of their historical and social existence. The exclusionary practices produced by the current system against Kurdish identity and language are not exceptional but point to an institutionalized mechanism. Every form of pressure on the Kurdish language directly targets the collective existence of a people. Starting from universities, we aim to strengthen the presence of the Kurdish language in all public spheres and to build a free life together against all policies of denial and assimilation.
Universities, which should be centers of free thought, have today been distanced from their democratic nature through trustee policies, centralization, and practices of repression. Producing in the Kurdish language or conducting studies on the Kurdish language or Kurdish people is marginalized on campuses and systematically restricted. We refuse to remain mere observers of these conditions. We see universities not only as educational institutions but also as leading spaces for social transformation. Against the standardization of knowledge and academic alienation, we consider it essential to struggle for universities to gain a pluralistic and egalitarian structure.
The demand for education in the mother tongue is not only a pedagogical preference but also a fundamental human right and a matter of equality and democracy. Where the mother tongue cannot find a place in the public and academic sphere, real equality cannot be spoken of. In this regard, we demand that Kurdish become not merely an elective course in universities but a strong and permanent academic field; that education in the mother tongue be implemented at all levels of education and in academic production processes; that Kurdish be placed under constitutional guarantee and used freely in the public sphere; and that it become fundamental in all public services.
TEV-KOM represents the will to overcome fragmentation and create a common political and cultural line. Within this shared network of solidarity, we aim to ensure coordination among universities, make studies on the Kurdish language and arts more visible, and establish solidarity networks in faculties, dormitories, and campuses in order to implement a democratic model in which differences coexist equally and freely.
Young students are the subjects who develop the most dynamic resistance against repression. As TEV-KOM, with a courageous, conscious, and organized line, we will expand solidarity against policies of isolation. We see the struggle for education in the mother tongue as an inseparable part of the struggle for peace, democracy, and freedom. Against all repression and obstacles, we declare that we will continue collective production both inside and outside the university.
Today the issue is not only the protection of a language but also what kind of life will be built. Either we will build a free future and a free life with our language and identity, or we will disappear within a system of assimilation and repression. We, as students and young people, are the main actors in shaping our own future through our words and actions. We call on all university communities, academics, and students to meet on the common ground we have created and to defend our language, our culture, and our dignity.”
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