CENTRAL NEWS
Şivan Zeren, a bookshop owner in Istanbul has seen international praise after launching the “Bring a Turkish book, Take a Kurdish one” campaign, free of charge.
Launching a struggle against the decreasing knowledge of the six thousand year old Kurdish language, Şivan Zeren sends Kurdish books free of charge to those who send Turkish books to his antiquarian shop, the Mezopotamya News Agency has shared.
Şivan Zeren, also writer of the books “Li Bin Siya Welateki”, “Kurdistanbol” and “Dilperest” had opened a small shop in a modest attic in Küçükçekmece, Istanbul, fighting for the development and knowledge of Kurdish.
Stating that there is little interest in books written in Kurdish due to pressures, Zeren said that books written in languages other than Kurdish were read more.
The bookshop owner told MA, “I’m making a book auction. This is how I deliver the books that the reader cannot reach. I focus on books in Kurdish and books on Kurds. However, there is more interest for Turkish books. Kurdish books are not read. Not requested. To increase this demand, I decided to sell cheaper than publishers sell.
Although I gave the friends around me cheaply, these were not enough, the demand did not increase. I noticed that the Kurds do not claim their language. Although they are political, they have no interest in Kurdish, they do not include Kurdish in their lives. I started such a campaign to at least reduce this problem a little bit. ”
Zeren also disclosed that the historical books written by Musa Anter also happen to be in his collection:
“I have received very important books with different works in this direction. Among the books that I received last, there are also books in the Apê Musa library during the trustee period. The trustee asked them to be burned and eliminated, but someone prevented this. He sends it to a shopkeeper in Istanbul. I got it from him. They’re in my hands right now. Most of them are in Kurdish. A Kurd who protected these books and sent them to a shopkeeper in Istanbul did not want it to be burned. Right now we have it, so we protect it.”
Zeren continued, “Speaking Kurdish should be normalised. It should be spoken in every segment of the society. Also, when someone who reads Kurdish books in the community is seen, there should be no political approach. People are afraid of it. Learning Kurdish is considered objectionable because it emphasises the political aspect of language.
Failure to speak the Kurdish language corresponds to the death of the Kurd. We need to produce social and civil projects to normalise our language. Families now teach Turkish to their children first, as there is a threat to Kurdish speakers. Kurdish children living in big cities now play their games in Turkish on the streets. Since the Kurdish language is not the language of the state, its alternatives are less than the Turkish language. For this reason it is not preferred. ”
MA / Mehmet Arslan
