Analysis (II): Which Nation's Language Do You Speak?

BH News Agency Patria presents the second part of the analysis by Prof. Dr. Hanka Vajzović, full professor at the Faculty of Political Science, University of Sarajevo. 

Which Nation's Language Do You Speak?

The essence of the story about renaming the teaching subject from Bosnian Language to Language of the Bosniak People is more or less known, as the case has deservedly received significant media publicity.  Nevertheless, it is worth briefly reminding ourselves. The Republican Pedagogical Institute of Republika Srpska (ostensibly the Institute, but certainly not without the knowledge of the superior Ministry of Education and the Government of the so-called smaller entity) decided, after a year-long agony of the constituent Bosniaks (parents and their children), the so-called returnees with entity citizenship of Republika Srpska (!?), to finally resolve the issue by abruptly deciding to grant their requests. A solution was offered, one might say, a compromise: you get the subject as you request, but not as you want, but as we determine. You invoke the BiH Constitution, and we have our RS Constitution, so may the strongest and most persistent win. Bosniak children have thus finally formally realized their right to study their mother tongue, but it is no longer "Bosnian" but "Language of the Bosniak People." Thus, even 13 years after the Constitutional Court of BiH ruling that entity constitutions must be harmonized with the state constitution, apparently nothing has been done regarding the language. On the contrary, when the years-long insistence that the language of the constituent Bosniaks, contrary to their will and the Constitution of our common state, be renamed "Bosniak" fails, then, instead, at least in the RS Constitution, it is stipulated that in their use are the language of the Serb people, the language of the Croat people, and the language of the Bosniak people. Convenient! Descriptive, one might say, quite "out of this world," but at least it is, well, equal – the same for everyone.  However, based on such provisions, it was decided just before the start of this school year that Bosniak children will henceforth learn "Language of the Bosniak People" in schools. It wasn't enough for them what was in the Constitution, so now it's even more descriptive and even "worse" (it sounds somewhat like a "cousin once removed") and, on top of that, extremely discriminatory, because in the same schools with so-called parallel programs, Serb and Croat children will have grades in Serbian or Croatian Language, respectively. It's simply unbelievable - let's imagine if in America or Australia, classes were held in schools on the "Language of the English People"!?  It is understood that in such a transformation, linguistically or formally semantically speaking, there is nothing controversial, only that we should be afraid that soon, by analogy with the mentioned case, there will be Republic of the Serb People instead of Republika Srpska. Even then, semantically, nothing would change (though, functionally, substantially, in terms of the current situation on the ground), because even in the existing phrase (Republika Srpska), it is about a possessive adjective (Serbian) that someone (accidentally, unversed in grammar?) slipped in on us once. Of course, I won't go into that further this time - that's a different story.   

Instead, I will remind those less informed that discussions about the name of the Bosniak language, or debates about the official language in Republika Srpska, took place much earlier, long ago, or continuously for years. Thus, in Serbia, as early as 1998 (less than three years after the end of the war), the Management Board of Matica srpska officially decided that it was not and could not be the Bosnian language but the Bosniak language, with the explanation that the name Bosnian hides the Bosniak aspiration "towards a unitary BiH, in which they and their language would rule." And later (2001/2002), the same request from Republika Srpska (that Bosnian must be changed to Bosniak language "unless some force in democracy says otherwise"), only then with an even harsher explanation from the then SDS representative in the National Assembly of Republika Srpska, Desanka Rađević: "Those who advocate for it to be Bosnian, want," she sharply stated, "to commit genocide." (sic!). Discussions about the language also took place in the Federation regarding this matter, especially in connection with amendments to the Constitution of Republika Srpska. Bosniaks reacted to all this by adopting the Charter on the Bosnian Language, which states, among other things, that "The Bosnian language is the language of Bosniaks and all those who feel it is theirs under this name”, and that "Manipulating the name Bosnian language for political purposes (…) does not question the credibility of using this name by Bosniaks in a national sense." And so, from time to time, someone often brings up this topic and tries to capitalize on it politically, including during the preparations for the census. Sharp remarks, fierce and nationalistic, but also more moderate ones, were made from Republika Srpska at that time: We do not dispute the right of Bosniaks to have their language, but it cannot be called Bosnian, but Bosniak. Bosniaks then responded en masse with arguments: Bosnian is a historical fact and an internationally recognized language, for which, according to the 1991 census, about 1,640,000 citizens declared themselves, and we, despite your political provocations, know that we have the right to choose the name of our language as we wish. And so, everyone their own way. Years pass, and the problems seem as if the war was yesterday.

Our So-Called Constitution is to Blame for Everything  

What is currently happening in the educational system of Republika Srpska is merely an illustration, a detail from the overall picture. There are many questions that still confuse citizens today, almost 20 years after Dayton. Some relate to politics, others to elementary logic.

- How is it possible that someone offered and someone else accepted such a bizarrely unrepeatable political identity for a civilized, let's say democratic, European country: a state = one republic of one of the three so-called constituent peoples + one federation of the state + one district (a district of municipal rank), belonging to no one and everyone?

- How is it possible that even two decades after the end of the war, we still do not have a Constitution but some long-functionally outdated Peace Agreement and its Annex 4, along with excessively autonomous, independent, unharmonized constitutions of entities, districts, cantons (almost even local communities)? After all, if Dayton was a means to stop the war, the question is why we are still clinging to it so desperately (it's not perhaps... just in case).

- How is it possible that citizens of a small country with about 3.8 million inhabitants must have dual internal citizenship (state + entity) and that some basic human rights are conditioned by it, because in case of non-acceptance of this nonsense, rights are simply taken away (District, Pilav case, Law on Residence, election of members of the Presidency, etc.)?

- How is it possible that, for example, Bosniaks are the majority nation in the country (almost 50%), but are treated as a minority in one entity or in some cantons; it is similar with the other two constituent peoples - it is stated that they are a majority here, a minority there, and then different human rights are conditioned by this? It is probably no longer useful to talk about the disenfranchisement of non-constituent peoples.  

- How is it possible that 51% of the territory of the "state Federation" is allocated to two constituent peoples (with almost 2,400,000 inhabitants), and 49% of the state territory to the "republic" (and onomastically reserved for only one people - Serb), which has almost half as many inhabitants or just over 1,300,000?

- How was it possible to accept all this back then (Dayton Agreement), and yet, during two decades, change almost nothing, and still try to divide the country and promote the story that it is composed of entities instead of divided into them, thus preparing the reform of only the federations, actually the first project of the "third," and then the idea of (con)federalization - the looser the better, because it falls apart more easily.   

And so on - we ask how, and we witness that it is possible. We ask why, and we all know the answer. We do not have a state, not even a properly "drawn" one on paper, let alone a functional and legally regulated one. Republika Srpska mocks it and threatens secession, and Dodik calls it devilish, rotten, tragicomic, an institutional monster, a country on its last legs, a wrong story, generously contributing to it becoming even worse. Until when? One can hope - until the new government, elections are imminent. We all know that the foundations are flawed, that the roof is leaking, but also that the government is only trying to deal with the windows and furniture. And even when we ask who is to blame for everything being so terrible - politics or the people, it seems we don't move beyond the eternal dilemma: chicken or egg? Either way, if nothing significant starts to change in the coming period, or at least if we don't stop the collapse of the state and society, may God help us. The first line of defense will be in the halls of the Parliamentary Assembly of Bosnia and Herzegovina. If there are no results and progress there, everything else will remain the same or simply become a misplaced story.