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is to walk the talk. We should offer the world the means and ways of this action.
This is the raison d’être of our MAAYA network!
Our concern today is to be all committed to the development of institutional
and legal instruments, that would enable preserving and promoting
multilingualism worldwide.
Although multilingualism is in the world a norm rather than an exception,
very few countries are now using institutional instruments to support it.
Certainly, it is partially due to the historical process of a monolingual Nation
State development, but, what is more important, it is also a consequence of
certain nations being dominated by others, in particular in different regions of
the world, at different levels of the evolution of human societies.
The experience of multilingual countries and regions (except for those where
linguistic conflicts have separated peoples) shows that numerous languages
can co-exist together, in harmony, in the same space, national or regional.
How can we learn from these positive experiences today and develop
instruments necessary to strengthen multilingual practice
From the very beginning we should realize that this is first and foremost a
political question, linked to the philosophical conviction in the necessity of
supporting diversity. It presupposes being mentally open to the Other and
respect for fundamental human rights.
Our approach should be implemented at three levels.
National Level
The first institution to support multilingualism is the school (in the broadest
sense, i.e. the educational system), which should be refounded in all countries
in order to develop a mother tongue-based multilingual education (mother
tongue understood as the most familiar language). The development of
multilingualism is the best guarantee for the development of a society that is
open to others and that respects linguistic and cultural diversity!
Besides, it is vital to create, where they do not exist, institutions of research
and promotion of the country’s various languages. And those countries where
such institutions are already established, should develop and reorient them
towards the enhancement of multilingualism.
An appropriate legal framework, with legislative and regulatory instruments
should be elaborated, in the context of an explicit language policy aimed at
promoting multilingualism and supporting every language of the country, both
in public life and in the private sphere, according to the strategic approach we
used to call «convivial functional multilingualism».
All the institutions promoting book, reading and literary creativity
(libraries, publishers, and associations of writers) should contribute to
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