Begoña Echeverria

INTRODUCTION

Heuscara, ialgui adi campora
Basque, go forth into the world!

Lengoagetan ohi inçan estimatze gutitan
Among tongues wert thou held in low esteem
Oray aldiz hic behar duc ohoria orotan
But now thou art due honour among them all
 
Berceak oroc içan dira bere goihen gradora
All the others are at their zenith
Oray hura iganen da berce ororen gaynera
Now Basque shall rise among them all

Heuscara, ialgi adi dançara
Basque, go forth and dance!

Bernard Etxepare,  Linguae vasconum primitiae, 1545

These words, taken from the first book published in Basque over 450 years ago, could just as easily have been written about any of the thousands of other languages in danger of extinction today. It is a common refrain that each language lost is a loss for humanity, for with it goes a unique way of looking at the world. As such, we in the scholarly community (among others) are encouraged to do what we can to "save" them.

But, in the end, it is the language choices of ordinary speakers that will determine  the fate of endangered languages.  Those who toil on their behalf-by recording last speakers, providing language-learning resources--can only hope their efforts will inspire others to take the language forth and dance.

So it might behoove us to ask:  what kinds of invitations do these efforts extend?  Who are they inviting to the dance and who might they be turning away? Underlying these questions is the assumption that language is not a neutral mode of communication, but a codification of hegemonic worldviews, a means of perpetuating unequal power relationships (Bourdieu 1991, Ehrlich and King 1994, Schieffelin, Woolard and Kroskrity 1998). As male dominance is one such power imbalance, we can expect to see this reflected even in materials that serve such seemingly noble purposes as saving endangered languages.

As a case in point, I focus here on one text created specifically to help Basque "go forth into the world":  The Basque-English Dictionary (Aulestia 1989), used to teach Basque in the American diaspora.  I will show that the Dictionary is not a "neutral storehouse of words and their meanings. Meanings are shaped by usage, and it is largely men's usage and meanings that are included" (Romaine 1999:117). Like pedagogical materials used to teach Basque in the Basque Country itself (Echeverria 2003) the Dictionary presents a vision of the Basque-speaking world that favors men. It is an open question, then, whether women would feel welcome to join that dance.

THE GENDER-NEUTRALITY OF BASQUE

Before detailing the ways in which androcentricism is perpetuated in the Dictionary, it is important to point out that the Basque language itself has no natural or grammatical gender. Indeed, the only place where gender is marked at all is in the familiar second-person pronoun, "hi"  (Aulestia 1989:a49). When the addressee is the subject of a transitive verb (ergative case) or is the indirect object (dative case), the auxiliary verb marks the addressee's gender ("-n" if female, "-k" if male):

Table 1: Gender-marking in Basque

A more unusual property of this gender-marking is its allocutivity, by which the inflected verb agrees with addressee's gender, even when addressee is not in sentence (Oyharçabal 1993:91):

Table 2: Allocutivity in Basque

METHODS

To see whether this gender-neutrality was realized, I examined all sample sentences used in the Dictionary (containing approximately 50,000 words) for all those which indicated gender in any way. In Basque, this meant the use of proper names, gender-differentiated pairs (mother-father, daughter-son, etc), and the second-person familiar pronoun "hi" discussed in Tables 1 and 2 above. In English, this meant not only use of proper names and gender-differentiated pairs, but also how gender-neutral Basque sentences were translated. This most often meant that "she" or "he" was used to translate the gender-neutral third-person pronoun "hura," and/or that "hers" and "his" were used to translate the third-person possessive "haren".

FINDINGS:  GENDERING THE BASQUE-ENGLISH DICTIONARY  

I found that the Dictionary (re)inscribes Basque with androcentric messages. First, it uses male referents for the overwhelming majority of gender-specific sample sentences.  Second, it restricts the range of roles and activities in which female referents appear. Third, the Dictionary positions female referents in a secondary position vis a vis male referents in a variety of ways. Let us take each finding in turn.

Infrequency of female mention

Table 3: Male dominance in sample sentences

As we can see in Table 3, there are a total of 2.390 sentences in the Dictionary which reference gender in some way.  Of these, 2.208 (92%) use only male references, while another 53 (2%) use both male and female references.  Only 129 sentences (5%) use female references exclusively.  Further, 29% (53 of 283) sentences with female referents include male referents as well, while this is true of only 2% (53 of 2.303) of the sentences with male referents.  Thus, female referents often share the stage with male referents, while male referents usually stand in the spotlight alone. 

A similar pattern emerges with regard to proper names: male names are used 59 times, but female names, only 17 times.  Fourteen of the male names are common names such as "Peter" or "John." But there seems to be a concerted effort to celebrate men who have contributed to Basque culture and the world in general.  Twenty-two of the sentences feature the names of Basques such as the writer Pedro Axular (1556-1664) or the philosopher Miguel de Unamuno (1864-1936). The laudatory largesse extends beyond the Basque world as there are nine references to non-Basque men such as Fidel Castro, Albert Einstein, Victor Hugo and even Adolf Hitler (used for the odd sentence, "Racism killed Hitler"). In contrast, eight of the seventeen mentions of female names use the rather generic "Mary." No mention is made of accomplished (and untraditional) Basque women, such as "Lieutenant Nun" Katalina de Erauso (b. 1592) or the Communist militant, Dolores Ibarruri (1895-1989).  Given the Dictionary's inclusion of non-Basque men in sample sentences, one might expect it to also consider non-Basque women who have made their mark on the world, such as Spain's Queen Isabel, France's Joan of Arc-or, perhaps more to the point, Navarra's Queen Jeanne d'Albret, who was indirectly responsible for one of the most important Basque texts, the (Protestant) translation of the New Testament, which she commissioned in 1571.  Instead, the only "famous" women mentioned in the Dictionary are the Virgin Mary and St. Agatha. Interestingly, no mention is made of Mari, the main deity of the Basque religion that pre-dated Christianity.

Restriction of female roles and activities

A second pattern that emerges from these data is the differences in the range of activities associated with male versus female referents.  Not only do female referents appear with much less frequency than their male counterparts, the activities and roles with which they are associated are also much more circumscribed. This is indicated in Table 4:

Table 4:  References to kin or romantic relationship

Only fifteen percent (N=345) of all sentences refer to relationship status in some way. But, in those sentences which include both female and male referents (third column), this percentage shoots up to ninety-one percent.  Even among those sentences in which only female referents are used (second column), more than half refer to procreative function and/or relationship status -as mothers, godmothers, stepmothers, wives, widows, grandmothers, daughters or sisters. 

But what of the sentences with female referents that do not mention relationship status or procreative function? With what kinds of activities and roles are female referents associated? The evidence shows that women and girls are featured in a much narrower range of activities and roles than are men and boys. There are only sixteen sentences referring to women or girls in ways that could be construed as associated with the occupational domain:

Table 5: Female referents in the occupational domain

Most of these sentences clearly portray the female referent in the traditional work domain. Only the last two portray women in ways that could be considered untraditional; neither of them is necessarily a wage-earning activity. And, it is not clear what kind of "demonstrator" is meant here:  a street protestor for some cause? Or a demonstrator of some gadget on television?  Further, her status as a sister does not escape notice. Indeed, "arreba" indicates that she is a male's sister; "ahizpa" is the word for the sister of a female.

In contrast, only 229 of the male referents (10%) mention their relationship status or procreative functions; instead, male referents are shown engaging in a wide range of occupations and activities.  To be sure, most of these sentences show males engaging in tasks associated with a traditional farming life-style, such as plowing, sowing, or herding sheep. But there are also many sentences in which the male referent is shown engaging in non-traditional or professional occupations in politics, history, even statue-making.

This variety is not limited to the occupational domain; men are also shown participating in a wider range of leisure activities than women. Sentences show them engaging in music (13); enjoying the mountains (7); racing (9); swimming or fishing (9); playing or watching sports (6); playing games or with animals (12); and just enjoying their leisure time in general (10). There are no sentences with female referents engaging in such hobbies and past-times, belying the claim that "girls just wanna have fun."

As the next section shows, they don't necessarily have fun even when they are invited to the dance.

Secondary positioning of female referents

The Dictionary also favors male referents by placing women in a secondary position vis a vis the male in several ways.  One example of this can be found in the 53 sentences in which both female and male referents are used. In only twelve of them (25%) is the female the agent of the sentence:

Table 6: Agency among female referents

The female agency in these sentences, however, is mitigated in part by the fact that they involve the female referent in a mothering role or giving birth, thereby reinforcing the role of women in traditional roles.

Another way that the Dictionary denigrates the status of the female referent is by using it for a definition that is traditional or restricted, while using a male referent for one that is associated with the wider world.  This can be seen when it comes to translating the Basque synonyms "argiratu" and "argitartu."  Both can be translated into English as "to publish, to bring to light, or to give birth":

Text 1:
argiratu vt to publish, to bring to light. Alabatto bat argiratu zuen.
She gave birth to a small daughter.
Argitaratu vt to publish; vt to give birth to. Liburu berri bat argitaratu du.
He has published a new book.

Once again, we see that the Dictionary uses the female referent only for the definition that is most restricted, that which is related to her procreative functions. But "du" ("that third person has") could just as easily been translated using "she" as "he."

But it is not only to the mothering role to which the female referent is constrained. The word "botu", for example, can be translated into English as "vote" or (ecclesiastical) "vow."  As we saw in Table 5 above, it is the more restricted, religious definition that is used with the female referent:

Text 2:
botu (B, G, U) n. vote, n (eccl) vow. Lekaime berriek lehen botuak egin dituzte.
The new nuns took their first vows.

In contrast, when it comes to political agency involved with the word, it is a male referent that is used:

Text 3:
botu eman vt to vote. Errepublikanoari eman dio bere botua.
He has given his vote to the Republican candidate.

Thus, "dio" (auxiliary verb, "That third person has it to that third person") is translated with "he" as the subject, even though "she" would have done just as well. 

Females referents are also placed in a secondary position in that they objectify or sexualize women or girls, but not men or boys.  The Dictionary explains, for example, that "droga" can be translated as "drug" or as "argument." Two sample sentences are used, both employing the gender-neutral "zuen" (past tense 3^rd person of "to do" or "to have"). 

Text 4:
droga n drug. Drograk erosteko dirua, gorputza salduz irabazten zuen.
She earned the money to buy drugs by selling her body.
droga n. argument.  Droga ederra atera zuen.
What an argument he caused!

While the female pronoun could have been chosen for both sentences, "she" is used only for the first, whose meaning is clearly sexual-and negative.

The same pattern emerges when it comes to translating several Basque words meaning "to touch."  Two sentences are used to illustrate the verb "hunkitu". Both are relatively neutral statements; both could have been translated with either female or male pronouns:

Text 5:
Hunkitu vt to touch, to feel, to palpate.  Eskuaz hunkitu diot. 
I have touched him with my hand.

Hunkitu--Ez zen inoiz hunkitu.
He never showed emotion.

Once again, we see that male pronouns are used for these sentences, even though "diot" (auxiliary verb, "I have it to that third person") and "zen" (3^rd person past tense of "to be") are gender-neutral. But a female pronoun is used when illustrating the sexually-charged kind of touching, "zirri egin":

Text 6:
zirri egin vt to touch (usually a boy touching a girl in a sexual way). Neska gazte horri zirri egin zion agure zaharrak.
The old man touched that young girl.

One might argue that this sentence is an accurate portrayal of a not-uncommon scenario. However, the word could have been used in a sentence sanctioning (even condemning) this kind of behavior or one in which the "young girl" fends off the old man's "touching."  Given the phrase's own definition, it could also have been used in a sentence about consensual sexual play between males and female age-mates. That this kind of choice was not made might suggest that this kind of activity is to be expected, not challenged.

Indeed, the sexualization of the female referents above is part of a general pattern of objectification of the female in the Dictionary.  Of the sentences in which female referents are used, many of them refer to physical appearance or women's bodies in some way.  These range from the relatively neutral ("Your oldest daughter has grown more beautiful") to the sexually violent ("A rapist got our daughter pregnant").  Taken altogether, these referents present the female as subject to the male gaze, rather than an agent in her own right.

The agency of female referents is further minimized by the last kind of secondary positioning in which alternative sentences with positive female agency are overlooked.  A common source for sentences in the Dictionary, for example, is Basque song.  One such song, from the 1970s, sings the praises of a militant young man who would rather die than give up his friends' names. The song is quoted to illustrate the word "to denounce" ("salatu"). In so doing, it uses "duk", the familiar pronoun used for male addressees (see Table 1 above):

Text 7:
Itziarren semea: hori duk mutila, inor salatu baino nahiago du hila.
Son of Itziar-there you have a boy-he prefers death to denouncing anyone.

However, others verses of this song are addressed to the young man's mother, Itziar, which also use the word "salatu"-- and the familiar pronoun for female addressees, "dun":

Text 8:
Maji neskatila, hori dun mutila, inor salatu baino nahiago du hila.
Maji-- there you have a boy, girl-he prefers death to denouncing anyone.

But this line is not used, even though it comes from the very same text as one that is used.  The same kind of oversight can be found when it comes to examples the Dictionary culled from more literary sources, such Etxepare's Linguae vasconum primitiae with which I opened this paper.  Among the poems is this collection is "A Hard-hearted lover's scorn," in which "Milord" attempts to woo a "fair, genteel lady" (Etxepare 1995:225).  But she fends off his advances with these words (among others):

Text 9:
Gazte zoroa nizan arren, enukezu hargatik.
A foolish girl though I might be, on that account will you not have me.

But the Dictionary does not avail itself of this example to define "foolish," choosing instead these two:

Text 10:
suntsun adj foolish, idiotic. Bizimodua olgeta dela uste du neska suntsun honek.
This foolish girl thinks that life is a game.

Text 11:
txatxala (B, U) adj foolish, stupid, simple (female). Andren txatxala baten hitzak dira. 
They are the words of a foolish woman.

Thus, these two sentences for "foolish" were created (presumably), ignoring a pro-female use of the term that was already available. Indeed, Basque culture has a centuries-old tradition of poetry and song which, although also male-centered, provides many references to women and girls (and use of the familiar second person pronoun, noka). One might wonder why more of these do not appear in the text.

GENDERING THE ENDANGERED

I have shown that, even though Basque itself is a gender-neutral language, the Basque-English Dictionary uses several strategies that portray the Basque-speaking world as one that privileges men.  A long line of research has shown how male bias is perpetuated through language (Ehrlich and King 1994, Romaine 1999, Spender 1980). More recently, researchers have shown how gender ideologies affect the language choices of second and foreign language learners (Pavlenko, Blackledge, Piller and Teutsh-Dwyer  2001). But those who advocate for or study endangered languages rarely seem take this insight into account.  While it is only through systematic examination of the Dictionary that the overwhelmingly male bias becomes apparent, it is not unreasonable to believe that at least some of these messages are noticed by those who are exposed to this text with some regularity. Nor is it improbable that women using this text would not suffer the same psychological discomfort other women have, when confronted with texts that treated them as "non-persons in their own language" (Romaine 1999:108).
  
While ethnographic research would be required to see if this is the case, the data presented here certainly serve as a cautionary tale to those engaged in the corpus planning so crucial to saving languages.  Such activities, like dictionary-making, are not ideological neutral. Rather than throw up our hands at endangered language speakers' "abandonment" of their languages, perhaps we should spend more time examining the extent to which these speakers feel welcome in the world we imagine for them.

Perhaps, to use Etxepare's metaphor, they don't feel invited to the dance

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Jose Ignacio Hualde, Margaret Nash and Robert Ream for their helpful feedback on this paper, and my graduate students for inspiring me with their enthusiasm. 

References

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