Education in the vernacular did not cause the closure of Franeker University. Realize that academic internationalization will lead to complete Anglicization of the Netherlands, Goffe Jensma warns.
Anyone who is in favor of further internationalization of Dutch universities should not substantiate that statement by referring to the demise of the University of Franeker. Berend Wierenga tries to do that in the article Vernacular education is disastrous for universities ( DVHN , 12-01). The comparison between the Franeker university in the early modern period and the Dutch university system of today is mainly a grab bag for interesting arguments from history.
Such a comparison between the 17th and the 21st century misses the point because in the 17th century at most a few percent of the population studied at a university, while today 30 percent of the working population has a university or higher vocational education. It is conceivable that developments in higher education now have a much greater impact on society as a whole than at the time.
Also, the comparison between English and Latin as cosmopolitan languages is misplaced. Latin was a dead but universal language, without a state basis, English is used as the first (mother) language in the Anglo-Saxon language area and therefore has a clear power base.
Actual enormities
The article is further marred by a number of factual enormities. For example, the vernacular language in Friesland at the time was not Dutch but Frisian. Moreover, in Franeker not only did teaching not take place in Frisian, but also not in Dutch. Officially, Latin remained the language of science until the Higher Education Act of 1876. Everywhere and at all universities.
It was not until around 1850 that Dutch, and until the 20th century, before Frisian acquired a somewhat generally accepted status as a possible language of science.
In principle, Dutch speaking has nothing to do with decline. The Dutch Nobel Prize winners later worked at Dutch-speaking and writing universities in what has been called the ‘Second Dutch Golden Age’.
Franeker’s decline did not occur in isolation
The decline of Franeker University, which is another misconception, did not occur in isolation, but was, socially and scientifically, a result of broader processes. After the Golden Age (around 1670), the British Empire began to take over the dominant position of the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands.
All Dutch universities experienced the consequences of this shift in power on the world stage. In addition, the decline of the strongly education-oriented Dutch university system of the time found a counterpart in the success of a new scientific research culture at German and British universities, institutions and societies.
Ultimately, it was only during the French period that the French authority, focused on greater efficiency and centralism, came to the conclusion that there could no longer be room for six universities in the new 19th-century Netherlands. A choice had to be made. The initial idea of one central Dutch university was eventually scrapped, but it was decided in 1811 to close Franeker.
In short, the constants in university history lie in the complex contexts in which scientific, socio-economic and socio-cultural developments may or may not reinforce each other.
Linguistic metamorphosis
If you now propagate that Dutch universities must internationalize further, it is clear that you are subjecting yourself to hierarchical thinking driven by the Anglo-Saxon world (for example about what is or is not valuable science). You must therefore dare to face the ultimate consequences of this, namely the complete Anglicization of society. This will start with secondary and primary education and will ultimately affect the entire Dutch public life.
We are less far removed from that situation than we often think. This may be beneficial for the university company (in a neoliberal, market-oriented, financial sense), but a negative consequence will be that the self-esteem of at least two generations of students, teachers and other Dutch people will be sacrificed to a greater or lesser extent to a process of linguistic metamorphosis.
They will have to live in a world in which – on average – they will not be able to express themselves optimally, neither in English nor in Dutch. With all the associated feelings of powerlessness and dissatisfaction. That is what the political debate should be about. Are we going to teach Dutch people to become ‘English’, and if so, how do we do that?
The ill-informed article about Franeker is actually the best argument to continue thinking about the question of why Dutch universities should not be transformed into Anglo-Saxon-oriented institutions.
Goffe Jensma is emeritus professor of Frisian in Amsterdam and Groningen