Vienna Hopes Language Classes Will Help Integrate Muslim Women

c. 2007 Religion News Service VIENNA _ It is the end of another grueling class as teacher Elisabeth Grimus-Bohm stands before a makeshift table of 10 women sitting in tiny chairs. She assigns one last exercise to her students: Say your name, what year you were born and introduce your neighbor. The women shift in […]

c. 2007 Religion News Service

VIENNA _ It is the end of another grueling class as teacher Elisabeth Grimus-Bohm stands before a makeshift table of 10 women sitting in tiny chairs. She assigns one last exercise to her students: Say your name, what year you were born and introduce your neighbor.

The women shift in their seats. Surely the students _ immigrants from Turkey, the Philippines and Bosnia _ can utter basic phrases four months into an introductory German class.


“When were you born?” Grimus-Bohm asks a student.

“9,000,” she answers.

After the women leave, Grimus-Bohm, a veteran instructor fluent in German, Turkish and English, surveys the empty classroom, looks over to the door and assesses their progress.

“It’s the beginning of the beginning,” she says.

Married Muslim women with children are the most veiled subgroup among the capital’s roughly 300,000 immigrants, and organizers of “Mama lernt Deutsch,” the largest German language program in Austria, hope it moves the city closer to solving the integration puzzle. In learning German, they reason, the women will be more likely to support their children in school and the barriers that have kept many European Muslims living in parallel societies will slowly break down.

Matti Bunzl, a professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, says immigrants _ particularly Muslims _ face significant social and economic barriers in Austria. Evidence shows Muslims are less likely to get home loans, secure gainful employment and be included in the affairs of the country.

“There is a lot more hostility toward them,” said Bunzl, an expert on Austrian society.

Returning to school is not only a dramatic lifestyle change but a courageous move for Austria’s married Muslim immigrants. Many barely reached literacy in their native languages. Early marriage is common and women move within tight social networks, determined by bloodline, religion and ethnicity. They tend to multiple children and heavy household duties. Many of their husbands forbid them from going out at night.

There is little time to study.

“In my opinion, all these husbands are machos, and they need their wives at home,” says Gerlinde Mayer-Kral, who helped organize a class. But, she added, “no husband forbids his wife to go to school.”

As in the rest of Europe, immigration and integration are oft-discussed topics in Austria. Last month, Vienna held two separate conferences on Muslims, integration and immigration. More are planned.


The vast majority of Austria’s immigrants came as “guest workers” in the 1960s and eventually settled permanently. They have made Islam the third-largest religion in this overwhelmingly Catholic nation. The faith is widely practiced among immigrants from Turkey, Serbia and the former Yugoslavia.

Turkish establishments _ mainly restaurants, stores and kiosks _ blanket Vienna, and in some neighborhoods, Turkish is the main language. Turkish-led Mosques and Turkish language classes are common. So is the lack of German proficiency.

“Do you speak German?” a visitor asks a Turkish woman.

“No, no,” she says.

Her daughter steps in. “Can I help you?” she asks in German.

Vienna has offered more than 1,200 German-language courses for more than 25,000 immigrants since 2001. Last year, the offer was extended especially to women and young people.

Currently, more than 120 courses are available for two three-hour-a-week sessions for about 2,200 participants. Mothers _ mainly Muslims _ learn German while their children attend school or the provided daycare.

“If we want immigrant women to learn German, then it is only logical to approach them through the schools. Learning German is the first step towards independence,” says Sonja Wehsely, former city councilor for integration.

In Austria, knowing German is a requirement in universities and an advantage for work. Vienna Mayor Michael Haupl compares ignorance of German to the failure to master another tongue in South America: “If you don’t know Spanish,” he said, “you’ll go hungry.”


Many of the women struggle in German class. Attendance is sometimes low. Dropouts are another problem. In Grimus-Bohm’s class, 13 students signed up, but three are regular no-shows. Other classes report similar figures.

German is the first class Cennet Acar, 57, has taken in more than 43 years. She says she grew up on a farm in Turkey and stopped going to school after second grade. She married young and has lived in Vienna for decades.

Learning German allows her to interact with others, but the classroom culture is foreign to her. She shakes her head when someone speaks to her in German. When Grimus-Bohm sometimes plays listening tapes, Acar falls asleep.

“Cennet, do you understand?” Grimus-Bohm asks.

Acar shakes her head and tries to catch up.

Gulten Unlu remembers migrating to Vienna 12 years ago from Turkey when she didn’t know a word of German. After her second child went to school, she says, she wanted to help with homework. And so Unlu enrolled in class last year and has near perfect attendance.

“It’s important to learn German to buy things,” she says. “I can help my kids with their homework.”

Critics charge the program fails to do enough to reach out to immigrants. Years after Turks, Bosnians and Serbians migrated to the area, experts say language courses are critical, while others argue that more integration efforts are needed.


“You can’t say, `You must learn German,”’ says Meltem Weiland, program director with Orient Express, a non-profit in Vienna that serves immigrants. “That is hard for these women.”

Elif Coban, an immigrant from Turkey, blushes when her German is complimented. She keeps up with her studies, despite a full schedule of children, household and husband.

“I’ve learned a lot,” Coban says. “I have lots to go.”

KRE/LF END LALWANI

Editors: To obtain photos of Muslim women at the German classes, go to the RNS Web site at https://religionnews.com. On the lower right, click on “photos,” then search by subject or slug.

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