Standard Basque - Advantages of Euskara Batua

Advantages of Euskara Batua

According to Koldo Zuazo, six are the main advantages that Euskara Batua has brought to the Basque language:

1. Basque speakers can easily understand each other by using Euskara Batua. When using historical dialects, the difficulties to understand each other are bigger, especially between speakers of non-central dialects.
2. Before the creation of the Euskara Batua, Basque speakers had to turn to Spanish or French to discuss highbrow topics or work subjects—Euskara Batua gives them a suitable tool for this.
3. Thanks to Euskara Batua, more adult people than ever have been able to learn the Basque language.
4. Basque language has broken its ever retreating boundaries. If we look at old maps showing the area where Basque was spoken, we will see that this area was always diminishing. But now, thanks to the euskaltegis and ikastolas that teach Euskara Batua, the Basque-speaking area is getting bigger and bigger, Basque speakers can be found in any place of the Basque Country, or even outside it.
5. Euskara Batua has given prestige to the Basque language, because now it can be used in high-level usages of society.
6. Basque speakers are more united: since Euskara Batua was made, the internal boundaries of the language have also been broken, and the sense of being a community is more alive. With a stronger speakers' community, Basque language becomes stronger.

All these advantages have been widely recognized—for example, they are cited by the pro-historical dialects organization Badihardugu.