Culture and symbols

The Yaz sign

ⵣ: a letter that became a cultural symbol

A letter, a sound and the best-known symbol of Amazigh culture.

No other sign stands for the Amazigh the way this one does. You find it on jewellery, on carpets, on forearms, on phone cases in Düsseldorf and Amsterdam. And yet it is first of all nothing more than a letter.

The sound

ⵣ is called yaz and stands in the Tifinagh alphabet for the sound z: the voiced s sound as in "rose". It is the same sound that Amazigh ends with, and it is exactly this connection that makes the sign usable as shorthand for an entire sense of self.

The figure

It is read as a human being: a body, two outstretched arms, upright. Many connect it with the name itself, Amazigh, which is usually translated as "free people". This reading is young: it belongs to the cultural revival of the 20th century, not to antiquity. That does not make it any less valid; signs get their meaning from those who use them.

The flag

Three horizontal stripes in blue, green and yellow with a red ⵣ in the middle. The colours are usually related to the landscape: blue for the sea, green for mountains and valleys, yellow for the desert. The banner dates from the 20th century, not from antiquity.

And today

Today you meet the sign above all as a cultural symbol: on jewellery and clothing, on carpets, at celebrations such as Yennayer, in logos and on music festival posters. In the diaspora it often simply stands for origin: a sign for people who may have half lost the language, but not the sense of belonging.

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