In the last decades, whenever the topic of Basque language unification and development has been approached, implicitly or explicitly, reference to the need of adapting Basque to the use of each and every function which is appropriate for languages in a linguistically standardised society has been obligatory. The outstanding effort sustained by public and private institutions in this sense is an important yardstick of the steps taken to consolidate and widen the range of Basque culture, which translate into the approximately one thousand volumes published annually in our language.

Having spelled out this situation, one can say that it is still an arduous task, which sometimes borders on the impossible, to develop a culturally significant and satisfactory life in Basque for many Basque people due to the existing lack of this type of infrastructure. This state of things is due, on one hand, to the fact that our cultural production is very scant and, on the other, paraphrasing the troubadour, Jaufré Rubel, because Basque has not yet become a comfortable "far-travellers´inn" (auberge du lointanin), that is, our language has not yet directly and systematically taken in the leading works of universal thought that are at the base of our western culture.

The current Basque Society, which takes up its niche in western culture, receives most of its sap from Graeco-roman roots and the later philosophical and scientific enrichment that they gave rise to throughout the centuries up until today. If Basque culture, that has also contributed, to the extent of its modest possibilities, to that cultural patrimony, does not achieve a fluent relation with this environment, no only in its Castilian and French expression, but also Basque, will not be able to adequately respond to its challenges for the future and will be destined to languish and disintegrate as such.