Cyprus-Forum.com

[KELEBEK]

Bilingualism can be divided into many groups, my fear as a Turkish-speaker is if we are forced to form a country with the G/C against our will, then that we may get a situation of subtractive bilingualism, and or covert bilingualism.

I seriosly doubt there will ever be "societal" bilingualism, as G/C generally do not want to learn Turkish and have no interest at all in it.


Types of Bilingualism

Covert Bilingualism
Where one language is concealed (for fear of discrimination etc.)

Ascendant Bilingualism
Where proficiency increases as a result of second language acquisition. Opposite to regressive bilingualism.

Additive Bilingualism
Second language is acquired without any detriment to the speaker’s native language.

Subtractive Bilingualism
Second language is acquired and the speaker’s native language deteriorates.

Societal Bilingualism
Some countries are officially bilingual. E.g. Finland (Finnish and Swedish), Canada (English and French). However, this status does not necessarily mean that there is widespread individual bilingualism.

[Saint Jimmy]

Bilingualism can be divided into many groups, my fear as a Turkish-speaker is if we are forced to form a country with the G/C against our will, then that we may get a situation of subtractive bilingualism, and or covert bilingualism.

I seriosly doubt there will ever be "societal" bilingualism, as G/C generally do not want to learn Turkish and have no interest at all in it.

Dudette!

the RoC maintains the constitutional provision about the Turkish language as an official language of the Republic! All our government documents, money notes, etc. are written both in greek and turkish! I'm not sure if I'm on the point, though... Are you referring to the extent to which GCs would be interested in actually learning greek? If so, I would agree with you that not many would be. If you are referring to the respect they (we) would show to the language, I would say that I think you are mistaken (no offence!). GCs generally don't mind the Turkish language and don't feel the need to kill it

[Alexandros Lordos]

Saint Jimmy,

I think kelebek's fear was that TCs would gradually either forget their Turkish, or pretend they are Greek speakers in order to avoid discrimination ...

Kelebek, if the proposed solution was a Unitary State, I could see this happening, but in a Federation where the official language of the TC state will be Turkish, and the majority population also Turkish speaking, no, I don't see any reason to fear ...

[Saint Jimmy]

Saint Jimmy,

I think kelebek's fear was that TCs would gradually either forget their Turkish, or pretend they are Greek speakers in order to avoid discrimination ...

Oh, my bad then! But even if the risk is there, what more can be done than constitutionally providing for Turkish being an official language? Let alone the fact that I don't see the risk... I am sure TCs are as proud of their language as we are and wouldn't give it up for anyone, much less for GC's 'approval'... Right?

[mehmet]

Language cannot be repressed. Look at the Kurds in Turkey who officially didn't exist as a nation let alone have a language. Half my family are from a village which was originally Greek. When they became Muslims and 'Turkish' they still spoke Greek to a better extent than Turkish. kelebek, you worry too much about language. As long as mothers teach their children their own language the language will survive but evolve as circumstances (not circumcision) permit. That is natural and only the most nationalistic of people will be troubled by this.

[Saint Jimmy]

As long as mothers teach their children their own language the language will survive but evolve as circumstances (not circumcision) permit.

Enough is enough with that word! It's not funny

[KELEBEK]

Even in a federation you can never have total equality of languages, and no matter how many provisions were made for the Turkish language, Greek will become again the language of commerce. My mother tells me that while she was brought up so many T/C could not speak their own language, this isolated from other T/C and so they became assimilated into the G/C community, at the expense of the declining Turkish language.
I believe this will repeat itself again unless we stay divided.

Bilingualism is bad news for T/C, as some those will work for G/C will speak Greek at work and will end up bringing it to their home, and so their Children will speak Greek too, and before long they`ll begin to communicate with each other in Greek. And in the end, we will become like the Maronites, a Greekicized minority.

[mehmet]

I still think you worry too much. Being 40 miles from Turkey and within range of telveison and radio how are we going to forget. It's not Greek you should worry about, if any langauge is causing you worry it should be English. I am as Turkish as anyone else, poor vocabluary notwithstanding. Ethnicity is not just about language alone.

[Saint Jimmy]

My mother tells me that while she was brought up so many T/C could not speak their own language, this isolated from other T/C and so they became assimilated into the G/C community, at the expense of the declining Turkish language..

But... your mother was not raised in a federated state, right? Could it be apples and oranges, then?

And in the end, we will become like the Maronites, a Greekicized minority.

I have a few Maronite friends, and as far I know they did not use to speak a separate language (it's very probable that I am wrong though, coz I never really talked about that with any of them, please let me know), so how are they a good example to your argument?

[KELEBEK]

St Jim

It doesn`t have to be a federal state, even then it was "officially" a bilingual state, but the situation was that only the T/C were bilingual, and Greek was fast becoming the main language in the T/C community. There were some villages and families of T/C that had become totally Greek-speaking. Federalism will not prevent this either.

Maronites speak Cypriot Arabic as their mother-tongue but it has lost its ground to Greek over the years, now very very few of them speak their own language.