Tag: turkish language

Turkey may end ban on parts of the alphabet

Saying your “A, B, C’s” will be a lot less stressful soon in Turkey. In an effort to clamp down on the use of foreign languages, especially Kurdish, lawmakers had made it illegal to use the letters X, W and Q.

According to PRI.org, Turkey’s prime minister is now proposing to end the ban. The letters were originally banned from public usage in the 1990s because of their close association to the Kurdish language.

Kurds make up 20 percent of the nation and the minority has been fighting both a political civil rights campaign and a decades-long violent insurgency.

The letters are commonly used across the nation despite the official ban. But there have been several high-profile government attempts to enforce the ban.

PRI.org reports that the mayor of one of the nation’s cities was prosecuted in 2007 after sending out a greeting card celebrating the Kurdish New Year which contained the letter “w.”

The case was later dropped.

via Turkey may end ban on parts of the alphabet | www.ajc.com.

October 8, 2013
Turkey the birthplace of Hindi, English: study

August 23, 2012 by Mira Oberman

A general view of Istanbul

Enlarge

A general view of Istanbul. Could the word for mother prove that Turkey was the birthplace of hundreds of languages as diverse as Hindi, Russian, Dutch, Albanian, Italian and English? A study used a massive database of common words—or cognates—both modern and ancient to trace the roots all the way back to Turkey.

Could the word for mother prove that Turkey was the birthplace of hundreds of languages as diverse as Hindi, Russian, Dutch, Albanian, Italian and English?

Researchers using a complex computer model originally designed to map epidemics have traced the evolution of the Indo-European language family to find an answer in a study published Tuesday in the journal Science.

Similarities between hundreds of languages spoken from Iceland to India have led to hot debates over where they originated and what their spread and evolution can tell us about early humans.

The dominant theory is that the languages now spoken by some three billion people came from Bronze Age nomads who used horses and the wheel to spread east and west from the steppes north of the Caspian sea near what is now Ukraine around 5,000 to 6,000 years ago.

Others argue that it was agriculture—not the horse—that helped spread the language. They trace the origins to Turkey around 8,000 to 9,500 years ago.

This latest study used a massive database of common words—or cognates—both modern and ancient to trace the roots all the way back to Turkey.

“This is one of the key cases put forward for agriculture being an important force in shaping global linguistic diversity,” said lead author Quentin Atkinson, an evolutionary psychologist at the University of Auckland in New Zealand.

The results build on archeological and genetic research which has suggested that early human migration helped spur the spread of agriculture, Atkinson said.

“It wasn’t just that all the hunter gathers were in Europe and looked over the fence and saw their neighbors were cultivating and started doing it themselves. There was a real movement of people,” he said.

“The languages suggest this is a movement of culture as well—the hunter gathers weren’t just picking up a plough, they were also adopting culture and the language.”

Using methods originally designed by epidemiologists to trace the language makes sense because the similarities between the evolution of living creatures and living languages has long been understood, Atkinson said.

“Darwin talks about it in the Origins of the Species and The Descent of Man, ‘these curious parallels,’ he calls them.”

Biologists tracing the roots of a global pandemic will take samples in multiple locations, sequence the DNA and map how the virus has evolved through time by looking at how its genes have been modified.

“Once they’ve got the family tree… they can trace back along the branches of the tree all the way back to the origin,” Atkinson said in a telephone interview.

“What we did was apply the same kind of approach to languages.”

The team built a database of cognates such as mother, which is moeder in Dutch, madre in Spanish, mat in Russian, mitera in Greek and mam in Hindi.

They then set about building a family tree for the languages which would capture them in space and time and account for the gains or losses of cognates.

“This is a major breakthrough,” archeologist Colin Renfrew of the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom said in an accompanying article in Science.

Not everyone was convinced.

“There is so much about this paper that is arbitrary,” Victor Mair, a Chinese language expert at the University of Pennsylvania, told Science.

The Atkinson model relies on logical leaps about the rates of language change and how languages diffuse, Mair said, while the steppe hypothesis “is based heavily on archeological data such as burial patterns, which are directly tied to datable materials.”

(c) 2012 AFP

August 24, 2012
Urdu vs English: Are we ashamed of our language?

Most Pakistanis have been brought up speaking our national language Urdu and English. Instead of conversing in Urdu, many of us lapse into English during everyday conversation. Even people who do not speak English very well try their best to sneak in a sentence or two, considering it pertinent for their acceptance in the ‘cooler’ crowd.

I wonder where the trend started, but unknowingly, unconsciously, somehow or the other we all get sucked into the trap. It was not until a few years ago while on a college trip to Turkey that I realized the misgivings of our innocent jabber.

A group of students of the LUMS Cultural Society trip went to Istanbul, Turkey to mark the 100th Anniversary of the famous Sufi poet Rumi. One day we were exploring the city when we stopped at a café for lunch. The waiter took our orders, and continued to hover around our table during the meal. We barely noticed him until he came with the bill, and asked us:

“Where are you from?”

“Pakistan”

The waiter looked surprised, and then asked whether we had been brought up in England. We answered in the negative, telling him how Pakistan was where we all had grown up and spent out lives. The waiter genuinely looked perplexed now. Finally he blurted out:

‘Then why don’t you speak in the Pakistani language?’

The waiter went on to explain how Turkey, particularly Istanbul was a hot tourist location, luring millions of people of different nationalities from across the globe. However, when the Dutch would come visit, they would speak Dutch. When the French would come, they would speak French. When the Chinese would come visit, they would speak Chinese. Similarly everyone in Turkey spoke Turkish. He claimed he was very proud of his language and culture and failed to understand how someone would not speak the language of their country and choose instead a foreign tongue.

There were around ten of us there, and we were all at a loss of an answer. We had never thought of it that way. It was just something that you took up because of society. Even when people speak in Urdu, they tend to include a lot of English words in their sentences. Why is that? Is it because we are not proud of our national language? I am sure all of us are aware of how beautiful Urdu is, the poetry, grace and rhythm of our language is exceptional.

One excuse that springs to mind is the concept of ‘ westernisation’ due to the increased pace of globalization in todays world. Globalization is a factor, and yet the Japanese still speak Japanese, the Thai still speak Thai, the Greeks still speak Greek. China, a powerhouse on the global economic front, despite its many factories and western products production still speaks Chinese. In fact when the Chinese Olympics were held in 2008, the Chinese government actually had to ask its Chinese public to learn a few basic English words to help welcome the world.

I respect how these countries value their sense of identity, culture and language. I was deeply ashamed of what image I was unknowingly portraying of my country. I am very proud of Pakistan and Urdu, as I am sure we all are. No matter the problems, it is still our identity. I understand the irony of this article, since it is written in English. However, it is one way to reach those people who may unconsciously be making the same mistake as I was.

When living in the UK or travelling abroad, I make sure I use Urdu to converse with fellow Pakistanis. At home, I am also trying, though it is admittedly difficult since apparently there is a weird and honestly ‘sad’ association of how ‘cool’, well brought-up and educated a person is with the amount of English he or she speaks. I write this article because it is high time we break such ignorant patterns in our society. Urdu is a beautiful and graceful language and we owe our country the respect it deserves by speaking and portraying our true roots.

Kiya khayal hai?

via Urdu vs English: Are we ashamed of our language? – The Express Tribune Blog.

June 22, 2011
Turkey: The growing power

Gavin Hewitt

In the era of awakenings, upheavals and revolutions: watch Turkey.

It has become a hugely ambitious country, bristling with self-belief. In a turbulent Middle East it believes it is the democratic role model. It eyes the role as spokesman for the region as a whole. When disputes need to be settled, it offers itself as the mediator. The State Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Cemil Cicek summed it up: “Everybody has to see Turkey’s power.”

Over Libya it is the country that the West watches more carefully than any other. For the moment, Turkey is supporting Nato’s campaign whilst refraining from joining in any attacks on Gaddafi’s ground forces. It is holding itself back, ready to step forward as the indispensable locator when the hour of negotiation approaches.

On the Libyan conflict it has flipped and flopped however. Early on, the Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan denounced any Western intervention as “absurd”. He raised fears of a “second Iraq”. Turkish officials seemed to lash out at what they portrayed as an oil grab by the West. They picked a fight with the French interior minister Claude Gueant who unwisely said the French President was leading a “crusade” to stop Gaddafi’s barbarism. He didn’t mean it of course in the historical sense but Turkish officials pounced on the tongue-slip.

That was then. Now Turkey is committing five or six vessels to police the arms embargo and is running Benghazi airport to co-ordinate humanitarian assistance.

Turkey wanted to disguise its hand, to see which way the battle flowed. Twenty thousand of its citizens work in Libya and it has lucrative contracts there. Commercial self-interest made it cautious.

The u-turn was driven by the realisation that the international community, including the Arab League, was determined that the killing of civilians had to stop.

Turkey had two positions. Firstly, it would not attack Gaddafi’s forces directly. Secondly, it was fiercely opposed to a coalition, led by France, setting the agenda.

Its problem with France is simple. President Sarkozy is against Turkey joining the EU as a full member. Ankara feels insulted and it is easy to meet Turkish officials with a mouthful of rage against the French president.

So Turkey wanted the operation run under Nato, where it has a role in decision-making and drafting the rules of engagement. Its position is hard-headed. “We are one of the very few countries that is speaking to both sides,” said one official. It waits for that moment when the mediator is summoned on to the field of play.

On the turmoil in the Arab world, Turkey has sold itself as the role-model. Early on it urged Hosni Mubarak to stand down. Many of the Egyptian demonstrators wanted Egypt to be like Turkey; secular yet certain of its Muslim identity but with free elections.

When the killings started in Syria, Prime Minister Erdogan was immediately on the phone. “I have made two calls to President Assad in the last three days and I have sent top intelligence official to Syria. I have called for a reformist approach.”

It is all skilfully balanced; on the side of reform but keeping a hand in with the man in power.

Sometimes it seems Turkish officials are everywhere. Such as when the prime minister shows up in Baghdad. It is Turkish goods and companies that so far have conquered Iraq’s markets. With the prime minister were 200 businessmen.

President Ahmadinejad of Iran may be isolated, but not with Turkey. Ankara has again positioned itself as the deal-maker. There is also the not-so-small matter of $10 billion in trade with Tehran.

Turkey has also helped shine its credentials in the Middle East with a major row with Israel over the interception of a boat heading for Gaza. Turkish citizens died in the incident.

So Turkey’s sphere of influence widens but, even so, there are the problems.

Since 2005 it has been engaged in accession talks with the EU. For the moment they are going nowhere. President Sarkozy and Chancellor Merkel favour instead of membership “a privileged partnership”. Turkey wants none of it and seethes with resentment.

Some – but not all – in the EU are wary. There are 24 million without work in Europe and the appetite for enlargement has dimmed. Not everyone is convinced that a Muslim country should be in the EU. It would be difficult to have Turkey join without its people being consulted.

Turkey knows this and asks the searching question: “Is the EU a Christian Club or is it the address of a community of civilisations? The current picture shows the EU is a Christian Club. This must be overcome.” It touches a raw nerve. But plenty in Europe ask whether Turkey would accept becoming a community of civilisations.

You could sense the strains and tensions when recently Prime Minister Erdogan went to Germany, where two million people of Turkish origin live. He caused huge offence when he told an audience in Dusseldorf: “Our children must learn German but they must learn Turkish first.” It was an open challenge to the German government which had been insisting that those who live in Germany must speak the language and integrate. The German chancellor opined that multiculturalism had failed because it led to separation.

There is, too, friction over Cyprus, and the disturbing detentions of reporters and writers. It forced the European Commission to warn Turkey over its democratic credibility.

And then there are the doubts as to how committed the ruling party is to secularism. Recently Ayse Sucu, who headed a woman’s group, was squeezed out after suggesting women themselves should decide whether to cover their hair.

There is an ongoing struggle within Turkey which will demonstrate its commitment to tolerance. That, more than anything, will determine whether it is indeed a role model.

But Turkey is on a roll. Sometimes – irritated at being rebuffed – it contemplates abandoning its pursuit of EU membership. It survived the economic downturn and its growth is an enviable 5%. It may prefer to go it alone and, like the Ottomans, revel in newfound influence.

But when it comes to Libya, Turkey demands to be listened to. And the West needs Turkey on side.

I’m Gavin Hewitt, the BBC’s Europe editor and this blog is where you and I can talk about the stories I’m covering in Europe.

bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/gavinhewitt/2011/03/turkey_the_growing_power.html, 30 March 2011

March 31, 2011
Turks might not wait

Eric Ellis

Turkey, with its strong economy and links to Asia, may not need to be part of the European Union.

IS IT European? Asian? Both? Neither? It’s a millenniums-old question; culturally, religiously, geographically and economically. And one that could be posed more and more of Australia and its embrace, if that’s what it is, of booming Asia.

The answer is elusive and multilayered. But spend a day marvelling at the retail phenomenon that is Kanyon in Istanbul’s gleaming new Levent financial district – to merely describe the massive Kanyon as a mall would be a major commercial undersell – and you’d have to think that question again. Judging from its glamorous tenants, Kanyon’s sensibility is high-end Euro-chic certainly, but the vibe is also LA at its modish funkiest. There are no Kaths or Kims at Kanyon.

Amid the ocean-going retail therapy being performed here, the one vibe Kanyon doesn’t much express is Islam, though most of the shoppers flashing wads of euros are indeed Muslims, even the 20-somethings in kitten heels and fleshy spaghetti-strapped summer slips dragging delighted, covered grandmas into L’Occitane, Oliver Peoples and Agent Provocateur. Immersed in Kanyon’s designer heaven, its easy to forget that Turkey is 98 per cent Islamic, with all the cliched preconceptions that suggests. Moreover, Turkey is governed by a party that doesn’t baulk at being described as Islamist, but on whose eight-year watch places like Kanyon have arrived and thrived.

Since the rule of Gallipoli hero Mustafa Kemal Ataturk through the 1920-30s, modern Turkey has aspired to formally and politically be regarded as European. It first applied to the EU’s predecessor bodies in 1959, just two years after the Treaty of Rome that unified modern Europe. But it’s been a struggle endured in vain. Today, Turkey’s still waiting, miffed as lesser former communist states have jumped the queue into the EU.

Economically, it seems a no-brainer. The IMF measures G-20 member Turkey as the world’s 17th biggest economy, its $US1 trillion output larger than all but five of the European Union’s 27 member states. Measured by GDP per capita, Turkey is bigger than five-year EU members Bulgaria and Romania and alongside its three former Soviet Baltic states.

Greater Istanbul provides about half of Turkey’s GDP and were it a separate state, its economy would be bigger than that of nine EU members, its GDP per capita up there with Germany and France. And there is serious money here too. In 2008, Forbes ranked Istanbul as fourth on its billionaires-by-city list, behind Moscow, London and New York.

Turkey stumbled last year in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis but few European economies rebounded with its vigour, following the 11.7 per cent GDP expansion in this year’s March quarter, with 10.3 per cent growth in the June second quarter. As Turks impatient to enter Euroland remind, its not Turkey that’s giving the EU the wobbles to threaten Europe’s economic raison d’etre but Portugal, Ireland, Greece and Spain, the so-called PIGS economies.

Indeed, there is a strong argument that far from Turkey waiting patiently to be officially deemed European, its entry would greater advantage the EU than it would Turkey, that Turkey would become Europe’s easterly emerging market, to recapture its mojo, rather as the American ”New Economy” that took off in the late 1990s helped shield the US from meltdowns in Asia, Russia and Mexico and street ahead of Japan. This is the view of industrialists like Suzan Sabanci Dincer, the stylish 45-year-old heiress of her family’s banking-to-cars-and-chemicals conglomerate. “The EU should have Turkey as a new member because it will add excitement and growth,” she says.

That the EU, ostensibly an Atlantic idea, adds new members to its east makes that argument all the more compelling. Turkey is arguably the only ”European” entity that makes any meaningful claim to being Asian, where the global economic axis is fast tilting. Turkish is even spoken in China. It’s an ancient country that, like many thrusting parts of Asia, feels new and invigorating.

Because Turkey has long been dancing to a European tune in its efforts to enter the EU, it virtually functions as a de facto EU state. Just as Asia is for Australia, about 75 per cent of Turkey’s trade is with Europe. Its financial sector adheres to European standards, unsurprising given that about half its banking assets are controlled out of European financial capitals. Multilingual and democratic, its laws, infrastructure, regulations and its democracy tilt more and more European.

So, if you’re Brussels, what’s not to like? The truth that dare not speak its name seems to be religion. Though ostensibly an economic entity, the EU is a very Christian club. Were it to enter, Turkey would be its only Muslim member, its 74 million people second only to Germany’s 82 million by population. That spooks a lot of Europeans, particularly in places like the Netherlands, Austria, Sweden and Denmark whose voters are lashing back at liberal immigration and welfare policies. Through an Asia-Pacific prism, this seems narrow and short-sighted. Immigrants tend to follow prosperity and if Turkey booms and develops while western Europe is mired in post-GFC ennui, it would seem more logical that the longer-term movement might be eastward, not westward.

That could also be true of the Turks themselves. The popular and impatient Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is gently hardening his line on EU entry.

This week, his President and former PM, Abdullah Gul, suggested in a BBC interview that since Turkey is becoming European administratively by stealth anyway, it’s finding more in common linking into the roaring economies of the Middle East and Asia than obsessing too much about joining the EU.

As Asia booms, Turkey’s millenniums-old question might well be answered yet, at Europe’s loss.

http://www.smh.com.au/business/turks-might-not-wait-20101110-17nto.html, November 11, 2010

November 10, 2010
BBC Turkçe’s TV Programme now Broadcasts Five Times a Week on NTV

The BBC‘s service in Turkish, BBC Turkçe, has further extended its presence on Turkey’s leading 24-hour news channel, NTV.

The BBC‘s current-affairs TV programme, Dünya Gündemi (World Agenda), will now be broadcast five days a week, Tuesday to Saturday, adding two more editions to NTV’s weekly schedule.

Dünya Gündemi brings TV audiences in Turkey reports and analysis of issues that dominate the global agenda. The 13-minute programme focuses on news that has a global and regional impact, covering subjects from worldpolitics and world economy to environment and climate change, from the social and ethical impact of latest scientific developments to arts, culture and sports.

Sarah Jones, Business Development Manager, Europe, BBC World Service, says: “This is an exciting development for us as it means more BBC content is now brought to the audiences of our Turkish partner, NTV. We are looking forward to delivering the quality and range of BBC journalism, now five times a week, to the viewers of the NTV channel.”

Hüseyin Sükan, Head of BBC Turkçe, adds: “We’ve had an excellent relationship with NTV since the beginning of our partnership in 2002. Dünya Gündemi was launched two years ago and has gone from strength to strength. I am delighted that we have reached a stage when we can reinforce our TV offer with two more editions of the programme every week. Both BBC Turkçe and NTV teams have put a lot of effort to make this happen, and we will make sure that our programme stands out.”

Ömer Özgüner, Head of News Programmes, NTV, comments: “Our relationship with the BBC has always been marked with harmony and high performance ever since we started. With extended editions, BBC Turkçe’s Dünya Gündemi programme will now better satisfy the audience’s need for in-depth and comprehensive reporting on a wide range of international topics which the BBC is known for. We are excited that this expertise will now reach more people, more frequently.”

Dünya Gündemi is now broadcast on NTV at16.30 local time Tuesday to Friday, and at 19.30 on Saturdays.

BBC Turkçe is a multimedia service, delivering international news, information, reviews and analysis in Turkish. Theradio programmes are broadcast nationally in Turkey at 07.00 and 18.00 local time on weekdays, 18.00 on Saturdays, and 11.00 and 18.00 on Sundays via the partner NTV Radyo. The BBC Turkçe website bbcturkce.com offers news and analysis in text, audio and video, and can be accessed via mobile phones and via a range of partner websites.

, 03 OCTOBER 2010

October 4, 2010