Talk:Arvanitika/Archive 1

message: "Arvanites are those whose mother tongue is Arvanitika (name in Greek - Áñâáíßôåò)/ Arberichte (name in their language); most linguists use the word Albanian for that language, but the community loathes its use, and it is therefore advisable that this sensitivity be taken into consideration unless researchers and/or human and minority rights activists do not mind alienating the very community they are studying. Likewise, they call themselves Arvanites (in Greek) and Arberor (in their language); but in Northwestern Greece, in their language, they use the term Shqiptar (the same used by Albanians of Albania), a term strongly disliked by the other Arvanites, who also resent being called Albanians."http://www.greekhelsinki.gr/english/reports/arvanites.html--Theathenae 00:31, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Investigating Obsolescence: Studies in Language Contraction and Death edited by Nancy C Dorian. The Albanian speakers of Greece are bilingual in Modern Greek and the local variety of Albanian known as Arvanítika; the latter belongs to the southern or Tosk dialect of the language. Arvanítika speakers are the descendants of settlers of Albanian ancestry who migrated to what is now Greece during the later period of the Byzantine empire, and lived in enclaved communities but not completely out of contact with the Greek-speaking populations. Relative geographical isolation, along with a socio-economically self-sufficient way of life, played a decisive role in the retention of the language for a period of almost five centuries. Albanau 00:57, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Albanau, please read what you quote, you will do us all a favor.  From the link you provided: "Sociolinguistic research conducted in two communities in southern Greece ... shows that people past their 50's on the average have a good command of the language (Tsitsipis 1983 and 1988)".  That was 20 years ago.  Today it would read "people past their 70's".  Which is exactly what I wrote ("septuagenarians and octuagenarians").  Half of these people researched by Tsitsipis in the 1980's are dead (life expectancy in Greece is 78) , and in ten years they will all be dead.  So please do not invent differences of opinion where there are none.  Chronographos 12:23, 21 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Article Start

message: Have you ever seen, talked to or lived among Arvanite Greeks?  Chronographos 15:31, 18 July 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Albanau is right in stating that Arvanites are already Greek citizens. What's there to discuss about that? Are you claiming, on the other hand, that Arvanites do not have Albanian roots? The Greek state may not recognize minorities, but we have already provided neutral sources about the case. What would you call an Albanian people that came from Albania, speaks an Albanian dialect and upholds Albanian traditions? Can their nation of origin be just erased? Is nationality of any people just some sort of paper that one can declare on his own, or what? The distinction made here is obvious that refers to Greek citizens, but to those Greek citizens of Albanian descent. These specific Greek citizens are called Arvanites in Greek, Arbërorë in their own language of origin and Arbërorë in Standard Albanian. --Grymnir 07:44, 21 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Albanau, why do you keep changing "Arvanite Greeks" to "Arvanite" plain?

message: Wonder what his IP is  :-)))   Chronographos 14:45, 20 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Gee, yet another ''mysterious'' sockpuppet ...

message: "Likewise, Arvanitika has never been included in the educational curricula of the modern Greek state. On the contrary, its use has been strongly discouraged at schools (and in the army) through physical punishment, humiliation, or, in recent years, simple incitation of the Arvanitika users (Williams, 1992:86; Trudgill, 1983:130-1). Such attitudes have led many Arvanite (as well as Vlach, and Macedonian) parents to discourage their children from learning their mother tongue so as to avoid similar discrimination and suffering (Trudgill, 1983:130)."
Source: http://www.greekhelsinki.gr/english/reports/arvanites.html
--Grymnir 17:43, 20 July 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Please notice how old this "data" is, ranging from the 70's mostly, to the early 90's.  Also notice that you invoke "Stohos", a fascist periodical that has since been banned for inciting racism.  If one looks for enemies, rather than allies, one can find them very easily.  Chronographos 19:59, 20 July 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: The gradual emergence of the Modern Greek nation-state after the revolution against Ottoman rule (1821) signaled the beginning of minority-language status for Arvanítika. The use of Greek in education, government, and bureaucracy in general led to specific negative attitudes twoards Arvanítika which over time were adopted by the speakers of the language too. --Albanau 23:35, 20 July 2005 (UTC)

text: These data are a part of those presented and that both concerned parties can use. Furthermore we, as Albanians, are making use of the Greek HRWC! We are using Greek data among other! I don't know how much more neutral than this it can get. Albanau has already provided other neutral sources in this very page. The facts are that Greece has, reportedly, not recognized minorities within its own establishment for years. The data make use of historical evidence and give also references. '70-'90 is a a very objective chronology and recent too by historical standards. If you have other neutral, more recent(!) information on the case, naturally you can contribute to the article. But what you and Theathenae are now doing is just deleting or preveting existing information and contributions to the topic. Is wikipedia a place to add information or to prevent it from being shown? --Grymnir 07:44, 21 July 2005 (UTC)

text: Where did I do such thing? Arvanites are Greek citizens! I thinks that's already clear! You are pushing inaccuracies, don't do that! Tosk is an Albanian dialect, what would a user from Japan think while reading "Arvanitic is a dialect of Tosk"? It helps claryfying within the phrase that "Arvanitic is a dialect of Albanian Tosk dialect". What are you afraid of? When I say "this Black Box" instead of just "this Box" am I doing a crime or claryfying things out?--Grymnir 08:59, 21 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Use of Arvanitika, Arbërishte is supressed by state (as of all other minorities in Greece)

message: :Albanian language (Encyclopædia Britannica Article) Dialects
:All of the Albanian dialects spoken in Italian and Greek enclaves are of the Tosk variety and seem to be related most closely to the dialect of Çamëria in the extreme south of Albania.
:Linguistic Anthropology of Praxis and Language Shift: Arvanitika (Albanian) and Greek in Contact Oxford University Press by Lukas D Tsitsipis
:Arvanítika, a variety of Tosk Albanian spoken in Greece for more than four centuries....
:Macedonian Conflict: Ethnic Nationalism in a Transnational World Princeton University Press by Loring M. Danforth
:There is also a small group of Arvanites, who speak a dialect of Albanian and who, like the Vlach, have developed a strong sense of Greek national identity.
:Investigating Obsolescence: Studies in Language Contraction and Death Cambridge University Press edited by Nancy C Dorian.
:The Albanian speakers of Greece are bilingual in Modern Greek and the local variety of Albanian known as Arvanítika; the latter belongs to the southern or Tosk dialect of the language. Arvanítika speakers are the descendants of settlers of Albanian ancestry who migrated to what is now Greece during the later period of the Byzantine empire, and lived in enclaved communities but not completely out of contact with the Greeak-speaking populations.
Every neutral sources say that the Arvanitic language is variety of Tosk Albanian. Enough said!
Albanau 22:43, 20 July 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Can you provide with any kind of source? Albanau 23:58, 20 July 2005 (UTC)

text: 1911 Encyclopedia? ? You do realize that an old Encyclopedia might have information that has since been disproven, and can no longer be used as factual information. And do you know that back then not much was know about the Albanian language and the dialects. Such as your statement made in in this talk page regarding the Albanaian language that I would like to comment on this "Tosks and Ghegs are not the same phara". Geg are those living in the north of Albania and Kosovo. Tosk is living in southern Albania and north west Greece." While you are correct in stating that the Albanian population are divded in two Geg and Tosk , you are highly erred and have angered me by stating that they are so different that "they as people with origin and the dialects can be considered separate languages and not the same people" and have further angered me in bringing Greece in this separatist and schismatic description of the Albanian people and Albanian language, also in regards of the Arvanites and Arvanítik language: a variety of Tosk Albanian. --Albanau 00:44, 21 July 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: You see, MATIA, you should not anger Albanau!  Albanau's feelings should not be messed with because they are holy.  Not to mention secret.  Chronographos 01:40, 21 July 2005 (UTC)

text: Are you inflating your ego enough already by judging others about their use of English? It's obvious he is using the "argument" of offense to his national history. This "argument" on its own does not hold, just as Theathenae's "argument" of "loathing" mentioned right below, does not hold either. Further, Gheg and Tosk are not tribes, but study-specific categorizations based on the variety within the national tradition of Albania. Do not troll this article any further. If someone wants to discuss about this scholar-made division, you can use the respective articles' pages. That's what Wikipedia is about, I think: Sharing knowledge!--Grymnir 07:44, 21 July 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Speak for yourself.  Theathenae's point is quite valid: if you invoke a document, you cannot really pick and choose its content according to your convenience.  As I have often said before, I am not participating in any part of the Tosk/Gheg/Arvanite dispute because I know nothing about Tosk/Gheg/Arvanite linguistically.  And, yes, one's understanding of English is crucial in a discussion: witness how Albanau tells me that I "don't know what I'm talking about" just because his English is so poor that he cannot understand what I write.  Chronographos 11:44, 21 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  acknowledge neutral source 

message: Dear Albanau, I've left some notes on Talk:Skanderbeg but it seems that the sources you needed are already present (I'm talking about the letters) on the external links of the article. Please check my notes and do any additions necessary to the article.MATIA 14:33, 21 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  a note for George Kastriotis [[Skanderbeg]] 

message: Yeah, yeah, yeah we know the story, according to sources blah blah blah 30% of Greece was Albanian, 30% was Slavo-Bulgaro-Serbo-Macedonian 30% was Turkish and 10% was Romanian. Because they couldn't agree with each other, they just decided to use a neutral ethnicity and language. And now back to the real world Albanian nationalists like Albanau claim that Arvanitika is nearly dead because it's forbidden to be used in Greece. Go to this link  and use on online translator on this phrase: "Αρβανίτικα Τραγούδια". Arvanitika has a status of a protected language in Greece, similar to that of Tsakonic. Hence people like Albanau are nothing but ignorant nationalists who have no clue on reality. They have never been to Greece nor every met an Arvanite Greek. 
And as for those people who consider Arvanites to be an "oppressed Albanian ethnic minority in Greece", I'll translate a funny quotation which I just found on a website  which deals with the factors of people's ethnic identities and feelings:
"Στην περιοχή που μένω, ένα μεγάλο μέρος τού πληθυσμού, ανήκει σε αυτή την κατηγορία, στους "Αρβανίτες". Μια μέρα λοιπόν, συνέβει το εξής κωμικοτραγικό. Μπροστά μου, βρισκόταν μια παρέα από Αρβανίτες. Τότε, πέρασε από εκεί ένας Βορειοηπειρώτης, τον οποίο γνώριζα, που είχε έρθει με την τελευταία αυτή μετακίνηση πληθυσμών. Μιλούσε σπαστά Ελληνικά, όμως αισθανόταν Έλληνας. Τότε, η παρέα τών Αρβανιτών, άρχισε να λέει μεταξύ τους: "Κοίτα ρε τον βρωμο-Αλβανό, που ήρθε να μας πάρει τις δουλειές! Δουλεύουν οι Αλβανοί, και δεν έχουμε δουλειές εμείς οι Έλληνες!"
<<...In the region that I live, a great part of the population belongs to this category, the "Arvanites". So one day, a comicotragic even took place. I found a group of Arvanites to be sitting in front of me. Then a Northern Epirote (Greek) that I knew passed by, he had arrived with the last population exchange. He spoke broken Greek but himself he felt fully Greek. Then, the group of Arvanites started saying between each other "Look at the dirty Albanian who came here to take our jobs! Albanians work and us Greeks stay unemployed!"...>>
That's the answer to Albanians who fantasise Arvanites as an oppressed part of the Albanian nation and claim that there's no such thing as Arvanite Greeks. End of story, I'm reverting and reporting Albanau for vandalism. Miskin 16:20, 21 July 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I appreciate if you bring quotes from Britannica, Cambridge, Princeton and Oxford University Press here for discussion as I have or other reliable sources insteed of bringing such anti- Albanian propaganda text that call Albanians dirty. Albanau 17:12, 21 July 2005 (UTC)

text: Britannica is for sure a reliable source and also an acknowledge neutral source and the information I brought is not out of date it is from 2000/2005. What you brought was a propaganda text, the author is a propagandist. Albanau 17:52, 21 July 2005 (UTC)

text: Partly Arvanite Greek? I don't understand that term! And we don't wan't others opinion or personal views of the Arvanites and the Arvanitic language incorporated in the article. His an propaganist, or who ever wrote that. Search on Britannica, Princeton, Cambridge and Oxford sources insteed! Albanau 18:13, 21 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Let's get this thing over with 

message: From ethnologue.com:
Arvanitika (Arvanitic) a language of Greece: Arvanitika is partially intelligible to speakers of Tosk.
Tosk a language of Albania: Reported to be inherently unintelligible with Gheg Albanian and partially intelligible with Arvanitika.
And to sum up what was previously written on those talk pages (please take the time and read them carefully): Gheg and Tosk are Albanian languages and also are the name of the Albanian people who speak them. Arvanitic is partially understandable by Tosks, and not understandable by Ghegs. From what you've shown until now it's hard for me to believe that you act in good faith, I do hope you will prove that I'm wrong. MATIA 14:20, 1 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Ethnologue says that Arvanitika is partially intelligible to speakers of Tosk. It doesn't say anything about Gheg. Unfortunatly, I can't really prove that, but you can't prove the reverse. I can only cite my personal experience and present this rather feeble argument: Compare Gheg with Tosk  and Arvanitic. You will see that the differences between these languages is smaller than the difference between say Norwegian and Danish, and we all know that there is a degree of intelligibility between the Scandinavian languages. How can you then say that Gheg speakers can't, to a certain point, understand Arvanites or vice versa. REX 09:29, 2 September 2005 (UTC)

text: ) MATIA 15:49, 2 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  just the facts 

message: I removed the pov pushing by 201.36.98.16 diff and I am copying his changes here, so that can be discussed along with Talk:Arvanites.
In Greece, as minority languages are all alien (Abstand) to Greek, the use of different names for them (Arvanitika rather than Albanian, Vlach rather than Romanian, Slav rather than Macedonian) has contributed to denying their heteronomy (i.e. their dependence on the corresponding standard language) and increasing their autonomy (by assigning them the status of autonomous languages). As a result, the minority language’s vulnerability grew significantly, as well as the dissociation of the speakers’ ethnic (Arvanite, Vlach, Slavophone) identities from the corresponding national identities (Albanian, Romanian, Macedonian) which have developed in the respective modern nation-states. Today, Arvanite ethnic identity is perceived by many members of the community as distinct from that of the other Greeks who have Greek as their mother tongue but as fully compatible with Greek national identity (likewise for many Vlachs and Macedonians). A similar phenomenon has helped weaken the links between Pomaks in Greece (speaking a Bulgarian-based language) and Bulgarians, and the consequent Pomaks’ assimilation into the Turkish ethnic and, by now, national identity in Western Thrace, an assimilation here detrimental to Greece’s homogenization and anti-minority policies.
Almost all speakers of Arvanitika are today bilingual, i.e. they also speak Greek, usually fluently for the younger generations. It is widely agreed that Arvanitika today have been influenced significantly by the linguistic environment in which they have evolved, sometimes for centuries, without any contact with the Albanian communities of modern day Albania. So, it has acquired a separate (Ausbau) status from Albanian, in fact with dialectical richness; nevertheless, at least partial mutual intelligibility between Arvanite and Albanian exists. Indeed, the recent (in the early 1990’s) arrival of hundreds of thousands, mainly illegal, Albanian immigrants in Greece has led to a successful test of that mutual intelligibility, when many settled in Arvanitika villages.
A comparison with standard Albanian shows that Arvanitika has suffered reduction and simplification. Reduction here means loss of: Albanian vocabulary (often replaced by Greek words duly adapted phonetically and morphologically); prepositions (sometimes replaced by Greek ones); verbal tenses; and forms. While simplification consists of loss of case forms, connecting particles and invariable verbal forms.
On the other hand, Arvanitika is threatened with extinction. In the early 1970’s, more than 80% of the inhabitants of Arvanite villages in the Attica & Beotia departments were found to be fluent speakers of Arvanitika, though the loss of the language was more pronounced in the villages close to Athens than elsewhere; at the same time, however, the actual use of the language was more limited. Moreover, there has been a rather widespread indifference among Arvanites, as well as Vlachs and Macedonian, about the fate of their mother tongues, along with self-deprecation: they have been led by the dominant unilingual Greek culture to -usually sincerely- believe that these languages are deficient, lack proper grammatical structure, have a poor vocabulary. So, gradually, Arvanites have switched from bilingualism to a subordination of Arvanitika to Greek; and, sometimes, young people discourage their parents from speaking the language (especially in public). It is probably a correct estimate, although no studies equivalent to that of the 1970s exist, that the language is used today by middle aged people (interchanged with Greek) and by elderly people (in most contexts) and much less by the younger generation (usually when addressing older people, in strict family context, or, sometimes, too, to make fun of non-speakers). Moreover, in the Peloponnese, it seems that the users are predominantly elderly people. Experts, therefore, agree that Arvanitika in Greece is threatened with extinction more than the equivalent Arberichte language of Southern Italy, as the latter country is more tolerant and does not feel threatened by plurilingualism.
Since the 1980s, some efforts to preserve Arvanite culture have been made. A congress was held in 1985. Four cultural associations have been created: the Arvanitikos Syndesmos Hellados (the Arvanite League of Greece) which has been publishing, since 1983, the bimonthly Besa (in Greek); the Kentro Arvanitikou Politismou (Center for Arvanite Culture); the Arvanitikos Syllogos Ano Liosion (Arvanite Association of Ano Liosia); and the Syllogos Arvaniton Corinthias (Association of Arvanites of Corinthia). Books on Arvanite culture have been published. Church reading and chanting in some Arvanite villages has been reported  Finally, we had the release of a CD with Arvanite music mentioned above. Overall, though, this movement is weaker than similar ones among Vlachs and Macedonians (and certainly among officially recognized Turks).
One reason for such a slow movement is the hostility of the Greek state to such ‘revivals’ among Arvanites, Vlachs, and Macedonians, which is indicated by police disruption of festivals (in Macedonia), and harassment of musicians who play and sing songs in minority languages; as well as by the tolerance -by the state and particularly its judiciary- of public calls, printed in the press, to use violence against those musicians; likewise, human and minority rights activists have been the object of similar threats, where even the European Union’s Euromosaic project -to report on the status of the linguistic minorities in the EU- was attacked). Moreover, the EBLUL’s first visit to the community was violently attacked in state-sponsored publications.
Likewise, Arvanitika has never been included in the educational curricula of the modern Greek state. On the contrary, its use has been strongly discouraged at schools (and in the army) through physical punishment, humiliation, or, in recent years, simple incitation of the Arvanitika users. Such attitudes have led many Arvanite (as well as Vlach, and Macedonian) parents to discourage their children from learning their mother tongue so as to avoid similar discrimination and suffering.
MATIA 08:13, 8 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: All this isn't really POV. They are quotes from the Helsinki Report. The person who did this is in Brasil (from his IP). Is it possible that the whole world refer to Arvanitic this way and only the Greeks disagree! REX 09:13, 8 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  anonymous pov 

message: I have to react. It seems to me that this is just another try of the Greek nationalists to hide that minorities live in Greece and they have no basic human rights. Those people there have no Greek origin and they see themselves as of non-Greek origin.
Same happens with all national minorities that live in Greece (Albanians, Macedonians, Turkish, Roma etc.). They have no basic human rights in Greece. Just few years ago they were even inprisoned if they spoke their mother tongues.
I just can not understand how can the world ignore this. Every single human rights organization is criticising Greece, but the impotent politicians do not do anything about it. What a fucked up world we are living in. Macedonian 00:40, 29 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Just another try to hide the truth about Greece