Title:
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Learning the language of ’the other’ : a linguistic ethnography of Turkish-language classes in a Greek-Cypriot school
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This thesis is a linguistic ethnographic study of the introduction of Turkish-language classes
in Greek-Cypriot Formal Education, a new initiative taken by the Cyprus Ministry of
Education in 2003. Taking into account the history of conflict between the two communities,
this project deals with the discursive (re-)negotiations of ethnic difference and ethnic
relations that occur in classes where the subject to be taught is the language of 'The Other'.
Focusing in particular on two Turkish-language classes in a Greek-Cypriot secondary school,
the thesis draws mainly on data collected during five months of ethnographic fieldwork.
With post-structuralist and anti-essentialist theoretical tools informing the ethnographic
approach, and analytical frameworks from interactional sociolinguistics, it investigates how
the details of classroom interaction connect with larger-scale processes, such as:
i) the history of intercommunal/interethnic hostility and rival nationalisms;
ii) educationald iscourseso f `Hellenic Paideia';
iii) processesa nd discoursess hapedb oth inside and outsideC yprus (i. e. EU entry,
initiatives for reconciliation);
iv) students' repertoires shaped in contexts outside the classroom (i. e. youth
organisations, football fan-clubs etc).
At the institutional level, the setting up of the language classes emerged as part of an effort
to improve the relations of the two communities and was thus in line with EU processes and
the attempts at the time to resolve the `Cyprus Issue'. However, the empirical investigation
shows that the ideology of 'rapprochement' underpinning this initiative was not compatible
with the hegemonic institutional ideology of Hellenocentrism that sees the neighbouring
community as 'The Other'. Both the teacher and the students appeared to recognise the
formal lesson as a site that did not permit any alternative discourses (e. g. leftist discourses)
and such discourses were silenced, whispered, or met with resistance. The ideological
conflict between 'rapprochement' and `Hellenic Paideia' appeared to pose significant
complications to the teaching process, and in the classes studied, the Turkish-language
teacher struggled to mediate the two ideologies and simultaneously deal with the history and
the current situation in Cyprus. Nevertheless, when talking outside the frame of a formal
lesson, there were students who appeared competent in discussing Cyprus politics and
demonstrated the ability to handle the tension caused by the ideological contestation
involved.
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