"karapanomanolokopoulos" > wrote in message
ups.com...
> >But actually, over 90 percent of the language
>>did not change at all. I hope my examples explain what you call
> "linguistic
>>engineering" which was far lesser in its scope than you seem to
> imagine.
> OK this is a direct quote from ataturk.com, "Ataturk.com is a
> non-profit organization, whose primary goals are, educate world about
> Ataturk, Turkish culture and heritage"
> "The transformation met with unparalleled success: In the 1920s, the
> written language consisted of more than 80 percent Arabic, Persian, and
> French words; by the early 1980s the ratio had declined to a mere 10
> percent."

I have no idea of this site but their claim is a gross over exaggeration.
Personally I think that my personal estimate of 10 percent is much nearer
the mark. Also note that they are talking about the written language (i.e.
the old Ottoman Court language) when it was common for officials to use as
many high-flying and not commonly understood words and phrases borrowed from
Persian or Arabic much as the legalese in English language documents that
only lawyers could understand in English. Luckily that is fast disappearing
from the English language also with government encouragement for the use of
plain English. That does not mean that the English language has changed only
that the legalese small print has changed.

The normal everyday Turkish has not changed all that much apart from words
and terms developed from common Turkish roots as I tried to explain to you
the other day.

But tell me, didn't your teachers ever teach you not to believe everything
you ever see in print? May I suggest that you apply the same logic to web
pages.

And now here is an anecdote. One day a neighbor knocked on Nasreddin
Hodja's door and asked whether he could borrow his donkey for the afternoon.
Hodja said, "Sorry but so-and-so has borrowed my donkey for the day". And
just then Hodja's donkey started braying. The neighbor looked quizzically at
Hodja as if to say, "You are lying to me, aren't you?" whereupon the Hodja
put his hand on his long white beard and said to the neighbor: "But
neighbor, don't you trust the word of a wise old sage and you trust the
braying of a donkey."

OK, so if you saw the claim that 80 percent of Turkish is no more and that
it has been wiped off the Turkish language since 1920, and you believe this,
then who am I to try and convince you that this is a grossly exaggerated
claim?

The earth is flat, after all, isn't it and the sun rotates around the earth?


>
> Oh, I think I understand it perfectly ;-)
>
> As far as the yoghurt sauce goes, I don't doubt it could be Turk in
> origins, but the version we both know today is probably a later
> modification. At least I've not seen many other places where whey is
> strained out of yoghurt..... maybe Bulgaria?
>
> As for Dolmas: It's very possible the traditional version with meat and
> cabbage wrapping came from Asia. Various types of dumplings are common
> throughout Asia, and so is cabbage. The vegeterian version though
> (Yalancee?) had to be developed in the Meditteranean. Grape leaves
> simply don't exist in the steppes.

Yalanci (pronounced Yalandji) Dolma is as you say the vegetarian version of
Dolma. But what makes you think that vineleaves are the only leaves that
can be used to wrap Dolma? The Turkey where Yalanci Dolma is very popular
they use other types of leaves to wrap Dolmas. In fact my favorite wrapped
Dolma are not the ones wrapped in vineleaves though vineleaf wrapped dolmas
have become more or less the only version known in Europe. Incidentally,
Yalan in Turkish means a lie, an untruth. Yalanci means a liar, a cheat.
Hence, Yalanci Dolma where you are cheated of the minced lamb content of the
dish.

OK you say that I rely too much on the origin of words used in naming these
dishes. But of course I am. How else would all these Turkish words come to
be used in naming the variants of these dishes? It would be like arguing
that the English terminology used in computing does not point out to
countries where computing originated. Would you seek any other origin to
such computing terms as e-mail, web pages, copy and paste, URL etc other
than an English speaking country?

>
>>I fully agree with you in this respect. But it might be interesting
> for you
>>to study old historic migrations for you will find that Greeks moved
> to
>>present day Greece in mass migrations from Central Asia --
> Well, there are many versions of where the Greek tribes descented from
> in to the Balkan Peninsula. Are you referring to the Caucasus mountains
> theory?
> BTW, The Chinese make a distinction beteween the Mongols in the north
> and the muslim Chinese in the west which are believed to be Turkic,
> closely related to Khazaks. In other words, Turks are a Mongolian type
> of people, but not all Mongols are Turks. Hence claiming that both that
> Moguls and the Yuan dynasty were Turkic, is an exaggeration at best!
>
>>We are all humans and we are all brothers. If
>>you ask me this is a strength rather than a weakness
> I guess you can argue that we're all human beings etc, that is the
> popular view promoted today, and that ethnic divisions and promotion of
> nationalist theories can only lead to conflict and eventually
> bloodshed. I would agree to an extend that diversity in rare cases
> brings strength, but more often than not it can lead to conflict. It's
> happening right now in Europe, and the admission of Turkey in the EU is
> right in the middle of the debate....... but this is beyond the scope
> of this food thread. ;-)


True, we are all humans and we are all brothers. Also true that ethnic
divisions can eventually lead to conflicts. That's why we have to
concentrate on what unites us rather than what divides us. It is not only
ethnic divisions that can lead to conflicts. What about religious divisions?
The sectarian wars in Europe come to mind here. What about tribal and racial
divisions? Europe is to this day very much a racist society despite or maybe
because of long, long wars between European antagonists that culminated in
WW1 and WW2 and which didn't really come to an end as WW2 was soon followed
by the Cold War which itself is not quite over yet.

And what about divisions as to which football team we support?

I hope with this last question I'll have given you food for thought!