Linguistic Turkology

Supervised by: Dr. Ruth Bartholomä

Duration: Since 2012

Linguistic Turkology deals with the Turkic languages, individually or as a family of languages, and both diachronically and synchronically. This includes issues of reconstruction of older, unused language varieties, questions of genetic linguistic relationships and etymological questions, the processing of handed-down text material and the investigation of hitherto unknown sources, as well as the engagement with linguistic questions concerning modern Turkic languages, the documentation of endangered languages and varieties, dialectological work, linguistic contact issues, and sociolinguistic phenomena. So far, work has been conducted at the Orient-Institut Istanbul on Turkish dialectology, Iranian Turkic languages, Middle Turkic texts, the linguistic history of the Oghuz branch and the South Siberian branch of the Turkic languages, and on linguistic attitudes in Turkey. In the last three years, the following projects and events have been carried out:

Projects

The Dictionnaire des phonemes Türk by Herman F. Kvergić in the Context of the Turkish Language Research

Supervised by: Dr. Astrid Menz

Main collaborator: Prof. Dr. Jens Peter Laut (Universität Göttingen, Turkology)

The library was able to procure second-hand a typescript entitled Dictionnaire des phonemes Türk. The undated three-volume work is probably from the 1930s. The first two volumes contain etymological studies on Turkic arranged according to phonemes; the third volume contains Turkic-Indo-European word tables.

The author, Hermann Feodor Kvergić, is an Orientalist from Vienna. In the 1930s, within the context of the Sun Language Theory, he wrote the “famous” text La psychologie de quelques éléments des langues Turques. The typescript has been digitized and made available online on MENAdoc, the Digital Collections of the DFG Specialised Information Service for Middle East, North African and Islamic Studies at Halle University Library. This will be expanded to include a broader digital collection on Kvergić, his work, and its influence on linguistic research in Turkey.

Selected Publications

Bartholomä, Ruth. “A Paper Tiger? Linguistic Rights and the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages (ECRML)”. Bülent Bilmez (Ed.). Türkiye’de Dil Hakları ve Dilsel Çoğulluk = Language Rights and Linguistic Pluralism in Turkey. İstanbul: İstanbul Bilgi Üniversitesi 2021. 155–170.

—.“Neo-Ottomanism, Purism or What? Current Suggestions for the Replacement of ‘Foreign Words’ in Turkish”. Ruth Bartholomä; Jens Peter Laut (eds.). The Turkish Language Reform and Beyond: A Never-Ending Story? Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz 2021 (Turcologica, 126), 77–114.

— (with Jens Peter Laut): “Introduction: Aspects of Language Policy and Planning in the Republic of Turkey”. Ruth Bartholomä; Jens Peter Laut (eds.). The Turkish Language Reform and Beyond: A Never-Ending Story? Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz 2021 (Turcologica, 126), 13–27.

Menz, Astrid. „The Gagauz Female Marker -(y)ka“. Turkic Languages 19 (2016). 53–62.

—; Csató, Éva Ágnes; Turan, Fikret (Eds.). Spoken Ottoman in Mediator Texts. Wiesbaden 2016.

—. „Idioms and Dialogues in Holdermann’s Grammaire Turque (1730)“. Spoken Ottoman in Mediator Texts. Hrsg. Éva Ágnes Csató, Astrid Menz, Fikret Turan. Wiesbaden 2016. 147-160.

—. „Expressions for Prospective and Avertive in Turkish and Gagauz“. Ankara Papers in Turkish and Turkic Linguistics. Hrsg. Ufuk Ataş, Çiğdem Sağın Şimşek, Jochen Rehbein, Deniz Zeyrek. Wiesbaden 2015. 647–657.

—. „188. Gagauz“. Wordformation: An International Handbook of the Languages of Europe. Hrsg. Peter O. Müller, Ingeborg Ohnheiser, Susan Olsen, Franz Rainer. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter 2015. 3433–3442.

—. „Gagauz (People)“. Encyclopaedia of Islam. Third Edition. Bd. 3. Hrsg. Kate Fleet, Gudrun Krämer, Denis Matringe, John Nawas, & Everett Rowson. Leiden 2015. 122–123.

—; Schroeder, Christoph. „Schrifterwerb in der Türkei (und türkischer Schriftspracherwerb in Deutschland)“. Schriftsprach- und Orthographieerwerb: Erstlesen, Erstschreiben. Hrsg. Helena Olfert, Christina Röber. Baltmannsweiler 2015. 55–68.

—; Demir, Nurettin; Karakoç, Birsel (Eds.). Turcology and Linguistics. Éva Ágnes Csató Festschrift. Ankara 2014.

—. „Gagauz (Language and Literature)“. Encyclopaedia of Islam: Third Edition. Bd.3. Hrsg. Kate Fleet, Gudrun Krämer, Denis Matringe, John Nawas and Everett Rowson. Leiden 2013. 95–96.

—; Kıral, Filiz. „Doğu Grubu Ağızlarında –miş ve imiş“. Türk Dilleri Araştırmaları 20 (2010/2012). 167–174.

—. „Erzurum Ağızlarında Ermenice Ödünç Sözcükler“. Türk Dilleri Araştırmaları 19 (2009/2012). 89–106.

—; Erdal, Marcel; Nevskaja, Irina (Hrsg.). Historical, Areal and Typological Aspects of South Siberian Turkic. (Turcologica 94). Wiesbaden 2012.

—. „The conditional in South Siberian Turkic.“ Historical, Areal and Typological Aspects of South Siberian Turkic. Hrsg. Marcel Erdal, Astrid Menz, Irina Nevskaya.Wiesbaden 2012. 59–74.

Events

Lecture Series: Language, Culture and Tradition Among Little-Known Turkic Peoples: From the Balkans to Northeastern China

Supervised by: Dr. Astrid Menz

Event date: Fall 2013–winter 2014

This series of lectures dealt with facets of the diverse Turkic-speaking world. Generally little known Turkic peoples and their cultural characteristics were presented on the basis of selected examples. The individual talks dealt with the cultural, historical as well as the linguistic features of Turkic-speaking groups in Europe (the Gagauz and the Chuvash peoples), Oghuz Turks in Iran, and Turkic-speaking groups of South Siberia and Northeast China. The talks were held in English and Turkish.

Talks

Bartholomä, R. (2021): „Between ‘Most Powerful Days’ and ‘in Serious Danger’: The Turkish Language in the Eyes of the Turkish Language Society“. e-Sociolinguistic Symposium 23. The University of Hongkong, 7. Juni 2021 (online).

—. „‚Going Back to the Dark Ages of History‘: The Turkish Language and Links to Its Past“. History Seminar/Webinar. Sabancı University, 12. Mai 2021 (online).

—. „A Paper Tiger? Linguistic Rights and the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages“. Dilsel Çoğulluk ve Dil Hakları. Türkiye Kültürleri Araştırma Grubu, İstanbul Bilgi Üniversitesi, 18. Juli 2020 (online).

—. „How to deal with a multilingual society in an officially monolingual state? Information strategies during the coronavirus pandemic in the Republic of Turkey“. Iterations of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Themes and Problem Spaces in Turkey, Iran and Germany. Orient-Institut Istanbul, 25.Juni 2020 (online).