Opinions - Testimonies

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• Jacqueline de Romilly, professor at the Sorbonne (1957), first woman professor at the Collège de France (1973), member of the French Academy (1988), honorary Greek citizen (1995) and Ambassador of Hellenism (2000):
  
  Dear Sir, I strongly wish that accents be preserved... read it
• ✝Peter Fraser, emeritus lecturer at Oxford University:
  
  I was glad to hear about your Movement for the reintroduction of the polytonic system of accentuation... read it
• Alain Segonds, directeur de recherche du CNRS, directeur général des Éditions Les Belles Lettres:
  
  Cher ami, j'avais longuement traîné à vous écrire sur cette délicate question [des accents], non que... read it
• Gregorios Sifakis, prof. emeritus of classical Greek philology at the University of Thessaloniki and New York University:
  
  Why do I insist on the polytonic accentuation system? A short—as well as precise—answer would be:... read it
• Zyranna Zateli, writer:
  
  I use accents and breathings in my writing because, first of all, I like them and love them... read it
• Vangelis Hadzigiannidis, writer:
  
  I remember I was in the swimming pool for my weekly hydrotherapy session, when... read it
• Yorgos Brounias, writer:
  
  I would say, now that I’m asked about it—because before I considered it as a fact without too many explanations—... read it
• Carlos Steel, professor of ancient philosophy, University of Leuven:
  
  I am a scholar in ancient Greek philosophy and an editor of ancient Greek texts in numerous prestigious international series... read it
• Concetta Luna, researcher at Scuola Normale Superiore, Pisa (Italy):
  
  Like millions of other Italians who went through the Classical Lyceum (high school), I learned ancient Greek... read it
• Philippe Brunet, professor of ancient Greek at Rouen university:
  
  The decision to switch from the polytonic to the monotonic system belongs to the Greeks and I have no right to interfere into their choices, but I can... read it
• François Patte, mathematician-sanskritist, professor at Paris V University:
  
  Some years ago I went to see a greek newspaper and was very astonished... read it
• Vernon E. Kooy, Retired Philosopher and Font Designer - Hastings, Nebraska, USA:
  
  By legislating in favor of the monotonic system, Greek has been “dummied down” short and simple... read it
• Phidias N. Bourlas, computer engineer:
  
  Twenty years later I found my beloved, lost, polytonic system again!... read it
• Chrissostomos Papaspyrou, chemist/linguist, educator at the Athens Special Lyceum for the Deaf & Hard-of-Hearing:
  
  I’m deaf. When I was three years old, I permanently lost my hearing. I don’t remember anymore... read it
• Nikos Dimitriadis, classical scholar:
  
  The goal of the Organization for the Internationalization of Greek Language is to widespread... read it
• Dimitrios Filippou, engineer:
  
  First of all I have to say that I am not a follower of the polytonic system, but... read it
• Nikolaos Ventouras, computer engineer:
  
  The arguments of both the (so-called) progressists as of the (so-called) rightists all start from... read it
• Yannis Gekas, private sector employee:
  
  I was born after the establishment of the monotonic system and so I was taught polytonic... read it
• Andreas Stalidis, mathematician - analyst:
  
  I will not speak about the reasons why the polytonic system should be re-introduced. There are well-argumented analyses on that, by worthy people... read it
• Yorgos Valsamis, director of ellopos.net:
  
  The wealth of the Greek language grown through all the periods of Greek history, doesn’t mean just a larger amount of words compared with other languages, but more ways, more emotions, wherefrom we gain a better unity with all the Greek culture, which is the foundation of the entire Orthodox history and, to a great degree, of the Western world too. Good knowledge of Greek means a stronger organism of the spirit, a higher measure and a greater thinking-ability, which is not a pure ability but a reality of thinking by itself. This is why the Greek Church kept the byzantine Greek of the Liturgy even during the Ottoman occupation, and in general “achieved in the linguistic issue the golden mean: in worship she kept the established form of the language while in preaching, with the exception of people mad with the past, she accepted the popular language ([demoteke, modern Greek or] romeika), this way affirming the Greek language in all its historical forms”. [1]

  A significant step toward the greatest possible aphasia of the Greek people was made by the official-governmental abolition of breathing marks and accents. After whole centuries of counter-evidence, polytonism is suddenly called “a frein to the efforts of pupils to conquer language and gain essential education”! [2] I believe it has already been proven how essential education became in Greece and how great was the ‘conquering’ of language by pupils. Given the importance of this pseudo-political adventurism’s decision, of the intervention to the accentuation as if it had a history of only a few years, by shortened procedures and with the hideous assistance of the academics’ vain-knowledge, of the “four-legged beasts that don’t know what language is”, as Castoriadis commented on them, it is obvious that a new split of the Greek people develops. Some say that we have to “save” ancient Greek! Ancient Greek is not (at the moment) a museum piece and does not need to be saved—but we need it; just like accents do not need to be saved —we are the ones who need them. Is it possible for us to end up a nouveau-riche rabble, and yet to have a civilization?

  Something secondary is not necessarily accidental. If oral speech precedes writing, this same speech, together with the society expressed in this speech, has produced the written form of the Homeric voice, in which, later on, and again not without reason, accentuation has been incorporated. This augmentation of the preceding body of language was not accidental and circumstantial, if not even deforming...

  It’s worth noting a fact which anyone can understand immediately, that to the absence of accents corresponded continuous writing, without spaces between words and only in capital letters. If we wanted even a utopic return to the preceding form of Greek, we would need ourselves to write without spaces between words and in capital letters. One of the foundational functions of polytonism is precisely the keeping of a coherence broken by the spaces between words. For that reason, along with others, it is also necessary for us to use the grave accent, which some polytonists underestimate.

  The current attempt to abolish polytonism, to the degree that it succeeds will inevitably be signifying the disappearance of the reason that polytonism was called to serve and realise. Since this reason is substantial, by disappearing causes a mutation of the whole body of language. Of course, at this point of decline we can’t exclude the possibility of turning our alphabet to Latin, according to the high standards of Turkey. As for the consequences to the very oral speech, these we will see in the distant future, if the ‘cultural revolution’ prevails, because the use of the polytonic system for so many centuries still participates in our pronunciation and our whole conciousness. Because a single generation has grown without accents and breathings, this doesn’t mean that we have already witnessed the results: they will arrive so slowly that some time we will be unable to remember even the causes of the fall, only one of them being the monotonic thinking.

  Is it possible for us to determine all the dimensions of such a mutation? Some are certain and by themselves capable enough, so that we cannot say that we didn’t knew. Such dimensions are described by the “Citizens’ Movement for the Re-introduction of the Polytonic System”, the most complete Web site on this critical issue (http://www.polytoniko.gr). This is where I found the following passage by Elytis:

  “I want to believe–and this faith of mine always reveals itself first in its struggle with knowledge–that, however it is examined, the presence of the Greek people through so many centuries on the European or the Asiatic lands of the Aegean managed to establish an orthography, where every omega, every upsilon, every acute accent and every iota subscript, is not but a little gulf, a downward slope, a vertical line of a rock on a curve of ship’s stern, wavy vineyards, church lintels, little white or red blots, here or there, from dove-cots and pots of geraniums.”

  Many meanings may exist in this paragraph, in which monotonists would perhaps discover only ‘nice words’, unimportant and irresponsible. Whatever the philological need of accents may be, they also carry another duty transmitted to us by polytonic generations, the duty not to have a code-language, but a pictorial, iconistic, living and analog one, a language beyond the simple need to abstract, mark and exchange information. The current modernization, dazzled by the technoscience of the Western individual, contemns a society that asks to be initiated in reality and not to control and subjugate it.

  Anyone can learn the accents and teach them to his children. It is not difficult! The only thing needed for not using accents is neither low intelligence nor lack of discipline, but the decided disdain of the language, of the thinking and of the civilization of Greece. Let us leave this privilege to the Parliament and the Academy since they asked and fighted for it, and let us learn the accents, this way gaining a double profit; because our thinking will benefit, and the realisation of a certain freedom will become stronger, that we are able in the most important issues not to depend to the probable adventurism of our leaders.

  (From the Web page http://www.ellopos.net/gr/polytonic.asp)

  [1] Metallinos, “The continuity of the Greek nation after the fall of Constantinople”, The fall of Constantinople, ed. Ev. Chrysos, Athens 1994, p. 327.

  [2] Proceedings of parlementary dicussions, January 11th, 1982.

  
  Child: One day I will call you into account for your errors.
  Adult: I’ll be ready. There is a huge bibliography on the subject.

• Katerina Sokratidou, employee in a shipping agency:
  
  When the monotonic system was introduced I was in secondary school, which means that I have already been taught accents for about 7 years. At start... read it
• Nikos Theodorou, mathematician:
  
  I got acquainted with the polytonic system very young, in primary school, when my mother... read it
• Jacob J. Adams, high school student:
  
  Our world is one of many choices.  We choose what to eat and what to wear.  We choose our careers and hobbies.... read it
• Hadjinikolaou Dimitrios, teacher of English language:
  
  Why I do not approve of monotonous, spiritless spelling. ... read it
• Avgoustinos Tsirimokos, reporter:
  
  ... read it
• Nikolaos Papadopoulos, sports teacher:
  
  ... read it
• Archimidis Anagnostou, (doctor, microbiologist):
  
  ... read it
• Ioannis Vamvakas:
  
  EN1... read it
• Dimitris Tabaoglou Computer engineer:
  
  EN1... read it
• Maria Kontarini, employee in the private sector, retired:
  
  EN1... read it
• Dimitris Armaos, Philologist, poet, essayist:
  
  EN1... read it
• Yannis Flytzanis, Student in Law:
  
  ... read it
• Athina Antoniadou, Conservation of antiquities:
  
  ... read it