Greece

Greek is the national and official language of Greece.

The establishment of the demotic variety of Greek as the official language of the Greek State in 1976 ended a long-lasting period of diglossia: the 'high' variety or katharevousa was used in all areas of public life (politics, law and justice, administration, religion and teaching in secondary and higher education), while the 'low' variety or Demotic was the language of everyday communication, literature and primary education. The only domain where demotic Greek is not used today is in liturgical texts of the Orthodox Church, which are written in Hellenistic Koine.

In its written form, Greek makes use of the Greek alphabet (an adaptation of the Phoenician script) following the historical orthography, i.e., a spelling which reflects word pronunciation during the Classical period (namely the Attic dialect of the fifth-fourth centuries BC) and uses a polytonic system with three accent signs to represent word prosody. This system was replaced in 1981 when the monotonic system was established, which makes use of a single accent to indicate word stress.

In education, with the exception of ERASMUS programmes, foreign nationals are only accepted into the 1st year of University if they can provide a certificate proving their competence in the Greek language. The International University, recently created at Thessaloniki, offers teaching exclusively in English. Elsewhere, a bilateral Franco-Greek programme has led to the creation of seven common Masters programmes where parts of the syllabus are taught in French.

In the field of work, a certificate proving competence in the Greek language, to varying levels depending on the profession, is required in the public domain. In the private domain this prerequisite has recently started to be adopted.

As far as consumer rights are concerned, European provisions on consumer information are applied. Most labelling on products is multilingual. In public places, signs are usually also transcribed into the Latin alphabet.

The relevant policies are determined by the following principles: equality of opportunities for children from different linguistic and cultural background, the elimination of discrimination and the integration of repatriated, foreign national and immigrant pupils. 

The education of repatriated, foreign national and immigrant pupils

In order to fulfil the educational needs of a heterogenous immigrant population the Greek state has legislated (a) reception classes for early primary education offering language courses and support to other educational subjects taught in school; (b) intensive language courses for those who have difficulties being integrated in the class – both of these function in the frame of general education schools; (c) primary and secondary intercultural schools and teacher's training programmes of the needs of intercultural education.

For all the above actions the teaching materials, the methods and the teacher's training have been designed on the basis of relevant scientific research conducted by the universities of Athens and Thessaloniki.

Educational programmes concerning the Muslim minority and the Roma

In order to cope with educational and other social problems experienced by the Muslim minority and the Roma, two major programmes have been conducted by the Greek universities. The objectives are to integrate these populations into the schooling system by intervening at nursery school level, teaching Greek intensively and fighting against illiteracy and school absenteeism.

The only minority language which is officially recognized and protected by the Treaty of Lausanne (1923) is Turkish, spoken by the Muslim minority in Western Thrace. Its recognition has been established by religious – and not national or linguistic – criteria. Apart from Turkish, a number of other languages are spoken by indigenous populations: Arvanitika, Pomak, Aromanian, Roma, Armenian, Ladino and Slavomacedonian. Due to the immigration flow, there are also several immigrant languages spoken in Greece: mainly Albanian, Bulgarian, Russian, but also Chinese, Pashto (Afghanistan), Urdu (Pakistan) etc. There are no official data concerning the exact number of the immigrants, their nationalities and language. It can be assumed that their number is about 500,00-700,000, i.e. about 7%.

In the Greek area a number of dialects (regional languages) are also spoken: Pontic, Cretan, Tsakonian etc. These dialects are in a process of recession due to the prevalence of Standard Greek.

The (non-linguistic) census of 1991 indicates that the number of Muslims living in Western Thrace is around 97,700, of which 54% are of Turkish origin, 34% Pomak and 15% Roma. Due to the fact that the Muslim minority's recognition has been connected with religion, each of these ethnic groups maintains its own language and tradition. The Pomaks (around 30,000 to 40,000 people) speak a dialect of southern Bulgaria which is strongly influenced by the Turkish of Thrace. The Roma of Western Thrace speak Romani. It must be noted however that Roma, either Muslims or Christians, are spread out across the whole of Greece, speaking a number of varieties of Romani alongside with Greek. These Roma do not enjoy the rights of the Treaty of Lausanne.

The Muslim minority of Western Thrace is the only one which benefits from the right of minority education in Turkish (as well as in Greek). In Thrace today there are more than 200 minority schools in primary education and about four in the secondary one.

This language was spoken by populations settled in Central and Western Greece from what is today Albania during the late Middle Ages. Arvanitika was strongly influenced by Greek and now is gradually becoming extinct.

The Aromanian (Vlachika)

Vlachika is the Romance language spoken by the Greek Aromanians, generally known as Vlachs, a minority who lived in the mountainous regions of Thessaly, Epirus and Pindus. Following the signing of the Treaty of Bucharest in 1913, Romania funded a number of Vlach schools, a situation that came to an end after the Second World War. This minority is nationally assimilated to Greeks though it expresses a special loyalty to their traditions. They try to maintain their language by using it in special occasions. However, their language is now considered by the Council of Europe to be in danger of extinction, with only 50,000 out of 200,000 Aromanians speaking it.

Armenian is the language spoken by the Armenian minority which numbers around 20,000 people. This number includes those who fled Turkey during the 1915 genocide as well as those who came to Greece as economical immigrants more recently. Under the supervision of the Armenian community mother-tongue classes (Saturday classes) are offered in Athens and Thessaloniki. 

Although decimated by the German deportations during the Second World War, there is still a Judaeo-Spanish community speaking Ladino of around 5,000, of which around half live near Thessaloniki. Under the supervision of the Jewish community mother-tongue classes (Saturday classes) are offered, mainly in Athens and Thessaloniki.

Slavomacedonian, a South Slavic language, is spoken by a minority population on the border of the Former Yugoslavian Republic of Macedonia, Bulgaria and Greece. There is no teaching provision for this language though it presents a relatively high linguistic vitality. Due to political reasons the status of this language has been the object of many controversies.

Greek legislation provides the teaching of at least one foreign language in all levels of education. English is compulsory in primary and secondary education. Additionally, there is an option ofFrench, German, Spanish and Italian as second foreign languages from the 5th grade of primary education. Two classes of fifty minutes each per week are devoted to each language.

The Centre for the Greek Language (CGL) is the official state-dependent body responsible for the certification of Modern Greek in Greece and abroad (http://www.greek-language.gr/greekLang/en/certification/index.html). The official exams are held once annually every May and certify attainment at four levels, A2, B1, B2 and C1 as designated by the CEF of the CoE. The establishment of A1 and the C2 levels is under preparation and the Greek version of the CEFR (www.komvos.edu.gr/Common%20European%20Framework.pdf) has been prepared and published in Greek. Except for the general attainment exams the CGL is engaged in the conduct of examination of certification of special purposes (EU citizens, returning Greek expatriates, immigrants, refugees).

The missions of the CLG, which works both within Greece and abroad, are, most notably, to support and promote the Greek language and thereby the national identity of Greeks abroad, to organise Greek language teaching for foreign nationals, to support Greek language teachers, to develop educational material and to undertake actions designed to promote and spread the Greek language.

The Greek state’s multilingual policy has been articulated by an action plan gradually being implemented since 2003, by a group of experts from the Universities of Athens and Thessaloniki. With the expert’s help, the Greek Ministry of Education developed a national language examination system, known as the KPG, through which to assess and certify the level of language proficiency of people who live, study and work in Greece. In doing so, it recognises a variety of European languages as a work qualification. People seeking employment are credited for their ability to understand and produce oral and written speech in languages such as English, French, German, Italian, Spanish and Turkish. Other languages such as Russian and Portuguese will soon also be included.