Mispronounced, shortened or new words derived from foreign languages can pose a danger to the next generation of Turkish speakers when they are conveyed in written forms, experts claim.
The new generation's misuse of Turkish especially on social media is slowly turning into a threat to the language's grammar. An expert who closely evaluated this situation suggests that this condition could damage the language's grammatical roots in the coming years.
Prof. Dr. Ahmet Tanyıldız, a lecturer at the Turkish Language and Literature Department at Diyarbakır's Dicle University, stated that abbreviations and mistakes, which may not be very important in spoken language, will become permanent once they are reinforced in written forms.
Pointing out that the environment especially contributes to language education, Tanyıldız said, "Language education starts from infancy. The language spoken by the parents in the family nourishes the child."
"Likewise, the contact established on the street, in the neighborhood and with friends also contributes to the formation of a person's language. Similarly, in primary and secondary schools, thanks to the education teachers continue to deliver, the child's knowledge of language continues to expand," he said.
Emphasizing that the Istanbul dialect should be known well for the correct and beautiful use of Turkish, Tanyıldız said: "As literature teachers, we try to teach and recommend the Istanbul dialect. The reason for this is that the Istanbul dialect is both the official language of the Republic of Türkiye and it is a tradition that has spanned more than 100 years. It is a beautiful dialect that has symbolized the Turkish language. Therefore, our friends who want to speak Turkish well should know and learn the Istanbul dialect well."
"Naturally, this does not mean that we deny the local dialects and local languages. In other words, a young person from Diyarbakır can know and speak by using all the features of the Diyarbakır dialect in detail. There is nothing odd about this. But since the Istanbul dialect is the main one, it is expected that the Istanbul dialect will be spoken," he said.
Stating that pronunciation and knowledge of beautiful, aesthetic words appear to be a significant part of knowing the language, the professor suggested that one shall start improving their language by reading a lot and reading aloud.
"As the world of words increases, our thinking speed will increase. Thus, the aesthetic level of the words we will choose will also increase," he noted.
"We will see beautiful Turkish works in front of us. If we read them aloud, we can see that our speaking will gradually begin to improve. And we need to read a lot. As the world of words increases, our thinking speed will increase. Thus, the aesthetic level of the words we will choose will also increase."
"Young people live fast in the modern era. Because they live fast, they think fast and speak fast. It is very natural for words to be rounded and some letters to be swallowed in spoken language. But this will become a problem once it enters the written language. Those little mistakes, which may not be very important in the spoken language, become permanent when they are passed into the written language," Tanyıldız said.
Pointing to technological developments as one of the biggest factors behind this change in the "word world," Tanyıldız pointed out that the actual world has now become a small village where everything occurs fast and at once.
"Everything can spread all at once. It is now very easy to access information. We can instantly visualize an event that took place on the other side of the world in seconds, through screens. The probability of language changing quickly in an atmosphere as fast as this is very strong," he concluded.