- In this study an attempt was made to investigate Turkish Cypriots’ attitudes towards their native
languagevariety Cypriot Turkish (CT), and Standard Turkish (ST). A questionnaire was used to
establish whether attitudes of Turkish Cypriots towards the two language varieties are by and large
prescriptive or not and whether variation in attitudes depends on age, gender and education.In
addition, the questionnaire aimed to gage the participants’ perceptions and evaluations of their own
linguistic production. The results indicate that there appears to be generational differences in terms
of the participants’ attitudes towards the appropriateness of CT being used to express seriousness
and politeness. Moreover, the younger generations claimed to have better written skills in ST than
the older generation. Gender does not seem to have any significant effect on the Turkish Cypriots’
attitudes towards the two language varieties. These findings are interpreted in the light of the post-
1974 context and the dominance of ST in education as well as the media in the north part of the
island.
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