The Language Question and the Diaspora

The issue of language has a privileged place in Greek intellectual discourse. In America the race question has been at the forefront of political discussions over the past century and a half; Italy has its Southern Question; in Greece it is the Language Question that has generated an analogous amount of pages and debate. The term diglossia refers to the simultaneous existence of two varieties of the same language. The term bilingualism applies to the simultaneous existence of two different languages. The diasporic promiscuity of the language question is particularly clear in the cases of Psycharis and Delta. For Psycharis, as for Korais, French was his primary language. Penelope Delta, though more adamant about the necessity of living in Greece, also lived her life between different countries and languages. Born in Alexandria, Egypt, she stayed there until she was thirty, when she moved to Frankfurt.