Abstract:
In this lecture we discuss the evolution of Pontic Greek within the broader context of Asia Minor Greek. Given the lack of sufficiently old textual evidence, which would normally provide clues as to the evolution of Pontic Greek, the conservative character of Romeyka, an endangered Greek variety still spoken in the area of Black Sea in Turkey, means that it can be used as a “window on the past” thus allowing us to tell a (his)story of continuity, contact and change from Hellenistic times to present day.
Short bio:
Ioanna Sitaridou is University Senior Lecturer in Romance Philology at the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at the University of Cambridge and Fellow and Director of Studies in Linguistics and Modern and Medieval Languages at Queens’ College, Cambridge. She has worked extensively on Old Romance syntax, language contact and language change. For her research on Romeyka she was awarded the Stanley J. Seeger Visiting Research Fellowship in Hellenic Studies by Princeton University in Spring 2011 and a Research Fellowship at the Center for Hellenic Studies at Harvard University in Winter 2015.