Remarkable article on Language Log about how everyday Turkish is being changed by the media. It’s not any sort of intentional change, but it has to do with English-language movies being imported into Turkey.
Well, you say, that’s not unusual. Picking up foreign words and incorporating them into your language is how languages stay healthy and evolve. Heck, English is a great example of this.
But it’s not English, but how English is being dubbed into Turkish, that’s causing the change. When dubbing, translators come up with words and phrases to lip-sync as close as possible to what’s on the screen. As a result, “Hello” gets translated to Selâm, rather than the more traditional Turkish Merhaba. And exclamations of surprise (“Wow!”) are being translated Vavvvv! rather than the more traditional Vay anasımı!
And as things become standards in the media, they become standards in common speech.
Fascinating.