Talk:Turkish alphabet

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Circumflex accent

I have an old edition of "Teach Yourself Turkish" published in 1953 which says on page 14, section 12, "the circumflex accent is written over a and u to indicate that a preceeding g, k or l is palatalized". It goes on to say that "some writers" also used it over long vowels in Arabic and Persian loanwords and gives the specific examples of circumflexes used to disambiguate the pairs hala (paternal aunt) vs. hâlâ (yet) vs. halâ (void). This accent is discussed further on page 15, section 18 and page 17, section 23.

I can't seem to find any information on this on the internet. Has this feature of Turkish writing become obsolete? Is this book just plain wrong? Can anybody shed some light? — Hippietrail 12:51, 27 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I've uncovered an interesting discussion on Usenet which goes into this here: http://groups.google.com.au/groups?hl=en&lr=&safe=off&frame=right&th=290ca9f886ce8a05&seekm=I0dm9.98164%24142.1281107%40news.chello.at#link1

— Hippietrail 13:14, 27 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Your source is correct. The governing body of the Turkish language still insists that the circumflex accent should be used in these three situations:

1. To disambiguate words with same spelling but different pronunciacions and meanings. (over a and u)
2. To indicate that a preceding g, k or l is palatalized. (over a and u)
3. To disambiguate the suffixes "-i" and "-î"

But in practice they are rarely used. Zfr 19:44, 4 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Well, when I watch DVDs with Turkish subtitles the circumflexes are generally shown so I assume you mean 'rarely used by the general population', right? Or is it general for all Turkish speakers, including linguists? Mulder1982 23:11, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

Most of the general population doesn't know how exactly to use circumflexes anyway. Even if they do, it's annoying to type them with a keyboard. That's why, TDK's suggestion (that they should be used in all cases of ambiguity) is almost entirely disregarded by general population. Tylose 15:21, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

Atatürk Q harfini sevmezdi

If you can trace the original of the well-known anecdote about Atatürk & Falih Rıfkı Atay, I suggest you include it to make this article even more enjoyable. --NigelG (or Ndsg) | Talk 11:59, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

palatalized G, K and L; long a, u, and i

It should be mentioned that the letter G, K and L in Turkish can each have two sounds. Examples are the words 'kâğıt' and 'kalem', 'gâvur' and 'gazel', lâle and lala. The presence of a circumflex sign on the vowel following the G, K or L indicates whether the consonant is to be palatalized. Also, words of Arabic or Persian origin may have the vowels a, u and i lengthened if they carry a circumflex sign. When a noun is converted to an adjective by the addition of an i at the end, it is written with a circumflex to distinguish it from the accusative case: e.g., askerî (military) vs. askeri (the soldier). It would be good if the IPA symbols for these variants were shown in the table.

The Turkish Language Association (Türk Dil Kurumu) prescribes these rules in its spelling guide [1]. However, there is a tendency among many Turkish writers to view the use of the circumflex as optional, except for resolving ambiguous words (e.g., 'hala' (aunt) vs 'hâlâ' (still, yet)). This practice makes the language less phonetic, and sometimes a non-native speaker just has to know what the correct pronunciation is. --InfoCan 19:47, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Turkish letter 'a'

In the table it says that the Turkish letter 'a' corresponds with the IPA-sign 'a' which is an open front unrounded vowel but the English approximation features an open-mid back unrounded vowel as in fun or but. The exact vowel isn't used in the English language but comes very close to a near-open front unrounded vowel as in words like bat, cat, fat ...

--

Comment to the above comment: I have friends that pronounce the Turkish letter A as [ɑ] (the a in father), not as [ʌ]. This leaves me wondering if the latter pronunciation is just İstanbul dialect, until Omniglot says that the letter A is pronounced as [ɑ], which was supposedly also true of Ottoman Turkish. This pronunciation is also confirmed by listening to some Turkish music - for example, Derya Köroğlu, the lead singer in the band Yeni Türkü, who's originally from İstanbul, seems to pronounce A as [ɑ] and not [ʌ]. Now, I know that drawing interpretation from musicians is probably not the way to go, but that does leave me wondering a bit. If no one objects, I can change that bit of the article. --Daniel Blanchette (talk) 01:12, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

Still incorrect, not self-consistent. The IPA in the table is /a/ but the English Approximation says 'As a in father'. The A in 'father' is generally the back vowel /ɑ/, e.g. Cambridge Dictionary UK//ˈfɑː.ðə^r// US/ˈfɑː.ðɚ/, although I have certainly heard /ˈfaː.ðər/. In other words. if the actual pronunciation [a] is correct, the example is wrong. But the above discussion and some sources prefer pronunciation [ɑ], which would be approximated by 'father'. So there are actually three issues:

1. What is the correct Turkish pronunciation of A, specified with IPA? [a], [ɑ], [ʌ] or ??

'Correct' of course =common, attested, officially decreed etc., qualify as necessary

2. Are regional/dialectic variants to be included?

3. The English Approximation must match the IPA as far as possible.

Interestingly, an AI-assisted inquiry (MS Edge/Bing CoPilot) gave the following (edited for clarity):

[a]: This represents an open front unrounded vowel.

[ɑ]: This is an open back unrounded vowel. However, this sound is less common in Turkish and might not be the standard pronunciation.

[ʌ]: This is an open-mid back unrounded vowel, similar to the “u” sound in English “cup”. Again, this sound is not typical in Turkish.

For most Turkish speakers, the first option ([a]) is the closest match. However, individual variations exist, and regional accents may influence pronunciation. If you’re aiming for a more authentic Turkish accent, stick with [a].

I am reluctant to touch this, as I am not a Turkish expert, but an internal inconsistency error like this shouldn't be allowed to stand. It is misleading. If anyone has a good example English word with the exact [a] sound, please help! D Anthony Patriarche (talk) 04:03, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

@DanCBJMS and D A Patriarche: The exact phonetic value of Turkish ⟨a⟩ varies between back [ɑ] and central [ɑ̈]. The latter sound, which is the more common of the two, can also be (and often is) transcribed as [ä], and in phonemic transcriptions the centering diacritic is often removed for simplicity, giving us /a/. In any case, the vowel's phonetically never front.

As for /ʌ/, while this symbol is traditionally used for the vowel sound in the English word cup, actually this transcription is phonetically inaccurate, because in most English dialects that vowel is actually pronounced as [ɐ]. [ɐ] is quite close to [ɑ̈], and as the English /ɑ/ is often long and Turkish has developed phonemic vowel length after the loss of /ɣ/, Turkish speakers may feel that the ⟨u⟩ in cup is a better representation of the Turkish short vowel. – anlztrk (talk | contribs) 07:51, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

English approximation of <ı>

There is no sound that sounds anything like /ɯ/ in English, so it is wrong to state that it sounds like nation, for 'nation' is pronounced /ˈneɪʃən/. The schwa is mid-central and somewhat rounded, while /ɯ/ is close-back and unrounded. For this, I have removed the claim from the article. Nay the snake 10:19, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

The 'o' sound

This article states that "o" is pronounced as in the word "no", which is clearly a diphtong in english unless you're from Jamaica. Other sources on the internet compare it with the "o" in the word "ornament" or "orchestra". This corresponds better with the turkish I've heard. Can someone with proper insight verify which example is the more fitting? JoaCHIP 13:44, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

"u" as in "nude"?

This seriously confused me. Apparently only in certain dialects of English, and I so far haven't found on wikipedia any information as to which dialects, where. I guess most "standard" dialects just don't have any similar sounds to compare with? Tanketz 02:46, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

English example for /ɾ/

The example word 'ladder' does contain /ɾ/ for many English speakers (see English_Language#Consonants), although it's not written with 'r'. Perhaps there should be a note about which English dialects are meant? Cibumamo (talk) 16:03, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Sivas or Kayseri?

The well-known photograph of Atatürk teaching the new alphabet was taken in Kayseri, according to http://www.tccb.gov.tr/common/gallery/ataturk/photo_00040.jpg. However, the photograph found on http://www.byegm.gov.tr/YAYINLARIMIZ/kitaplar/FMD/eng/01024.htm is clearly taken on the same occasion or in any case at the same spot, but stated to be in Sivas, about 160 km northeast of Kayseri. Both sources are Turkish government sites; they cannot be both right. Does anyone know of a way to decide between the two spots? See also commons:Image:LIllustrationCover13October1928.jpg.  --Lambiam 22:40, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

link for "Turkish alphabet and pronunciation guide" is broken

http://www.turkishclass.com/basic_alphabet.htm is getting 404 errors

Bahri Okuroglu (talk) 19:33, 25 September 2008 (UTC) bahrio

Phonology

I have a friend who speaks Turkish, and when he speaks "A" and "U" it sounds more like [a] and [u], not [ʌ] and [ʊ]. Are those latter pronunciations just the Istanbul dialect, or is there something that I'm not getting? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.223.57.216 (talk) 02:05, 15 December 2008 (UTC)
turkish of turkey or middle asia? [in some siberian dialects/ languages the 'a' is talked as /a/]
Tabascofernandez (talk) 21:12, 14 July 2017 (UTC)

Letter Ü

• There is "ü" in "music", "museum", "confuse" and "future" —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.165.242.206 (talk) 16:36, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

If you're French, yes.--92.75.194.36 (talk) 19:30, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

in french 'u' is pronounced /ɥ/ (as a consonant) but /ɯ/ is a vowel.
Tabascofernandez (talk) 21:16, 14 July 2017 (UTC)

Ğ / ğ

The article has interesting information on the provenance of most of the "accented" Turkish letters, but lacks anything historical at all on the most unique Turkish letter "Ğ /ğ". What was the reason for choosing the "inverted breve" diacritic for The Arabic letter غ? Was it in use for transcriptions of Arabic or Ottoman Turkish already or was it specifically invented from scratch? — Hippietrail (talk) 01:24, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

You answered the question yourself: The symbol is used in some transcriptions of the Arabic alphabet, such as ISO 233-2.--92.75.194.36 (talk) 19:39, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

No, the scheme you are talking about was made in 1993 not prior Turkish alphabet. --Mahmudmasri (talk) 12:31, 1 December 2010 (UTC)

the small letter g can't be written by cedilla, so the breve is used instead. in turkish its /ɣ/ sound reduces to a /ɦ/ while its aspirated couple, the /x/ reduced to /h/ and shown by H.

Tabascofernandez (talk) 20:59, 14 July 2017 (UTC)

Sounds: wrong examples!

Sounds: examples must be short and clear! it says: "ç = As ch in chimpanzee" /why chimpanzee? chalk will be better! bobblehead, dillydally, gargoyle, shenanigans, vivacious, internationality for "L" sound! Are you joking? Please find better examples! Who wrote them? Why shenanigans? You can easily say: "ş = As sh in she" Please change them! Böri (talk) 14:03, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

Deletion of irrelevant content: citation of a scene from Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow.

Five years ago, at 22:55 on 4 August 2006, back when the article was a stub, an irrelevant passage was ignorantly inserted under the heading, "Trivia". It said that the novel Gravity's Rainbow contained a plot element about committees charged with developing a "New Turkish Alphabet". Very soon thereafter, the novel's author's name was added to the remark. Unfortunately, it would be a full year, http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Turkish_alphabet&oldid=152919976, before the crucial information was added that this plot element had to do with the Soviet Union, specifically with Soviet Central Asia, the area east of the Caspian Sea. Soviet Central Asia was of course never part of even the Ottoman Empire, let alone its successor state, modern Turkey. The plot element, which is in any case fictional, had NOTHING to do with the language of modern Turkey (or even with the language of the Ottoman Empire). The insertion of the passage was due to confusion over the terms "Turks" and "Turkish". In one sense of the word, the "larger" sense, the Turks are a group of ethnicities which, although they are distinct, see each other as sister peoples, calling each other "Turks"; plus, many of their languages are extremely similar to the point that there is a useful degree of mutual intelligibility. The reason for this situation is, of course, that the distinct peoples originate from a single language community calling itself "Turks". In fact, many of the distinct ethnicities arose less than a thousand years ago, which is recent in terms of ethnic evolution. In these respects, the "Turks" are exactly like the Slavs. "Turks" in this larger sense include Kazakhs, Uzbeks, Azerbaijanis, etc. In Western academic parlance, it is standard to use "Turkic" to indicate "Turks" in the "larger" sense. On the other hand, the Turks are unlike the Slavs in that among the multitude of "Turks" is one group that is known by no other name, this group of course being the Turks of Turkey. Now, it's a historical fact that the Russians in particular, especially before the 20th century, often referred to all the distinct Turkic nations as "Turks" regardless of whether they were Nogais (Nogays/Noghais/Noghays), "Crimean Tatars", Tatars, Ottoman Turks, Balkars, etc. Soviet Central Asia had three "union republics" dedicated to "Turk" ethnicities: Kazakh SSR (Soviet Socialist Republic), Uzbek SSR, and Kirghiz SSR. The scene in Pynchon's novel would have pertained to these Turkic SSR's. For that reason above all, but also because it's a piece of fiction and an obscure piece, it has no place in this article. This is why I just deleted the section, "In popular culture", which contained nothing but a sentence alluding to a this scene from Gravity's Rainbow. Dale Chock (talk) 06:27, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

"ü as ue in clue"

No. "clue" is pronounced /klju:/ (ranging between [klu] and [klju:]). Neither version has [y] in it. A better option would be as "oo" in "food", in some English or Scottish dialects.

Punctuation marks

We should cover the difference between “inverted commas” and —dashes— as quotation marks. — kwami (talk) 20:31, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

What is this supposed to mean?

In Turkish alphabet#Early reform proposals: "If you see a circle at the end of a word it means that every other letter is silent". 78.0.218.49 (talk) 01:59, 10 April 2015 (UTC)

Prononciation sample for letter R

In the sample it states the following:

R r /ɾ/[2] As tt in better

To me this makes absolutely no sense. The 'R' should have a sample containing this letter. The 'As tt in better' has no relevance to this letter at all. A better suggestion should be proposed, such as 'As R in Roving (rolling r)' — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hveene (talk • contribs) 11:10, 2 February 2017 (UTC)

In American English, the 'tt' in better is pronounced as an alveolar flap. This is a close approximation to the rhotics (the r consonant) in a number of languages. — Ƶ§œš¹ _{[lɛts b̥iː pʰəˈlaɪˀt]} 04:05, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

A talk

it'll be so nice if we replace C c /dʒ/ with (dotless) J ȷ and replace Y y /j/ with (breve) J̆ j̆ . then we get rid of I ı /ɯ/ with showing it with Y y while merging (all loan) J j /ʒ/ with previous C c. in Azeri (acute) É é /e:/ excludes Ə ə /æ/ (allophone of turkish E e /ɛ/) while (cedilla) Ķ ķ /x/ replaces X x. the Q q is fully covered by G g /g/. [because TR: k /q/ and AZ: g /ɢ/ are allophonic too]. if summarize: replacing [ I ı ] and [ Ç ç ] by [ J̆ j̆ ] and [ Ķ ķ ], respectively. while killing dots in ( İ j ). see what happens:

an alternate sorting and representing

for a Qwerty keyboard [TuR-glish], also these shortcuts are available: eh/e:/, jh/ʒ/, gh/ɣ/, x/ʃ/, q/x/ (where qh/q/ )
Tabascofernandez (talk) 20:56, 14 July 2017 (UTC)

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Taught

"Approximately gh in "taught"". Are you guys aware that the "gh" in "taught" is always silent in all standard varieties of English? 77.73.168.99 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 17:17, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

This has been changed to "through", with exactly the same mysterious logic. Pirate pete (talk) 14:11, 20 July 2018 (UTC)

Word-final r

A word-final r, as in bir, is pronounced more like a fricative than as a tap, at least in Istanbul and Ankara. (Perhaps this applies to any coda – which then is just the single consonant r, never a cluster.) You can think of it as a halfway aborted tap, closing but not opening again. I'm not sure how to denote that in IPA. Perhaps /ɾ˺/ with the "unreleased stop" diacritic?  --Lambiam 09:30, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

Ğ, the breve'd "g" not mentioned

The letter g with a breve, that's an inverted circumflex, lengthens the preceding o.

Prunefaced Grammarian (talk) 15:57, 22 December 2018 (UTC)

More general: the preceding vowel. It has other uses, though – as is explained in the article under ref 'c'. Richard 10:31, 28 December 2018 (UTC)

Thanks.

Prunefaced Grammarian (talk) 15:27, 16 October 2021 (UTC)

Turkish Latin Alphabet?

I would move the page to 'Turkish Latin alphabet' or something along these lines. Throughout history the Turkish language was written using several alphabets. Therefore I think calling this page 'Turkish alphabet' is confusing, especially when there's another page about the Ottoman Turkish alphabet SpecialKaenguruH (talk) 10:34, 18 May 2019 (UTC)

Apostrophe?

The inflection table of wikt:İstanbul includes an apostrophe, but no mention of it is made in this article. What does it mean? Rua (mew) 10:44, 28 November 2019 (UTC)

The apostrophe seems to be used when declining any proper name. Burzuchius (talk) 13:45, 13 December 2019 (UTC)

Pronunciation of /i/

The table shows "i" is pronounced as /i/ in the IPA, which corresponds to the i in fit, but this makes no sense. Fit is pronounced /fɪt/ in English while /i/ in the IPA marks a close front ungrounded vowel as in "see" /si/, so how is "i" pronounced in Turkish? /i/ or /ɪ/? SanctaSofya (talk) 20:44, 31 January 2022 (UTC)

Lowercase l is incorrectly listed as i

In the image containing the alphabet for Turkish, uppercase dotless I is incorrectly paired with lowercase dotted i. Instead it should be paired with lowercase dotless ı. The faulty image is linked here: https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Turkish_alphabet.svg Jjamison (talk) 22:02, 19 June 2022 (UTC)

Pronunciation of dotless ı

Shouldn't the dotless ı be represented by /ə/ rather than /ɯː/? It sounds like "e" in "the". 2A02:1811:D42E:B900:5909:D861:EBC9:3856 (talk) 04:06, 24 November 2022 (UTC)

The alphabet was not created by Agop Dilâçar!

Agop Dilaçar did not create the new Turkish alphabet. He never took part in the new alphabet commission. He was not even in Turkey when the New Turkish Alphabet came into force in 1928. While the new alphabet was being prepared in Turkey, he was living in Bulgaria and had no ties to Turkey. He came for the first time after a long time to attend the language congress in 1932. When he arrived, the new Turkish alphabet was already widely used. 88.243.159.186 (talk) 16:01, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

That is your opinion. Many reliable sources state otherwise. Nocturnal781 (talk) 17:16, 21 March 2023 (UTC)

This is not my opinion, this is a fact. What you call a reliable source is only ideological newspaper and unsourced blog posts written after 2000. If you look at the original state records of the alphabet commission studies in 1928, you will see that there was no such person as Agop Martayan. If you know Turkish, you can learn all the processes made with alphabet studies with all its resources in this scientific article. Studies Carried Out by the Language Committee on the Adoption of the New Turkish Alphabet - Doç. Dr. Fahri KILIÇ In addition, Agop Martayan does not write that he took part in this alphabet commission even in his own article. As I said, he was not in Turkey in 1928, he was not even a Turkish citizen. It is not even possible for him to participate in language studies. 88.243.159.186 (talk) 12:55, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for reverting the IP @UrielAcosta:, @Nocturnal781: - the IP is being extremely disruptive and POV editing in multiple pages regarding Agop Dilâçar, and they're also edit-warring. I think if they don't stop, an edit-warring report is more than due.

Now to the IP, Wikipedia is based on reliable WP:INDEPENDENT sources, which confirm that Agop Dilâçar (Hagop Martayan) composed the Turkish latin alphabet:

1. "The modern Turkish alphabet based on Latin was composed by Hakob Martayan (Agop Dilâçar)" – Aidan Russell, Truth, Silence and Violence in Emerging States: Histories of the Unspoken, Routledge

2. "With the establishment of the Turkish republic in 1923 and the language reforms initiated by Mustafa Kemal in 1928, the language went through a radical transformation: it would no longer be written in the Arabic alphabet but in the Latin, and it would be purified of its Arabic and Persian vocabulary. Concurrently, it would no longer be called Ottoman Turkish but simply Turkish. A language committee was established to adapt the Latin script to the phonetic demands of Turkish, resulting in a new alphabet of 29 letters. The script was founded by an Armenian, Hagop Martayan (1895-1979)." – Adam J. Goldwyn, Renée M. Silverman, Mediterranean Modernism: Intercultural Exchange and Aesthetic Development, Springer, page 224

This is an undeniable fact, WP:INDEPENDENT sources confirm it. So stop POV editing and adding sources that are not WP:INDEPENDENT and violate WP:AGEMATTERS. KhndzorUtogh (talk) 20:05, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

You are very interesting people. You are referring to unsourced books written in 2019 instead of the official records of the 1928 state. Then we have to ask Aidan Russell the following question: How did Agop Martayan, who lives in Bulgaria, join the alphabet commission in Ankara in 1928? I sent you the article written by Agop Martayan directly. In his own handwriting, he says he did not take part in the alphabet commission. Why do you stubbornly find the lies written after 2000 and point it as a source? On what basis does Adam J. Goldwyn, Renée M. Silverman claim that Agop Dilaçar was in the 1928 alphabet commission? There are no footnotes about it in either book. Why are unsourced books that don't provide any references being referenced, rather than a scientific academic article? What you can do is to find the lies written after 2000 and throw them here. So, if "Agop Martayan was the first president of Turkey" was written in those books, you would believe it like the word of God. Please, someone who speaks Turkish come; Let him read the 1928 alphabet delegation lists as originals, not the lies written after 2000.

If Agop Martayan created this alphabet himself in Bulgaria, why was the Language Commission established in Ankara in 1928? What did Ragıp Hulusi Özden, İbrahim Grantay, Ahmet Cevat Emre, Mehmet Emin Erişirgil, İhsan Sungu, Avni Başman, Falih Rıfkı Atay, Ruşen Eşref Ünaydın, Yakup Kadri Karaosmanoğlu, Ali Haydar Taner work on for 1 year? Either you don't read the article on the wikipedia page yourself. Agop Martayan creates the Turkish alphabet, but then a language commission is established in Ankara and 10 linguists there create the Turkish alphabet again. Nonsense! Canuur (talk) 21:31, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Is this your account IP? If so, in addition to reading the notices I left on your IP talk page, you need to actually read my comment above before posting replies like this – I already told you that Wikipedia prefers modern and independent sources per WP:AGEMATTERS, WP:INDEPENDENT, please read these. Your source is from 1930, and it's neither modern (almost century old) nor independent. The reliable, modern and independent sources I provided here clearly state Agop Dilacar was the founder of Turkish Latin based script. And we don't canvass on Wikipedia, don't write on other people's pages to "help" you. KhndzorUtogh (talk) 21:58, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

There is deliberate disinformation being made here right now. You are not looking at correct information, but distorted information that was written after 2000 and does not provide any source on the subject. The fabricated information given is already cornologically incorrect. Agop Martayan came to Turkey for the first time in 1932, but the Language commission was established in Ankara in 1928 and they worked on the Turkish Alphabet for 1 year. Agop Martayan was never involved in the alphabet studies. In fact, he does not have an alphabet study in Bulgaria. He has articles on this topic. Agop Martayan has never said "I invented the alphabet" in any of his articles or in any TV broadcast. Canuur (talk) 22:15, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

@Canuur Do not personally attack your fellow editors by calling comments here "disinformation" - you base this claim on nothing hence it's a personal attack to accuse someone of this. Are you not listening? See modern and independant sources, Wikipedia isn't written on outdated source from 1930, see WP:AGEMATTERS, WP:INDEPENDENT. See the quotes from the sources again if you've somehow missed my comment: : 1. "The modern Turkish alphabet based on Latin was composed by Hakob Martayan (Agop Dilâçar)" – Aidan Russell, Truth, Silence and Violence in Emerging States: Histories of the Unspoken, Routledge : 2. "With the establishment of the Turkish republic in 1923 and the language reforms initiated by Mustafa Kemal in 1928, the language went through a radical transformation: it would no longer be written in the Arabic alphabet but in the Latin, and it would be purified of its Arabic and Persian vocabulary. Concurrently, it would no longer be called Ottoman Turkish but simply Turkish. A language committee was established to adapt the Latin script to the phonetic demands of Turkish, resulting in a new alphabet of 29 letters. The script was founded by an Armenian, Hagop Martayan (1895-1979)." – Adam J. Goldwyn, Renée M. Silverman, Mediterranean Modernism: Intercultural Exchange and Aesthetic Development, Springer, page 224 These are reliable, modern, independent and academic sources based on which we write Wikipedia - we don't write Wikipedia based on your own original research. Agop Martayan doesn't need to say "I invented the alphabet" on radio or TV, what kind of argument is this? Reliable sources from academic publications state that he's the creator of the alphabet, this is what Wikipedia is based on. Seems like you just don't like the information from independent, modern and reliable sources. KhndzorUtogh (talk) 22:24, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

There are no footnotes on this subject in any of the books you mentioned. These books are unsourced plain texts written after 2000. In other words, it can be written in those books that "Agop Martayan is the first president of the Republic of Turkey". I am sending you directly Agop Martaya's articles on the new Turkish alphabet. He never says "I invented the new Turkish alphabet". It is already impossible to do that. Because he was not a Turkish citizen in 1928, he did not live in Turkey and he was not a member of the Language Commission.

Türk Dili Dil ve Edebiyat Dergisi, Dilâçar, A. Alfabemizin 30. Yıldönümü, Ağustos 1958, C: VII, S: 83, s. 534-541

If you write "a book says this in 2019, a book says this in 2016" again, what you are doing here is disinformation. Because no footnotes were written for the claim made in those books. it's just plain text. Canuur (talk) 22:39, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

@Canuur What you call "these books are unsourced plain texts written after 2000" are reliable books published by academic publications such as Routledge and Springer, please take your bias out of your comments. And I already told you several times that Wikipedia is written based on reliable, independent and modern sources, so actually Wikipeida prefers modern books not century old book from 1930s like you tried to insert in the article. Do you possibly not fully understand the English language? Can you carefully read the following guidelines before ever commenting on this subject WP:INDEPENDENT, WP:AGEMATTERS? "what you are doing here is disinformation" - another personal attack for which you've been warned for already [2]. I'm going to report you if you make another remark like this. And you restored your canvassing comment - canvassing isn't allowed on Wikipedia and I notified you of this [3], please remove your canvassing comment or you'll be reported. KhndzorUtogh (talk) 23:05, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Unfortunately, the issue here cannot be resolved with you. what you're doing is just dictation. I need to talk to more experts about this wikipedia page. (unless you delete the messages I wrote to people of course) Canuur (talk) 00:31, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Why is the correct information not written according to historical documents?

Unfortunately, the lie is written on the page that only Agop martayan invented the Turkish alphabet, not according to the 1928 Turkish Alphabet commission work records, but by showing the unofficial books that were written after 2000 and do not provide any source. Even a column written in Turkish was taken as a reference for this false information "İrfan Özfatura: "Dilimizi dilim dilim... Agop Dilâçar" (Turkish), Türkiye Gazetesi, April 3, 2011. Retrieved February 15, 2012" The funny thing is, it doesn't say "Agop Martayan invented the Turkish alphabet" in this column. Although it was never mentioned, the lie "and the linguistic team which invented the modern Turkish alphabet included several Armenian linguists, such as Agop Dilâçar." was added to the page with reference to this column. I directly sent you the article written by Agop Martaya on 9 August 1958 in the Turkish Language Institution about the new Turkish alphabet. Türk Dili Dil ve Edebiyat Dergisi, Dilâçar, A. Alfabemizin 30. Yıldönümü, Ağustos 1958, C: VII, S: 83, s. 534-541 Where did Agop Martayan write "I invented the Turkish alphabet"? Canuur (talk) 22:05, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Agop Dilâçar/Language committee

@GGT: Reading the body of the article and Springer and Routledge sources, We need to nuance/specify this part because it isn't contradictory, but different people worked on different things, the source published by Springer mentions both by stating that "A language committee was established to adapt the Latin script to the phonetic demands of Turkish, resulting in a new alphabet of 29 letters. The script was founded by an Armenian, Hagop Martayan", both facts can be simultaneously true, and don't exclude or contradict each other, and the body of the article supports both of these. Agop is already mentioned in the body of the article as doing such (creating the script, not the entire alphabet with it's grammar and phonetics, as it was erroneously worded before). Upon further review, both could be duely mentioned in the lead with proper wording, if there's any need to mention them in the lead at all. - Kevo³²⁷ (talk) 13:46, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Why are Agop Dilacar's own articles rejected, but a book written without reference and reference in 2019 is considered a reference? Türk Dili Dil ve Edebiyat Dergisi, Dilâçar, A. Alfabemizin 30. Yıldönümü, Ağustos 1958, C: VII, S: 83, s. 534-541 In August 1958, Agop Dilaçar wrote an article titled "30th Anniversary of Our Alphabet" in the journal of the Turkish Language Institution. he describes the alphabets used by the Turks from the 13th century to the period of the Turkish Republic. He tells about the alphabet discussions in the last Ottoman period. He tells that an alphabet commission was established with Mustafa Kemal in 1928 and that about 10 linguists in the committee created the new Turkish alphabet in 1928. But nowhere in the article does He say "I created the Turkish alphabet" or "I was in the alphabet commission". The reason is very clear. Because in 1928 Agop Martayan lived in Bulgaria, not Turkey. He came for the first time in 1932 upon Atatürk's special invitation. The reason is not the subject of "new Turkish alphabet" by Agop Martayan, but his research on Turkish, Indo-European languages and Sumerian relations. In other words, Agop Dilaçar's writings are not accepted as a source and are deleted, but any book dated 2019 that has nothing to do with linguistics and says "Armenians invented the Turkish alphabet" without providing any source is considered a source. If you look at the original state records of the alphabet commission studies in 1928, you will see that there was no such person as Agop Martayan. If you know Turkish, you can learn all the processes made with alphabet studies with all its resources in this scientific article. Studies Carried Out by the Language Committee on the Adoption of the New Turkish Alphabet - Doç. Dr. Fahri KILIÇ Unfortunately, Turkish sources are directly rejected without being read and examined. In other words, someone opens the "Google Books" site and writes keywords such as "agop dilacar Turkish alphabet", forcibly dictates the post-2010 books that support the false claim from the results. Canuur (talk) 19:06, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

we should not push agenda and obey the rules. that is the most important thing. i coming from eksisozluk.com and many people will come. be natural and stay calm people!!! ----modern_primat ඞඞඞ ^TALK 20:49, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

Hi Kevo327 and KhndzorUtogh, I'm sorry about getting back a bit late, I've been rather busy lately. Sorry for the lengthy comment in advance. So I've actually been aware about the issue regarding Agop Dilaçar here for a while and had the article on my watchlist, but never had the time to do some proper work here. The personal attacks and the canvassing are obviously unacceptable and I'm sorry that this has been the case here - I wish I had time to look into this properly before things escalated. Aybeg Canuur: you do have a point, but the way in which you are conducting yourself in the discussion unfortunately does everything possible to take away from that point.

I fully agree, Kevo327, that nuance is necessary here - but on face value it is contradictory to say that both Dilaçar and the committee designed the alphabet. As the committee's involvement in the alphabet's creation is absolutely undeniable, any source asserting Dilaçar's involvement in the alphabet ideally needs to acknowledge the presence of this commission and Dilaçar's specific involvement in creating the alphabet. It's pretty WP:EXTRAORDINARY to claim that this person single-handedly designed the alphabet when an entire commission was created for this reason and, as rightly pointed out by Canuur, even he had no claim to the alphabet in his writings.

I have examined the sources that support Dilaçar's contribution to the alphabet. These are both tangential claims made in passing in works that are on a completely different subject matter. More precisely:

• Truth, Silence and Violence in Emerging States: Histories of the Unspoken - this is a book about the politics of memory by Aidan Russell, whose geographical area of expertise is Subsaharan Africa; he has not conducted any independent research on Turkey nor on linguistics. He makes the assertion that Dilaçar designed the alphabet in a sweeping paragraph glossing over Armenian persecution in Turkey from 1915 all the way Hrant Dink. There is no inline attribution for this claim.
• Mediterranean modernism : intercultural exchange and aesthetic development - this book likewise has no inline attribution to support the claim. Its subject matter on aesthetics is so completely unrelated to the topic at hand that there is no way that the authors or the peer reviewers would have rigorously fact checked this statement, and indeed the only possible way to produce this source during this discussion would have been to simply Google Books "Agop Dilacar Turkish alphabet" and WP:CHERRYPICK the sources that came up.

Now, let's do this the proper way - let's have a look at the subject matter experts and their writings on the Turkish language reform. There's loads of literature but I'll focus on the two most relevant ones in English for brevity:

• The Turkish Language Reform: A Catastrophic Success by Geoffrey Lewis, Oxford University Press. Although published in 1999, this work remains the definitive account of the Turkish language reform in English, and for good reason (it's not exactly a fast moving field anyway...). Lewis devotes an entire chapter to the new alphabet and the workings of the committee (pp. 28-39), and also mentions Dilaçar a few times through the book. His only reference to Dilaçar in relation to the alphabet comes on p. 31: " Agop Dilaçar (1962: 41) tells of showing him, sometime between 1916 and 1918, a copy of Nemeth’s (1917), Türkische Grammatik which printed the Turkish in a Latin transcription [...] Kemal did not like it much."
• Eternal Dawn: Turkey in the Age of Atatürk (2019) by Ryan Gingeras, Oxford University Press. An excellent and critical recent volume on Atatürk's rule in Turkey. He discussed the new alphabet and language reforms in pp. 176-182 with again an in-depth account of the committee. No mention of Dilaçar here either.

This is in addition to the ample Turkish-language sourcing previously cited. So we have very authoritative sources that completely omit Dilaçar when discussing the creation of the alphabet - against this we have random, cherry-picked sources that tangentially mention his ostensible work on the alphabet with no substantiation of what he may have added on top of the committee, no details on the actual workings of the committee and no attribution. The conclusion must be clear. I hope this settles the dispute - I'll edit the article in line with what I've said here. --GGT (talk) 20:24, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

@GGT: I'd preferred to answer earlier but i didn't have the chance, I won't comment on any behavioural issues and discuss on the content:

First of all on the two sources, The names that appear on the cover are the reviewing academics, not the actual authors of the two sources, as each individual article in the books are seperate and credited to their authors;

• In Mediterranean modernism : intercultural exchange and aesthetic development the author is Defne Çizakça, PhD., lecturer in one of the universities of Turkey with various history articles on the later years of Ottoman empire and beginning of the Turkish Republic, who would presumably have all the Turkish sources at hand.
• in Truth, Silence and Violence in Emerging States: Histories of the Unspoken our author is Vicken Cheterian, PhD., an expert analyst with a well respected book on the denial of the Armenian genocide, in his article, Agop is mentioned in the context of the systematic marginalisation of Armenians in recent Turkish history, an article was written on Another marginalised/omitted Armenian in Agos (mentioning this to clarify the link to Hrant Dink).

Both are adequate adacemics on the broader scope of 20th century history of Turkey, if not in the narrower scope of linguistics.

As for the other sources, I'm afraid that histiographic bias or policies might have a part in the omission of Agop:

• The Turkish Language Reform: A Catastrophic Success: in the part on the working of the committee that did the adaptation of the latin alphabet (pp. 28-39), an origin or a inspirationary source for the latin script isn't mentioned, with the inline citations from the primary source being those of Atay and Ülkütaşır, Turkish Histiography does have well documented instances of omitting Armenians, similar problems regarding Turkish Histiography of Atatürk's era is present in several areas (and in a few wikipedia articles as well, can name a few if you're interested)
• I can't comment on Eternal Dawn: Turkey in the Age of Atatürk as I could access it.

In the light of sources presented, we don't have sources where there isn't an attribution for an initial script or an origin or partial origin of a script, possibly due to deliberate omission by primary source (among other possible reasons), and we have those who attribute it to Agop Dilaçar.

CHERRYPICKING doesn't make sense since we don't have directly conflicting statements.

Until the discussion ends, I'll add back in the article that Agop Dilâçar made a latin script for Turkish in 1916, since we both have sources on that at least. - Kevo³²⁷ (talk) 20:41, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Hi, @Kevo327: thanks a lot for your reply. No need to be prompt in answering, we're not in a rush.

I will have to be frank that your statement that "we both have sources" that "Agop Dilâçar made a latin script for Turkish in 1916" is absolutely false. Neither of us have sources that support that specific statement. Çizakça and Cheterian do not give any specific year for his ostensible script-creation. Lewis, on the other hand, merely states that Dilaçar introduced Kemal to Nemeth's Latinised Turkish alphabet; there is absolutely no implication that Dilaçar himself created a script. I have added precisely this into the article already - this is in itself quite a substantial intellectual contribution to the development of the script and should not be minimised. Dilaçar gave more details about this specific encounter in an interview, which has been transcribed in this magazine article in Bütün Dünya. Here, he states that he was the first person that showed Atatürk a Latinised version of Turkish by showing him Nemeth's script. He makes absolutely no claim that he designed a script in 1916 - an indeed he details how he was serving in the army at the time. So your proposed statement is unfortunately completely incorrect.

I'm pretty sure I can identify more problems with orthodox Turkish historiography than merely omitting Armenians, but then I can identify many problems with any nation's historiography, the key is being critical about the sources at hand. The fact here is that Cheterian may well be a respected historian about genocide denial but he has done absolutely no work on the development of the Turkish alphabet and only mentions this claim in passing. Neither Cheterian nor Çizakça are discussing the development of the Turkish alphabet, they're not really intellectually engaging with this topic at all, they're just using it as an illustrative point. It's a good rhetorical point but anyone familiar with academic writing can tell you that neither these authors nor the editor nor the reviewer would have rigorously fact checked this claim. WP:HISTIC has a good section about this, and it starts by saying "The most desirable source for an individual claim is the scholarly work that gives weight to discussing the claim in the first place".

The bottom line is that any source that actually gives weight to discussing the development of the Turkish alphabet does not even bother discussing about a possibility that Dilaçar might have created a Latin script. Either this is a claim that is so removed from truth that the concerned scholars haven't bothered actively refuting it, or it has been so completely glossed over that it's not quite made its way to specialist literature, in which case, it's not our place to right this wrong anyway.

I'll end by posing some questions and putting the onus on you if you insist that Dilaçar designed a script. Are there any specific details about this script at all? When did he design it? Did he publish it or did he personally present it to Atatürk or did he make people aware otherwise? How did it differ from the end product of the committee? How did this influence the committee when he wasn't a part of it? Given how WP:EXTRAORDINARY this claim is, I would expect at least one of these questions to be answerable using a reliable source. Please, no more passing mentions, I'm talking about true intellectual engagement. If Dilaçar did indeed design an alphabet, I want to give some proper encyclopaedic information about this. And again, we're not in a rush, so please do take your time looking into this and I'm more than happy supporting with any Turkish-language sources (and may try pop to the British Library over the weekend if you want me to look at a specific book). GGT (talk) 21:45, 27 March 2023 (UTC)