{"id":432,"date":"2017-07-04T03:14:48","date_gmt":"2017-07-04T07:14:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/globalreporting2017\/?p=432"},"modified":"2022-03-25T14:19:01","modified_gmt":"2022-03-25T18:19:01","slug":"who-is-a-greek-for-how-long","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/globalreporting2017\/who-is-a-greek-for-how-long\/","title":{"rendered":"Who is a Greek? For How Long?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"width: 676px;\" class=\"wp-video\"><video class=\"wp-video-shortcode\" id=\"video-432-1\" width=\"676\" height=\"380\" loop preload=\"metadata\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"video\/mp4\" src=\"http:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/globalreporting2017\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/36\/2017\/07\/MVI_9157.m4v?_=1\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/globalreporting2017\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/36\/2017\/07\/MVI_9157.m4v\">http:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/globalreporting2017\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/36\/2017\/07\/MVI_9157.m4v<\/a><\/video><\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><em>Video by Talya Nevins<\/em><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><em><span class=\"s1\">By Talya Nevins<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><strong> ATHENS\u00a0<\/strong>&#8212; Greece is one of the most homogenous countries in the world. <\/span><\/p>\n<p>Numbers tell the story: \u00a0A\u00a0<span class=\"s1\">2011 national census \u00a0found \u00a0that 93 percent of the citizens of the Hellenic Republic described themselves as ethnically Greek. A full 98 percent of the population identified its religion as Greek Orthodox. And 99 percent of citizens listed their primary language as Greek, according to the most recent government data available. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"> For as long as most Greeks can remember, this uniformity has been central to the country&#8217;s identity. But since 2011,\u00a0<\/span><span class=\"s1\">the resident population of Greece has been changing rapidly, and today those changes are beginning to look permanent.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">On June 29, Greek historianKostis Karpozilos presented a historical tour of the Benaki Museum\u2019s modern Greece exhibition. Karpozilos, youthful despite his three degrees and slightly graying beard, organized the lecture around the question \u201cWho is a Greek?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">According to Karpozilos, Greek identity evolved in tandem with the struggle for Greek independence\u2014religious, intellectual, and national\u2014from Ottoman rule. Because the Ottoman Empire organized its population by religious community, the Greek Orthodox population successfully organized a revolution and emerged victorious in 1821. However, as Karpozilos explained, \u201cAfter victory, now what? Democracy, but what kind?\u201d Thus, the process of Greek identity formation was born out of the war, and in victory the challenge to define Greekness became urgent. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">Indicating a surprisingly petite copy of the first Greek Constitution encased in glass, Karpozilos explained that the document from 1844 essentially defined a Greek citizen as \u201csomeone who is Greek Orthodox, speaks Greek, and lives in Greece\u201d (which was then geographically restricted to the Peloponnese and Athens). The following century was characterized by ethnic cleansing of non-Greeks, attempts to conquer more land in the Balkan wars, and the formation of a homogenous Greek nation first through integration of minorities, then \u201cby expelling, suppressing, and killing the others,\u201d Karpozilos continued.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">After the Greek army\u2019s \u201cCatastrophe\u201d at Smyrna, which ended Greek dreams of territorial expansion, the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne ordered a compulsory population transfer between Turkey and Greece in an attempt to end conflict between the two countries. More than 1 million Greek Orthodox were brought from Turkey to Greece and 600,000 Muslims were moved from Greece to Turkey in exchange.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">This swap ensured that Greece\u2019s population was almost entirely Greek Orthodox, but these 1 million people were not yet Greek. They were uprooted by war and politics and transplanted in Greece to build new lives. The route they took from Smyrna\u2014now Izmir in modern Turkey\u2014 to the Aegean islands is the same route that refugees now perilously traverse in mass numbers. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">An estimated 1.04 million refugees and migrants arrived in Greece in the last 18 months, according to the CIA World Factbook. Most of these people attempted to continue on to Northern Europe. However, approximately 60,000 refugees and asylum-seekers remain in Greece, stuck in limbo between dangerous home countries on one side and the closed borders of European countries on the other. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">But for how long can these refugees\u2019 lives in Greece continue to be considered limbo? Many of these people\u2014mostly Afghans and Iraqis, whom the European Union considers less of a priority than Syrian refugees\u2014 have been here for years, with no indication that they\u2019ll leave any time soon. Isobox modular homes in Schisto refugee camp have gardens with 9-foot high sunflowers. Children <a href=\"http:\/\/www.euronews.com\/2017\/06\/20\/refugees-integration-starts-with-education-the-example-of-avlona-elementary\"><span class=\"s2\">enroll in school and learn Greek<\/span><\/a>, not German.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">In a June 26 lecture on modern Greece, University of Athens Professor Dimitri A. Sotiropoulos carefully maintained a distinction between the demographic statistics used to describe the official Greek population and the status of the 60,000 refugees and migrants living in camps, squats, UN-provided apartments and makeshift accommodations. In discussing unemployment rates and poverty figures, he only mentioned Greeks who are incorporated into civil society. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">When asked when Greece and the refugees themselves will accept that these 60,000 are here to stay and adjust policies and data accordingly, Sotiropoulos replied, \u201cAs long as they are kept and remain on these four islands,\u201d referring to the islands of Lesbos, Samos, Chios, and Leros where the majority of refugees are kept, \u201cnobody will notice, apart of course from the local residents of these islands\u2026 They can throw resources at these four islands and Greek society will not have to pay attention. But this is not a solution.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">In addition to finding a more sustainable solution to the refugees\u2019 economic and humanitarian needs, the challenge that awaits Greece in the coming months and years will be how to adjust the idea of Greekness so that the 60,000 people who are here to stay may have a shot at successful integration. After this modern-day population transfer, how will the definition of Greekness change?<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; Video by Talya Nevins By Talya Nevins ATHENS\u00a0&#8212; Greece is one of the most homogenous countries in the world. Numbers tell the story: \u00a0A\u00a02011 national census \u00a0found \u00a0that 93 percent of the citizens of the Hellenic Republic described themselves as ethnically Greek. A full 98 percent of the population identified its religion as Greek<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/globalreporting2017\/who-is-a-greek-for-how-long\/\">Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":332,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-432","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","post-preview"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/globalreporting2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/432","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/globalreporting2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/globalreporting2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/globalreporting2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/332"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/globalreporting2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=432"}],"version-history":[{"count":20,"href":"https:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/globalreporting2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/432\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":839,"href":"https:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/globalreporting2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/432\/revisions\/839"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/globalreporting2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=432"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/globalreporting2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=432"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/globalreporting2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=432"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}