Coronavirus also affected Turkish
Coronavirus, which has taken hold of Turkey since March, added new words to everyday language. Applied English and Translation Program student Erdem Gürsu prepared a study titled, "How did the Covid-19 outbreak affect our language use?" under the supervision of Lecturer Dr. Filiz Mergen, Izmir University of Economics (IUE) Vocational School Applied English and Translation Program. Dr. Mergen stated that expressions such as "new normal", "social distance", "controlled social life", "contact patient", "distance education" and "herd immunity" are among the new words and phrases that have entered our lives.
Dr. Filiz Mergen drew attention to the fact that foreign words, which are frequently used in medicine, have become a part of daily life. Stating that most words are used not with their Turkish equivalents, but only in the form of Turkish sounds with the method called borrowing, Dr. Mergen said, “Among these are words such as 'hygiene, isolation, quarantine, online, digital, disinfection, disinfectant, ventilation' that are used in different fields and that we are familiar with. In addition to these words, there are also words that most of us have heard for the first time such as 'pandemic, filiation, asymptomatic, intubation, peak, pneumonia'. The use of these words in this way instead of their Turkish equivalents is worrisome in terms of the corruption of our language. However, thanks to the epidemic, our awareness of the productive feature of language has increased.”
BRAND NEW SLOGANS
Noting that with the epidemic, new words and phrases were formed that would enable the narration of events that had never been encountered before, Dr. Mergen said the following: “Balcony concert, concert in the car, normalization, new normal, normalization calendar, social distance, controlled social life, zoom meeting, contact patient, contactless payment, herd immunity, short-term working or working from home and distance education are among the new words and phrases that have entered our lives. With the Covid-19 outbreak, we have started to use some words more frequently. ‘The words 'mask' and 'distance' are the two most striking examples of this. Noting that brand new slogans emerged with the epidemic, Dr. Mergen reminded that slogans such as "Stay at home", "Stay healthy", "Wear a mask", "Life fits into home" are frequently used.