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all spent some years in emigration, acquiring the Athenian accent. When talking to each other
during the school time they mainly use Albanian, but after the school when they meet on the
village streets, in the church or kafeneio they often shift between two languages.
During the breaks mainly Albanian language can be heard on the corridors and the courtyard
of the school. As they keep company with the rest of the pupils who speak only Albanian,
those pupils (five among seven children whose one or both parents originate from
Dhërmi/Drimades or Palasa) who speak both languages (Greek and Albanian) use the local
Greek only on rare occasions. When I was learning Albanian and giving the lessons on
English language (to pupils from fifth to eighth grade) I encountered insults and
stigmatizations only in one class, aimed at a girl in fifth grade, who recently moved to
Dhërmi/Drimades together with her mother, who originates from the village. Before that the
girl was living in Ioannina, where she completed first four grades of the primary school. As
her command of Albanian was not fluent, she was often teased by her schoolmates with
pejorative expressions such as Kaur 36 (non believer) and Greku i derrit (a Greek pig). As she
was not accepted by the majority of her schoolmates, she kept company with few pupils of the
first and second grade, whose parents originated from Dhërmi/Drimades like her mother.
According to my observations as well as conversations with the teachers, two of the bilingual
children did not have problems with understanding Albanian language and their level of
knowledge of Albanian language was similar to their performance in rest of the subjects like
math, history, etc. Three of the bilingual pupils – among whom one attended the first grade,
one the second grade and one the fifth grade – had some problems with understanding
Albanian, while in other subjects their teachers did not perceive any problems. All five
bilingual pupils have spent either months or years in Greece. Except for the pupil in the fifth
grade all of them returned to the village some time before entering the primary school.
1.6.3. Spoken Languages
Most locals use Greek dialect combined with Albanian words in their everyday speech, used
on streets, and in kafeneias, local shops and churches. Besides typical words in
Dhermian/Drimadean dialect (like okso - outside, psiha - some, ortha - chicken), the local
vernacular often includes the Albanian words for numbers, months, seasons, measures, the
36 For more details about the word kaur, see Chapter Two, Contested Histories; subchapter 2.1. Dividing People
and Places.
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