Language: a pervasive presence:
Curators
Greek language in the 80’s, as well as the rest of the country’s culture, is like a narrow margin in the middle of a horizontally positioned hourglass. On the left lie the old words, the old world, the old culture. On the right, the new, the world as we know it today. There, in the middle, in the 80s, stands a filtered vocabulary. Somewhere between the drachma and the euro is the Eurobasket membrane. Inserted amongst KKE (the Communist Party of Greece) - KKE εσωτερικού (Communist Party of Greece - Interior) and Syriza one can find the hybrid known as SYN (The Coalition of the Left, of Movements and Ecology, commonly known as Synaspismos and abbreviated to SYN) .
This “in-between” vocabulary permeates the old and funnels it into the new in two different ways: a) The archaic dressed in modern words slips into the new era disguised, b) the actual new one that demands a powerful new language in order to express itself properly. The Greek language of the 80s is both a camouflaged language and a revolutionary one (acts as both a camouflage and as a means of revolution). Thus, the 80’s language doesn’t limit itself to what collective memories of generations past established as «the language of the youth» and the neogreek slang used by the middle classes. Everyday speech during this decade is enhanced by political influences but remains internally divided between an advertisement / regulatory language with new imperatives and intonations, and a language featuring strong, post-war survival elements. Moreover, the permanent prevalence of “dimotiki” (The language of the people, the modern vernacular form of the Greek language) used by politicians in their popular speeches as well as the entirety of the administrative sector, the democratization of literacy and education, the introduction of monotonic orthography and the conservative reactions to it shall be reflected in a multi-faceted linguistic presentation. The Language Pavilion has no tangible area in the exhibition, and the main exhibits will be presented in the catalogue, yet, Language will be present and active in many different ways throughout its course. Stickers placed at certain points of the venue will bring together linguistic areas thought to be in rivalry, the loudspeakers will be mixing iconic voices and phrases of the 80s, and unexpected recitations carried out by actors in other pavilions will substitute for the spatial dimension of the text with the primary impression of sound and the oral quality of language.