Issues of identity and power in a greek-cypriot community

An investigation of reported attitudes and language use in Cyprus has enabled an interpretation of social conditions affording status and 'price' to products available in the linguistic market-place. It has identified boundaries of social division and provided reasons for the coexistenceofmultiple linguistic codes.An empirical investigation, with recourse to the theory of practice (Bourdieu, 1997), identifies and accounts for the use of national and international codes (i.e. the Greek-Cypriot dialect (GCD), Standard Modern Greek (SMG) and English), their market value and their location within the strata of the community. Simple summary scores fromfactor analysisgroupings suggest that despite the power and hegemonic potential of international languages such as English, the strength of the national codes persist due to their dominance as purveyors of instrumental worth and collective symbolism. English exists in response to symbolic and pragmatic forces determined by modernity. Moreover, multivariate analysis of variance reveals that it is those with greatest socioeconomic power who use English as a resource, enabling the construction and exploitation of multiple social identities.