Issues of dialect use in education from the Greek Cypriot perspective

The issue of mother‐tongue education has preoccupied linguists and educationalists for many years. Some bring forward arguments in support of the use of dialects or non‐standard languages whereas others question their suitability as mediums of instruction. In multidialectal settings, choosing a language for instruction is never an easy matter because many factors need to be considered. In this article an effort is made to examine the situation in Cyprus, where the language of instruction is Standard Modern Greek (SMG) whereas the mother tongue of the students is the Greek Cypriot Dialect (GCD). On the basis of the results obtained from an attitudinal survey of teachers, the practice of using SMG officially and GDC unofficially is examined and assessed. An attempt is made to explore the feasibility of introducing GCD alongside SMG in the educational system of Cyprus.