Jennifer Manoukian’s recent essay titled “That’s not Armenian! Encounters with language purists past and present” published on H-Pem is thoughtful and informative and worth reading. It argues that the Armenian language has always borrowed from others and even the version of Armenian which we commonly think is the most “pure Armenian” (մաքուր հայերէն), classical Armenian, is also full of borrowings from other languages, especially Persian. It advocates an easing up of the purist approach to the language adopted by the Mekhitarists in the 1700’s and a more relaxed attitude toward spoken Western, and presumably Eastern Armenian as well. An...
