Kusköy, Turkey - the whistling village | European Journal

Loud, piercing and sharp...a whistle is hard to ignore. But whistling languages are in danger of dying out. But residents of Kusköy on the Black Sea coast still communicate by whistling.An ee sounds higher than an ah. Consonants are distinguished by changes in pitch over different intervals of time. Eskimos communicate with whistles; so do indigenous people in the Amazon, and in Europe shepherds keep boredom at bay and communicate by whistling to each other. But the world's 70 whistling languages are slowly becoming extinct. Kusköy in Turkey is defending the tradition.

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• whistle
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[Tecfan]

Thank you, stumble

[avlasam]

unbelievable!

[NAPOLIFANSLONDON]

AMAZING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[paolaclark]

That's amazing. There is a similar whistling language in island La Gomera, one of the seven Canary Islands, Spain. Nowadays I think they're teaching this language to the La Gomera kids at school. It's really important to preserve this ways of communication as a treasure of the human culture and evolution.

[frostyh81]

so amazing, it's hard to believe!! Wish I could learn haha

[Telepian]

@Telepian and went to that town.

[Telepian]

The 1 dislike is from a guy that can't whistle.

[ukilic86]

There is a 1 dislike. I think that he clicked dislike because he didn't know the language.

[aporia82]

@Nitrozzy7 may be they are the immigrants of pontos?

[aporia82]

@apostel13 it's 100% true. I heard that some spanish mountain villagers also had a similar speech.

[aporia82]

@lovelyhera1314 well I'm not from the Black Sea region of Turkey (I'm from Istanbul), but as far as I know, thanks to modernity and globalisation, this tradition is dying and will be gone soon. the kids are using the sms and the msn :) many local cultures are disapperaing and it's pretty sad to witness that.

[lovelyhera1314]

But are the children speaking the language? All the whistlers seem to be adults, and aging adults at that - the language will be gone in a generation if the kids aren't learning.