Ramazan Shahin

Here you can watch videos of young Ahiska Turks who have been resettled in the USA and wrestle folkstyle in HS now.
http://www.youtube.com/user/wrestlerilyas
http://www.youtube.com/user/kemran101777
http://www.youtube.com/user/rustik602

Notice that they and their friends are talking in Russian. Also the subtitles in some of the videos + almost all comments to the videos are in Russian. This means: in the USSR, they were forced to give up their Turkish language.

Akzent,

What do you mean by "give up their Turkish language"?

Not to use it.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by akzent

Not to use it.

---

Not use it where? Not to speak it or what? In America kids of many different Nationalities know only English. Italians, Russians, Germans and so on that were born in America speak often only English. How is that different from the Turks in USSR?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Big

What I am saying is that take Jews in Russia for example. Even though they were not a popular minority they still had their last names and nobody forced them to take different names.

---

Correct me if I'm wrong but they did force those who didn't have surnames to adopt them though. Armenians and Georgians already had last names (along with Jews) so they could keep them but the others such as Chechens, Azeris, Ossetians, and Daghastanis, had to pick up last names. (i.e. adding "ev" or "ov" to their fathers names)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Yazdani

Correct me if I'm wrong but they did force those who didn't have surnames to adopt them though. Armenians and Georgians already had last names (along with Jews) so they could keep them but the others such as Chechens, Azeris, Ossetians, and Daghastanis, had to pick up last names. (i.e. adding "ev" or "ov" to their fathers names)

---

I don't know much about that but if they didn't have last names at all, then they needed to get them. I am not even sure if that was during Soviet era or before that.

I read that Jews in Germany were given last names as well. Government officials simply made up names and gave them to Jews randomly. I believe all Jewish names ending in "man" and "stein" were given in Germany.

I heard this as well for some in Russia as well. Don't know if it was specifically for Jews, but the last names Belov (white) and Chernov (black) were last names that hade been changed.

Also Russians from the Yakutian region only had one name and so were given Russian names. That is why many Yakutians have very Russian first names like Sergei and Roman, Pavel and last names like Ivanov, Dmitriev, etc.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Yazdani

Correct me if I'm wrong but they did force those who didn't have surnames to adopt them though. Armenians and Georgians already had last names (along with Jews) so they could keep them but the others such as Chechens, Azeris, Ossetians, and Daghastanis, had to pick up last names. (i.e. adding "ev" or "ov" to their fathers names)

---

It's correct.
This is Caucase war period.