The University of Thessaloniki is directly linked with the struggle over puristic versus informal Greek (Katharevousa and Demotiki respectively). At the School of Philosophy, which was founded by the pro-Demotiki A. Papanastasiou to combat the conservatism of Athens, such scholars as Manolis Triandafyllidis and Ioannis Kakridis found refuge. There they were to create, in the words of Emmanouil Kriaras, "an Acropolis of the Demotiki".
Language and ideology being directly dependent on one another, the movement lent the School a progressive and cooperative spirit generally, both among the professors and in their relationships with the students. In 1956 the Institute for Modern Greek Studies was founded with the aim of promoting the survival and expansion of the pro-Demotiki ideology.
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