Since the last twenty years of the nineteenth century, the 'Language Question' had been the axis around which Greek intellectual life evolved.

Yannis Psicharis has been elevated to a leading figure of demoticism, while To Taxidi mou (My Journey) became the manifesto of demoticism and a landmark in the this issue, as well as a point of departure for the birth of a literature based on popular language. Thus the main ideological issue in this period was language, that is, the struggle for the establishment of demotic Greek. This demand went hand in hand with demands for educational reform and the reaction to it, personified in the conservative elements of society.

A series of manifestations expressed the desire of modern Greeks to claim the right to speak their own language, which in turn provoked reactionaries who were strongly opposed to the idea. The promotion of the Language Question alarmed conservatives. Mob demonstrations that ended up in bloody riots occurred at the beginning of this period. In 1901 the periodical Noumas rallied old and young with the common slogan of a national language. The Language Question was closely related to educational reform. In 1902 various articles under the comprehensive title To glossikon zitima kai i ekpaideftiki mas anagennisi (The Language Question and our educational renaissance) were published by the demoticist doctor from Constantinople, Photis Photiadis; these were published a few years earlier in a Constantinople newspaper and had definitely linked the language and educational questions and demonstrated the necessity for linguistic-educational reforms as a means for the restructuring, development, progress and national integration of Hellenism.