Although it is mutually intelligible with both Gagauz[2] and Turkish to a considerable degree, it is usually classified as a separate language,[citation needed] due to foreign influences from neighboring languages spoken in the Balkans.
Balkan Gagauz Turkish was given international prominence through the Oscar-nominated 2019 film Honeyland, in which the protagonist is an ethnic Macedonian Turk and mostly speaks in the local dialect throughout the film.
Population
There were around 460,000 speakers of Balkan Gagauz Turkish in Turkey in 2019[1] and an estimated 4,000 in North Macedonia in 2018.[3]