There is as much czech literature and media as slovak literature and media in. University of groningen mutual intelligibility in the slavic. I showed my friend a video in czech and he could only understand one word tak so, this way, used by the speaker as a fillthepause word. As such, spoken danish and swedish normally have low mutual intelligibility, but swedes in the oresund region including malmo and helsingborg, across a strait from the danish capital copenhagen, understand danish somewhat better, largely due to.
Spoken czech at a regular speed is almost not intelligible with russian. The levenshtein distance between two languages or dialects is often used as a yardstick against which empirical research can be measured, using tools to check. Jun 03, 2009 the slovak language has been influenced by many languages, including czech, polish, and german. We decided to focus on three west slavic languages czech, slovak. The west slavic languages are a subdivision of the slavic language group. In poland, because of the closer linguistic relationship between the dialect and the standard polish language, the dialect is becoming diluted more quickly than in the czech republic. Languages understandable to englishspeakers without learning.
Which two slavic languages are the least mutually intelligible. The results show that in most cases, a division between west and south slavic languages does exist and that west. Measuring crosslinguistic intelligibility in the germanic, romance and slavic language groups charlotte gooskens a. Asymmetry has been observed, for example, between spanish and portuguese and between czech and slovak. Even though poland borders both czechia and slovakia, i have heard that poles and slovaks, on average, get along better linguistically than poles and czechs. Polish and sorbian also differ quite considerably from czech and slovak in upper registers, but nontechnical and lower register speech is readily intelligible. With the exception of some studies of czechslovak mutual intelligibility e. From what i have heard anecdotally, not as mutually intelligible as slovak and polish. Pdf mutual intelligibility of languages in the slavic. This study reports on the results of a listeningtask experiment concerning the intelligibility of czech, polish and slovak to students of the sorbianlanguage secondary school in bautzenbudysin, germany. Mutual intelligibility between west and south slavic languages. The czech and slovak languages form the czechslovak or czechoslovak subgroup within the west slavic languages most varieties of czech and slovak are mutually intelligible, forming a dialect continuum spanning the intermediate moravian dialects rather than being two clearly distinct languages. Czech, slovak, polish, croatian, slovene and bulgarian in terms of their lexicon, orthography, morphology, phonology and syntax. Pdf mutual intelligibility of languages in the slavic family robert.
Mutual intelligibility between closely related languages in europe. Mutual intelligibility among the slavic languages by robert lindsay the mutual intelligibility mi of the languages of the slavic family is an interesting topic because many are mutually intelligible to one degree or another. Sep 15, 2015 with the exception of some studies of czechslovak mutual intelligibility e. Slovak sometimes also called slovakian is an indoeuropean language belonging to the westslavic branch, and is most closely related to czech. Czech and slovak are more mutually intelligible than spoken function words. Czech and slovak are two closely related languages which together form the czechoslovak subgroup of the west slavonic languages, to which there belong two further subgroups, the lusatian and the lechitic. The intelligibility of words was, unsurprisingly, higher than the intelligibility of texts, but on the whole, across all methods czech and slovak was the most intelligible language combination. The bestdocumented case of asymmetric intelligibility is danishswedish. Since the dissolution of czechoslovakia mutual intelligibility has declined for younger speakers, probably because czech speakers now experience less exposure to slovak and vice versa. Czech language wikimili, the best wikipedia reader. Some mutual intelligibility occurs with spoken rusyn, ukrainian, and even russian in this order, although their orthographies are based on the cyrillic script. In spite of their similarity and a nearly complete mutual intelligibility see below, the literary languages are clearly. Czech, slovak, polish, croatian, slovenian and bulgarian on the level of lexicon, orthography. Mutual intelligibility between west and south slavic.
Accounting for mutual intelligibility of lexis availability of lexical alternatives leads to asymmetric intelligibility look into cognates. In linguistics, mutual intelligibility is a relationship between languages or dialects in which speakers of different but related varieties can readily understand each other without prior familiarity or special effort. Czech slovak ruthenian slovene croatian bosnian bulgarian macedonian serbian russian. The slovak language has been influenced by many languages, including czech, polish, and german. And to what degree to czech and slovak speakers understand one another. Slovakian language project gutenberg selfpublishing. Are slovak, czech, and polish all mutually intelligible. How mutually intelligible are the czech and polish languages. Mutual intelligibility wikimili, the best wikipedia reader. Grammatically and phonologically, the cieszyn silesian dialect is closer to polish than to czech.
The mutual intelligibility of slavic languages as a source of. Eastern slovak dialects have the greatest degree of mutual intelligibility with rusyn of all the slovak dialects, but both lack technical terminology and upper register expressions. Germanic language mutual intelligibility best, country. Request pdf the measurement of mutual intelligibility between westslavic languages the west slavic languages are close enough for their speakers to use their mother tongues when communicating. In linguistics, mutual intelligibility is a relationship between languages or dialects in which. Mutual intelligibility between closely related languages in. Most dialects of czech and slovak are mutually intelligible. What is the level of intelligibility among czech, slovak, polish. Like other slavic languages, slovak is a fusional language with a complex system of morphology and relatively flexible word order. On the other hand, speakers of closely related languages can often communicate with each other to a fair degree. The mutual intelligibility is partial and perhaps asymmetric, but one can often discern the meanings of the majority of the words in a sentence, and correctly infer the grammar.
Intelligibility of czech and slovak is around 82%, and varies from 7095% depending on the dialect. If two languages, a and b, are mutually intelligible and are closely historically related, linguists say that a and b are dialects, a is a dialect of b, or b is a dialect of a all of these statements are equivalent. Mutual intelligibility hovers at around the 90% mark both ways, with a very slight advantage held by the slovaks in understanding czech. Measuring crosslinguistic intelligibility in the germanic. Sloboda and nabelkova 20, most of them have relied on purely structural descriptions e. In the present study we tested the level of mutual intelligibility between three west slavic czech, slovak and polish and three south slavic languages croatian, slovene and bulgarian. This type of com munication is called receptive multilingualism and our tourist is quite familiar with it. Pdf mutual intelligibility between west and south slavic languages. Slovak is closely related to czech, to the point of mutual intelligibility to a very high degree, as well as polish.
Previous studies have indicated that mutual intelligibility between closely related language pairs is sometimes asymmetric. Conditional entropies were the lowest between czech and slovak, whereas be. Pdf mutual intelligibility between west and south slavic. May 14, 2008 so what exactly is the level of mutual intelligibility between polish and czech slovak. These distances will then be used in further studies as linguistic predictors of intelligibility among the six languages. Mutual intelligibility between closely related languages in europe pdf. So what exactly is the level of mutual intelligibility between polish and czechslovak. Corpora and quantitative data in slavic languages springerlink. Northern germanic languages spoken in scandinavia form a dialect continuum where two furthermost dialects have almost no mutual intelligibility. Feb 06, 2017 from what i have heard anecdotally, not as mutually intelligible as slovak and polish. Czech and slovak are two closely related languages which together form the czecho slovak subgroup of the west slavonic languages, to which there belong two further subgroups, the lusatian and the lechitic. Most varieties of czech and slovak are mutually intelligible, forming a dialect continuum. Corpora and quantitative data in slavic languages pdf.
The slavic mutual intelligibility is that time, newspapers and magazines in sorbian. The languages are spoken across a continuous region encompassing the czech republic, slovakia and poland as well as the former east germany and the westernmost regions of ukraine and belarus and into lithuania. It is sometimes used as an important criterion for distinguishing languages from dialects, although sociolinguistic factors are often also used. Mutual intelligibility of languages in the slavic family. Intelligibility problems are mostly on the czech end, because they dont bother to learn slovak, while many slovaks learn czech. In addition there are large czech communities in the usa, particularly new york, chicago, and in australia.
Pdf the mutual intelligibility of slavic languages as a source of. Dialect a variety of a language spoken by a group of people that is characterized by systematic features e. Mutual intelligibility among the slavic languages beyond. The asymmetric intelligibility between czech and slovak, whereby. They include polish, czech, slovak, kashubian, upper sorbian and lower sorbian. Pdf in the present study we tested the level of mutual intelligibility between three west slavic czech, slovak and polish and three south.
And to what degree to czech and slovak speakers understand one. However, mutual intelligibility is given to slovak and, to a lesser extent, also to polish and sorbian. It is commonly believed that all slavic languages are fully mutually intelligible, which implies that they are close. To what extent are the different branches of the slavic. The measurement of mutual intelligibility between westslavic. Czech is also spoken in parts of germany, austria, poland, slovakia and the ukraine. This advantage is exposurerelated and would be completely erased by one evenings worth of conversation, i should think. Spoken by over 10 million people, it serves as the official language of the czech republic.