# Metropolitan regions with distinctive dialects: do they adapt to standard language, and if so - how?



## Martin78

DenisBiH said:


> Of course, but I see some additional parallels for Sofia and Zagreb: the capital being situated in an area whose dialect is well outside the area of the dialect used as the basis of the standard language, and moreover, being situated in an area whose dialect rather than being central represents a transition to dialects of neighboring languages - in the case of Zagreb to Slovenian, in the case of Sofia to Serbian and Macedonian.
> 
> So you have a gigantic ever increasing mass of people supplanting the original speech of the capital, and the countryside literally just outside the city bounds speaking a very different variety of the language. Though the last bit might be somewhat different, Kajkavian around Zagreb is still very much alive as far as I know, and Orlin mentioned that Bulgarian dialects have lost much of their prestige.



That is very true. Dialects becoming less prestigious is of course also very common in most European countries (Italy, Switzerland and Norway strike me as obvious exceptions) but in most European countries, it was the dialect of the capital, or a dialect close to the capital, that evolved into the standard language, so the "capital dialect" never became unfashionable. The BCS standard based on peasants in Eastern Herzegovina is perhaps the most obvious exception, although the Italian standard based on Tuscany is better known. And then, as you've all said, Bulgarian that is based on Eastern dialects.

It is rather interesting how differently people in different countries thought about the standard, but the three main principles seem to have been
 - The language of the capital, the court and the king. (eg French, based on the court language)
 - The language of some archaic "uncorrupted" dialect (eg BCS, based on villages in BiH)
 - The language of a famous cultural period (eg Italian, based on works of Dante and other Tuscan authors)


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## DenisBiH

Martin78 said:


> That is very true. Dialects becoming less prestigious is of course also very common in most European countries (Italy, Switzerland and Norway strike me as obvious exceptions) but in most European countries, it was the dialect of the capital, or a dialect close to the capital, that evolved into the standard language, so the "capital dialect" never became unfashionable. The BCS standard based on peasants in Eastern Herzegovina is perhaps the most obvious exception, although the Italian standard based on Tuscany is better known. And then, as you've all said, Bulgarian that is based on Eastern dialects.
> 
> It is rather interesting how differently people in different countries thought about the standard, but the three main principles seem to have been
> - The language of the capital, the court and the king. (eg French, based on the court language)
> - The language of some archaic "uncorrupted" dialect (eg BCS, based on villages in BiH)
> - The language of a famous cultural period (eg Italian, based on works of Dante and other Tuscan authors)




The standardization of Serbo-Croatian in the 19th century, or rather B/C/S today, followed not only the second but also the third pattern as well - the literature of Dubrovnik was also one of the key reasons for choosing that particular dialect for the standard. And the third reason was that it was very widespread because of historical reasons (migrations prior and especially during the Ottoman period)

Here's a quote from the famous Bečki književni dogovor of 1850:



> Jednoglasnice smo priznali da je najpravije i najbolje primiti južno narječje da bude književno; i to
> a) zato što najviše naroda tako govori,
> b) što je ono najbliže staromu slovenskomu jeziku a po tome i svjema ostalijem jezicima slovenskijem,
> c) što su gotovo sve narodne pjesme u njemu spjevane,
> *d) što je sva stara dubrovačka književnost u njemu spisana*,


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## Martin78

DenisBiH said:


> For the standardization of Serbo-Croatian in the 19th century, or rather BCS today, followed the third pattern as well - the literature of Dubrovnik was also one of the key reasons for choosing that particular dialect for the standard.



This is of course not a linguistic question, but that could perhaps be disputed  It seems as if Vuk had his mind set on which dialect he saw as the ideal (ie his own dialect) and the fact that it was spoken in Dubrovnik, and had been used by such great writers as Držić and Gundulić, was his ideal "selling point" to sell the language to Croatians who mostly didn't speak neoshtokavian ijekavian, but of course were very well acquainted with the Ragusan literature. Apart from agreeing to add "h" to his standard, largely thanks to Dubrovnik, did Vuk admit any other difference from his own dialect into the standard?

Someone said that Vuks slogan "Piši kako govoriš" really should have been "Piši kako govorim"... ;-)


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## phosphore

Martin78 said:


> It is rather interesting how differently people in different countries thought about the standard, but the three main principles seem to have been
> - The language of the capital, the court and the king. (eg French, based on the court language)
> - The language of some archaic "uncorrupted" dialect (eg BCS, based on villages in BiH)
> - The language of a famous cultural period (eg Italian, based on works of Dante and other Tuscan authors)


 
In the case of Serbian it is actually a myth. The most prestigious dialect nowadays is the standard dialect of Belgrade, which is almost the same as the dialect of people living at the outskirts of the city, while those who come with the genuine East Herzegovina accent their pronunciation is very much regionally marked.


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## DenisBiH

Martin78 said:


> This is of course not a linguistic question, but that could perhaps be disputed  It seems as if Vuk had his mind set on which dialect he saw as the ideal (ie his own dialect) and the fact that it was spoken in Dubrovnik, and had been used by such great writers as Držić and Gundulić, was his ideal "selling point" to sell the language to Croatians who mostly didn't speak neoshtokavian ijekavian, but of course were very well acquainted with the Ragusan literature. Apart from agreeing to add "h" to his standard, largely thanks to Dubrovnik, did Vuk admit any other difference from his own dialect into the standard?
> 
> Someone said that Vuks slogan "Piši kako govoriš" really should have been "Piši kako govorim"... ;-)




Perhaps, but this is more of a political question I guess. The fact is that they (Serbs, Croats and even a Slovene) signed off on that document with that particular phrasing extolling the virtues of the literature of Dubrovnik, and that that document and their accord had far reaching consequences. 

What I think is often being neglected when talking about this is the magnificent array of pre-1850 Croatian attempts at standardization of a common "Illyrian" language. You have for example Bartol Kašić from the island of Pag in the 17th century choosing Bosnian speech, shtokavian ikavian, for the basis of his Illyrian language.

As for what Vuk took and from where, apart from bringing h back, I believe the fact that jekavsko jotovanje did not become a part of the standard is also partly due to Dubrovnik. I say partly because I've read some argue Vuk also saw these same traits in the speech of Muslims. Here's in Vuk's own words:


> "Srpski se govori najčistije i najpravilnije u Hercegovini i u Bosni. Istina da onamo po varošima i gradovima ima mnogo turskijeh riječi, u ostalome ona braća naša zakona Turskog govore ljepše srpski od seljaka i Grčkoga i Rimskoga zakona."


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## Martin78

phosphore said:


> In the case of Serbian it is actually a myth. The most prestigious dialect nowadays is the standard dialect of Belgrade, which is almost the same as the dialect of people living at the outskirts of the city, while those who come with the genuine East Herzegovina accent their pronunciation is very much regionally marked.




Interesting! So what are the differences between the standard dialect of Belgrade and the East Herzegovina accent? Apart from Belgrade being ekavian and often lacking unaccented long vowels, of course.


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## phosphore

Martin78 said:


> Interesting! So what are the differences between the standard dialect of Belgrade and the East Herzegovina accent? Apart from Belgrade being ekavian and often lacking unaccented long vowels, of course.


 
Many unaccented long vowels are missing and the tonality is much less pronounced, which leaves a whole other impression of the language. We usually say that those with an East Herzegovina accent sing too much or - _zapévaju_.


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## Martin78

phosphore said:


> Many unaccented long vowels are missing and the tonality is much less pronounced, which leaves a whole other impression of the language. We usually say that those with an East Herzegovina accent sing too much or - _zapévaju_.



I see! So that explains my mistake yesterday when we talked about tones in Belgrade and I said that in my non-native ears, Belgrade Serbian didn't appear to have tones. As I had heard quite much Croatian and Bosnian before meeting people from Belgrade, the Belgrade speech struck me as lacking tones. 

Again, that was of course in the ears of a native Swedish-speakers (thus used to tones, but in a completely different language)


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## phosphore

Martin78 said:


> I see! So that explains my mistake yesterday when we talked about tones in Belgrade and I said that in my non-native ears, Belgrade Serbian didn't appear to have tones. As I had heard quite much Croatian and Bosnian before meeting people from Belgrade, the Belgrade speech struck me as lacking tones.
> 
> Again, that was of course in the ears of a native Swedish-speakers (thus used to tones, but in a completely different language)


 
You should hear some people from Niš speaking. I think saying, for example, _pročȉtati_,_ lȅpo_ or _Nȉš_, instead of _pročìtati_, _lêpo_ and _Nîš_ would instantly identify you as a Southerner.


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## Orlin

phosphore said:


> You should hear some people from Niš speaking. I think saying, for example, _pročȉtati_,_ lȅpo_ or _Nȉš_, instead of _pročìtati_, _lêpo_ and _Nîš_ would instantly identify you as a Southerner.


 
Ja bih verovatno tako zvučao jer mislim da su dinamički akcenti kod kratkih vokala (kako je uvek u bugarskom) otprilike kao BCS kratkosilazni akcenat.


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## phosphore

Orlin said:


> Ja bih verovatno tako zvučao jer mislim da su dinamički akcenti kod kratkih vokala (kako je uvek u bugarskom) otprilike kao BCS kratkosilazni akcenat.


 
Pa da, mada nisam nikad čuo Bugare, tako govore i ovdašnji Makedonci.


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## sokol

Moderator note:

Split off from this Slavic forum thread about Bulgarian and Sofia.

We decided to move to EHL and re-formulate the original question in a way that this will become a sociolinguistic thread, with a historical perspective (development of these situations), namely (and quite clumsy, admittedly):

*Metropolitan regions with distinctive dialects: do they adapt to standard language, and if so - how?*

So this thread is about metropolitan regions where *the native dialect differs significantly from standard language,* and *how they adapt to this situation* (if they do at all - that is there might be cases where the local dialect is used universally for spoken purposes even though standard = written language differs significantly).

Cheers
sokol
moderator EHL

To give an example (and posting now as an 'ordinary' forero ), take Vienna, not my hometown but the town where I live now:

Local dialects differ vastly from standard language, and are still spoken.
However, a new colloquial standard is developing (has been so for possibly two decades, three at most) which basically is relying heavily on the original dialect concerning syntax and morphology, but phonetically it sounds like standard language to Austrian*) ears.
*) While I've heard Germans many time referring to this new colloquial standard as "Austrian (Viennese) dialect" the perception is different in Austria, for us it is perceived as "standard language".

This makes situation in Vienna quite difficult to understand for foreigners (with "understanding" I'm here both referring to actually understanding the _language_ as well as understanding the language _situation_ ): you may hear dialect here, mixed with this new "colloquial standard" and "proper standard language", in sometimes wild mixtures which are even for native Viennese people difficult to predict (though of course for us not difficult to understand ): that is, ask a Viennese native about which variety will be used when, and chances are high that he or she predicts incorrectly with a high percentage.


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## se16teddy

Martin78 said:


> Dialects becoming less prestigious is of course also very common in most European countries


In England in recent years we have experienced something of an opposite effect: well educated people with standard accents adopting something of the vernacular to sound more in touch with Everyman. The accent of choice is known as "Estuary". This article discusses the phenomenon. http://www.phon.ucl.ac.uk/home/estuary/sellars.htm 

I wonder, though, this was a characteristic of the New Labour era. We are now led again by public-school-educated politicians who seem less ashamed of their standard vowels.


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## berndf

se16teddy said:


> I wonder, though, this was a characteristic of the New Labor era. We are now led again by public-school-educated politicians who seem less ashamed of their standard vowels.


I think the phenomenon started a bit earlier, in the early 80s. The revolt of the Thatcher era against the traditional class system was not only directed against ideological trade unionists but also against pre-capitalist structures in British society in general and in the economy in particular. Having been educated at Eaton and Oxford (traditionally a privilege of the aristocracy) did no longer mean you automatically belonged to the elite of the country but rather maked you as a dinosaur. Consequently, speaking RP was no longer deemed desirable by those who regarded themselves as forming the new elite, like the "Essex boys" in the City.


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## Montesacro

Martin78 said:


> Dialects becoming less prestigious is of course also very common in most European countries (Italy, Switzerland and Norway strike me as obvious exceptions)



It looks like you don't know much about Italy and its linguistic situation.
Some dialects are alive and well, others (especially in big cities) are on the verge of extinction.
What matters here is that all of them have never been considered "prestigious" by their speakers.
In formal situations and registers, when "prestige" is required, there's no choice but using standard Italian.


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## Wikislav

Martin78 said:


> Dialects becoming less prestigious is of course also very common in most European countries (Italy, Switzerland and Norway strike me as obvious exceptions) but in most European countries, it was the dialect of the capital, or a dialect close to the capital, that evolved into the standard language, so the "capital dialect" never became unfashionable. The BCS standard based on peasants in Eastern Herzegovina is perhaps the most obvious exception, ...


Concerning BCS, the Hercegovina's standard applied in Bosnia or Serbia is at least majoritary there, although not urban. However in Croatia it is an imposed tiny minority of 7% to 10% native maternal speakers only, the rest being other major dialects of Ikavians 46%, Kaykavians 31% and Chakavians, prevailing around and within the largest Croatian cities as _Zagreb, Split_ and _Rijeka_ by 50% to 80%. Another problem is that dialectal Kaykavians and Chakavians are economically advanced and more literate above 90% and the rest half-literate (any illiterate), while standard Shtokavians are literate 3/5 only, 1/4 half-literate and the rest illiterate. 

The standard Yekavians are prevailing only in minor eastern towns as Osijek and Dubrovnik. The most extreme examples of dialectal urban agglomerations is Split with prevailing _3/4 Ikavians_ (150,000 citizens), Zagreb capital with _1/2 Kaykavians_ (420,000 ones), and Rijeka with _1/2 Chakavians_ (100,000). Standard Yekavians are partly tolerated in Rijeka and minor towns, but in Zagreb and Split they are almost restricted in local lingual ghettos. In occasion of major festivities and sport matches, chiefly in Split and Zagreb are frequent attacks on other dialectal speakers or destroyng of their cars. So this absurdic imposing of a minoritary rural standard in Croatia resulted by the iterative dialectal conflicts, and by a general lingual chaos now escaping from socio-linguistic control.


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