Lower Sorbian language

Encyclopedia : L : LO : LOW : Lower Sorbian language

Lower Sorbian (dolnoserbšćina) is a Slavic minority language spoken in eastern Germany in the historical province of Lower Lusatia, today part of Brandenburg. It is one of the two literary Sorbian languages, the other being Upper Sorbian.

Lower Sorbian is spoken in and around the city of Cottbus in Brandenburg. Signs in this region are usually bilingual, and Cottbus has a Gymnasium where the language of instruction is Lower Sorbian.

Contents

1 Phonology

1.1 Consonants
1.2 Vowels
1.3 Stress

2 Orthography
3 External links

Phonology

The phonology of Lower Sorbian has been greatly influenced by contact with German, especially in Cottbus and larger towns. For example, German-influenced pronunciation tends to have a uvular trill [ʁ] instead of the alveolar trill [r], and a "clear" [l] that is not especially palatalized instead of [lʲ]. In villages and rural areas German influence is less marked, and the pronunciation is more "typically Slavic".

Consonants

The consonant phonemes of Lower Sorbian are as follows:

Bilabial Labiodental Dental Alveolar Alveolo-palatal Postalveolar Palatal Velar Glottal
Stop p  b
pʲ  bʲ t  d k  g
kʲ  gʲ
Affricate ts tɕ  dʑ tʃ  dʒ
Nasal m
mʲ n nʲ
Fricative f  v
fʲ  vʲ s  z ɕ  ʑ ʃ  ʒ x h
Approximant r
rʲ j
Lateral approximant lʲ

Lower Sorbian has both final devoicing and regressive voicing assimilation:

/dub/ "oak" is pronounced [dup]
/susedka/ "(female) neighbor" is pronounced [susetka]
/litsba/ "number" is pronounced [lidzba]

The postalveolar fricative /ʃ/ is assimilated to [ɕ] before /tɕ/:

/ʃtɕit/ "protection" is pronounced [ɕtɕit]

Vowels

The vowel phonemes are as follows:

Monophthongs	Front	Central	Back
Close	i	ɨ	u
Open-mid	ɛ		ɔ
Open	a

Diphthongs Centering in in
Starting close iɪ ij ɨj uj iw ɨw uw
Starting mid ej ɔj ɛw ow
Starting open aj aw

Diphthongs	Centering	in	in
Starting close	iɪ	ij ɨj uj	iw ɨw uw
Starting mid		ej ɔj	ɛw ow
Starting open		aj	aw

Stress

Stress in Lower Sorbian normally falls on the first syllable of the word:

Łužyca /ˈvuʒɨtsa/ "Lusatia"
pśijaśel /ˈpɕijaɕɛlʲ/ "friend"
Chóśebuz /ˈxɨɕɛbus/ "Cottbus"

In loanwords, stress may fall on any of the last three syllables:

internat /intɛrˈnat/ "boarding school"
kontrola /kɔnˈtrɔlʲa/ "control"
september /sɛpˈtɛmbɛr/ "September"
policija /pɔˈlʲitsija/ "police"
organizacija /ɔrganʲiˈzatsija/ "organization"

Orthography

The Sorbian alphabet is based on the Latin alphabet but uses diacritics such as acute accent and caron. The standard character encoding for the Lower Sorbian alphabet is ISO 8859-2 (Latin-2).

External links

Slavic languages
East Slavic	Belarusian \| Old East Slavic † \| Russian \| Rusyn (Carpathians) \| Ruthenian † \| Ukrainian
West Slavic	Czech \| Kashubian \| Knaanic † \| Lower Sorbian \| Polabian † \| Polish \| Pomeranian † \| Slovak \| Slovincian † \| Upper Sorbian
South Slavic	Banat Bulgarian \| Bosnian \| Bulgarian \| Burgenland Croatian \| Croatian \| Macedonian \| Molise Croatian \| Montenegrin \| Old Church Slavonic † \| Serbian \| Serbo-Croatian \| Slavic (Greece) \| Slovenian
Other	Church Slavonic \| Old Novgorod dialect † \| Proto-Slavic † \| Russenorsk † \| Rusyn (Pannonia) \| Slavonic-Serbian † \| Slovio
	^† Language death>Extinct

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	Bilabial	Labiodental	Dental	Alveolar	Alveolo-palatal	Postalveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Stop	p b pʲ bʲ		t d					k g kʲ gʲ
Affricate				ts	tɕ dʑ	tʃ dʒ
Nasal	m mʲ		n		nʲ
Fricative		f v fʲ vʲ		s z	ɕ ʑ	ʃ ʒ		x	h
Approximant				r rʲ			j
Lateral approximant					lʲ