Kashubian language

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Kashubian kaszëbsczi, pòmòrsczi
Spoken in:	Poland, Canada
Region:	Pomerania
Total speakers:	50,000
Language family:	Indo-European Balto-Slavic Slavic West Slavic Lechitic Pomeranian Kashubian
Official status
Official language of:	in official use in some communes of Pomeranian Voivodeship, Poland
Regulated by:	no official regulation
Language codes
ISO 639-1:	none
ISO 639-2:	`csb`
ISO/FDIS 639-3:	`csb`
Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. See IPA chart for English for an English-based pronunciation key.

Kashubian or Cassubian (Kashubian: kaszëbsczi jãzëk, pòmòrsczi jãzëk, kaszëbskò-słowińskô mòwa; Polish: język kaszubski, gwara kaszubska) is one of the Lechitic languages, which are a group of Slavic languages.

It is assumed that it evolved from the language spoken by some tribes of Pomeranians called Kashubians, in the region of Pomerania on the southern coast of the Baltic Sea between the Vistula and Oder rivers.

It is closely related to Slovincian, and both of them are Pomeranian language dialects. Although the Kashubian language can hardly be understood by Polish speakers, until recently, many Polish linguists considered it a dialect of Polish.

Similarly to Polish, Kashubian includes numerous loanwords from Low Saxon, such as kùńszt (art) from German Kunst. Other sources of loanwords include Baltic languages, Russian and Polish.

First printed documents in Kashubian originate from the end of 16th century. Modern spelling was first proposed in 1879.

In 2002 census, 53,000 people in Poland declared that they mainly use Kashubian at home. Research shows that many Kashubian-speaking parents use Polish rather than Kashubian at home, because they believe that if they spoke Kashubian, their children would find it more difficult to learn Polish.^{[citation needed]} A number of schools in Poland teach in Kashubian as a lecture language and it is used as an official alternative language for local administration purposes in parts of Pomeranian Voivodeship. Kashubian is also spoken by Kashubians living in Canada.

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[edit] Gallery

Bilingual sign in Polish and Kashubian in Puck, Poland

[edit] See also

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Kashubian language edition of Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[edit] External links

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