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Zdzisław Stieber, (June 7, 1903 – October 12, 1980) was a Polish
linguist Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. It is called a scientific study because it entails a comprehensive, systematic, objective, and precise analysis of all aspects of language, particularly its nature and structure. Linguis ...
and
Slavist Slavic (American English) or Slavonic (British English) studies, also known as Slavistics is the academic field of area studies concerned with Slavic peoples, Slavic areas, languages, literature, history, and culture. Originally, a Slavist or Sla ...
. He was born in Szczakowa, then part of the Austro-Hungarian province of Galicia (since 1918
Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populous ...
). His family was of assimilated German descent in Poland for generations. He died in
Warsaw Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is officia ...
. Initially a student of chemistry, Stieber turned his attention to comparative Slavic linguistics at the University of Kraków in 1926. His interest in the dialects of border areas led him to the study of East Slovak and
Ukrainian Ukrainian may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Ukraine * Something relating to Ukrainians, an East Slavic people from Eastern Europe * Something relating to demographics of Ukraine in terms of demography and population of Ukraine * So ...
dialects, where his work focused on
toponyms Toponymy, toponymics, or toponomastics is the study of ''toponyms'' (proper names of places, also known as place names and geographic names), including their origins, meanings, usage and types. Toponym is the general term for a proper name of ...
, their etymology, and the history and settlement of the places where they are attested. He also carried out research on Sorbian and Belarusian, and was involved in producing linguistic atlases of Kashubian (1964–78),
Polish Polish may refer to: * Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe * Polish language * Poles, people from Poland or of Polish descent * Polish chicken *Polish brothers (Mark Polish and Michael Polish, born 1970), American twin screenwr ...
(Nitsch 1957–70), and Lemkian (1956–64). Particularly valuable was his introduction of colors and symbols to dialect maps. Stieber's work in the 1930s represented some of the first studies of the dialect of the
Lemko Lemkos ( rue, Лeмкы, translit= Lemkŷ; pl, Łemkowie; uk, Лемки, translit=Lemky) are an ethnic group inhabiting the Lemko Region ( rue, Лемковина, translit=Lemkovyna; uk, Лемківщина, translit=Lemkivshchyna) of Car ...
Rusyns. The deportation of this ethnic group in
Operation Vistula Operation Vistula ( pl, Akcja Wisła; uk, Опера́ція «Ві́сла») was a codename for the 1947 forced resettlement of 150,000 Ukrainians (Boykos and Lemkos) from the south-eastern provinces of post-war Poland, to the Recovered Terri ...
after World War II underlines the importance of Stieber's work carried out while the community was still intact. Stieber also produced works on the history and development of Polish (1934), Czech (1957), and Slavic in general (1969). Stieber held teaching appointments in Kraków, Lviv, Łódź, and Warsaw. His work in Polish and Slavic philology had a particularly strong influence on the introduction of the structural method in the teaching of phonology at the University of Łódź. The Nitsch-Trnka-Stieber Law (stating that phonemic contrasts in a language can only be produced by regular sound laws or borrowing, but not as a result of analogical changes in morphophonemic rules) remains a matter of debate today (cf. Manaster-Ramer 1994). In 1982 the Ukrainian Slavist George Y. Shevelov published an extensive reminiscence of Stieber in the journal ''Harvard Ukrainian Studies''.


References


Further reading

* Manaster-Ramer, Alexis. 1994. On Three East Slavic Non-Counterexamples to Stieber's Law. JSL 2(1): 164–70. * Nitsch, Kazimierz et al. (eds.). 1957–1970. Maly atlas gwar polskich. Wrocław. * Shevelov, George Y. 1982. Zdzisław Stieber, In memoriam (7 June 1903 – 12 October 1980). Harvard Ukrainian Studies 6(1):79–92 * Stieber, Zdzisław. 1934. Geneza gwar laskich. Kraków. * Stieber, Zdzisław. 1938. Sposoby powstawania słowiańskich gwar przejściowych. Kraków. * Stieber, Zdzisław. 1956–64. Atlas językowy dawnej Łemkowszczyzny, 8 vols. Łódź. * Stieber, Zdzisław 1969. Zarys gramatyki porównawczej języków słowiańskich. Warsaw. * Stieber, Zdzisław et al. (eds.). 1964–1978. Atlas jezykowy Kaszubszczyzny i dialektów sąsiednich. Wrocław. * Stieber, Zdzisław & Tadeusz Lehr-Splawiński 1957. Gramatyka historyczna języka czeskiego. Warsaw. {{DEFAULTSORT:Stieber, Zdzislaw 1903 births 1980 deaths Polish people of German descent Linguists from Poland Jagiellonian University alumni 20th-century linguists