Russenorsk language
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Russenorsk (; russian: Руссено́рск, ; en, Russo-Norwegian) is an extinct dual-source "restricted
pidgin A pidgin , or pidgin language, is a grammatically simplified means of communication that develops between two or more groups of people that do not have a language in common: typically, its vocabulary and grammar are limited and often drawn from s ...
" language formerly used in the Arctic, which combined elements of Russian and Norwegian. Russenorsk originated from Russian traders and Norwegian fishermen from Tromsø (northern Norway) and
Kola KOLA (99.9 FM) is a commercial radio station licensed to Redlands, California, and broadcasting to the Riverside-San Bernardino-Inland Empire radio market. It is owned by the Anaheim Broadcasting Corporation and it airs a classic hits radio form ...
(north-western Russia). It was used extensively in Northern Norway for about 150 years in the
Pomor trade Pomor trade (from rus, Поморье, r=pomorje, p=pɐˈmorʲjɪ; ''po'' «by» and ''more'' «ocean»; «area by the ocean», the same word is the basis for Pomerania), is the trade carried out between the Pomors of Northwest Russia and the p ...
. Russenorsk is important as a test case for theories concerning pidgin languages since it was used far away from most of the other documented pidgins of the world. As is common in the development of pidgins and trade languages, the interaction of fishermen and traders with no common language necessitated the creation of some minimal form of communication. Like all pidgins, Russenorsk had a rudimentary grammar and a restricted vocabulary, mostly composed of words essential to Arctic fishing and trade ( fish, weather, etc.) however, Russenorsk was used outside of fishing and trade context during the off-season as it was not uncommon for Russians to remain in Norway during the Winter.


History

Barter existed between Russians and Norwegians for 150 years in Troms and Finnmark counties. This barter was supported by the Norwegian government, and King Christian VII conferred city status to several settlements, such as Tromsø, to facilitate it. Norwegians mainly traded fish for flour and wheat from Russians. The trading went on throughout the sunny months of the year and was beneficial to both sides; Norwegians had access to cheap fish in the summer, whilst Russians had surplus wheat. Traders came from the areas near Murmansk and the White Sea, most often to Vardø, Hammerfest, and Tromsø, occasionally further south to the Lofoten islands. The earliest recorded instance of Russenorsk was in 1785. It is one of the most studied northern pidgins; many linguists, for example, Olaf Broch, studied it. Unlike equatorial pidgins, it was formed from only two languages, Norwegian and Russian. Furthermore, these languages are not from the same branch of Indo-European languages. Also unlike equatorial pidgins, Russenorsk was formed from one social class. Until 1850, Russenorsk was socially acceptable for all social classes. In 1850, Russenorsk became more limited to Norwegian fishermen, whereas Norwegian traders learnt Russian through exposure in Archangelsk and Russian trade centers, often formally studying the language to the extent that they could communicate in rudimentary Russian. This increase in Russian study caused the devaluation of Russenorsk in terms of social status. In 1917, Finland's declaration of independence from Russia caused the Russian–Norwegian border to decrease significantly. In 1919, the border disappeared completely. Furthermore, the Soviet Union limited international contact significantly, decreasing the need for the common language between Norwegians and Russians. The last such Norwegian–Russian trade occurred in 1923.


Phonology

Russenorsk uses many of the phonemes common to both Norwegian and Russian, altering phonemes only used in one. Pronunciation was depended on the language background of the speaker. */mn/, absent in Norwegian, became /n/: много ли (mnogo li, how many?) → ''nogoli''. */x/, absent in Norwegian, became /k/: хорошо (khorosho, good) → ''korosho''. */h/, absent in Russian, became /g/: ''hal'' (half) → ''gal''. *final voiced consonants, absent in Russian, became unvoiced: gav (sea) → ''gaf'' More is known about the Norwegian variety of Russenorsk due to the fact that most of the texts in Russenorsk were written by Norwegians. In the few Russian records of the language, there are examples of both /z/ and /ts/ in the words презентоме (prezentome, to give) and принципал (printsipal, captain), for which the Norwegians used /s/. The Russian affricate /tɕ/ in words such as чай (chaj, tea) was substituted by the Norwegians for the fricative /ç/.


Vocabulary

Corpora of Russenorsk consist of lists of individual words and phrases as well as records of dialogues compiled by linguists such as
Just Knud Qvigstad Just Knud Qvigstad (4 April 1853 – 15 March 1957) was a Norwegian philologist, linguist, ethnographer, historian and cultural historian. He was also a headmaster in Tromsø, and a politician for the Conservative Party who served as mayor of Tro ...
. The corpora include c. 400 words, about half of those only appear once in the records (so-called
hapax legomena In corpus linguistics, a ''hapax legomenon'' ( also or ; ''hapax legomena''; sometimes abbreviated to ''hapax'', plural ''hapaxes'') is a word or an expression that occurs only once within a context: either in the written record of an entire ...
), therefore, the vocabulary contained only 150-200 core words. The origin of its vocabulary is generally held to be approximately 40% Russian and 50% Norwegian, with the remaining 10% from Dutch,
Low German : : : : : (70,000) (30,000) (8,000) , familycolor = Indo-European , fam2 = Germanic , fam3 = West Germanic , fam4 = North Sea Germanic , ancestor = Old Saxon , ancestor2 = Middle L ...
,
French French (french: français(e), link=no) may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to France ** French language, which originated in France, and its various dialects and accents ** French people, a nation and ethnic group identified with Franc ...
, English, Sami, and
Swedish Swedish or ' may refer to: Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically: * Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland ** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...
. Many words in Russenorsk have a synonym from the other primary language. *, (halibut) *, (man) *, (this) *, (not) Some words can be etymologically traced to both Norwegian and Russian, for example, (Norwegian) and (Russian). Some words have an unclear etymology, for example, or can come from Russian, Swedish, or Finnish. Some Russenorsk words survive in the dialect of Vardø: * (Russenorsk: , rus, красть, krast', to steal) * ( rus, хлеб, khleb, bread)


Grammar

One of the characteristics differentiating the pidgin from jargon is its grammar; however, Russenorsk did not go through tertiary hybridization.Russenorsk is mainly influenced by Norwegian grammar, leading some to conclude that it is a variant of Norwegian with some Russian influence. A lack of
metalinguistic awareness Metalinguistic awareness, also known as metalinguistic ability, refers to the ability to consciously reflect on the nature of language. The concept of metalinguistic awareness is helpful in explaining the execution and transfer of linguistic know ...
amongst Russenorsk speakers may have led them to believe they were speaking the language of their interlocutor; that is, that Russians believed they were speaking Norwegian and vice versa. There are no clear verb conjugations. The main indication of a verb is the suffix ''-om'', for example, ''kapitan på kajuta slipom'' (the captain is asleep in his cabin). Nominative nouns usually end with ''-a''. Conjunctions used to make compound sentences or dependent clauses are ''ja'', ''i'', and ''jes''. ''Kak'' is used as an interrogative word. The general word order is SVO, with some alterations for questions and sentences with adverbs. ''På'' is used as the only preposition for the oblique case: *For possession: ''klokka på ju'' (your watch) *For location: ''mala penge på lamma'' (little money in the pocket), and ''principal på sjib''? (Is the captain aboard the ship?) *For temporal relation: ''på morradag'' (tomorrow), ''på gammel ras'' (last year). *For direction: ''moja tvoja på vater kasstom'' (I will throw you in the water), ''nogoli dag tvoja reisa på Arkangel otsuda''? (How many days did you travel from here
o get O, or o, is the fifteenth letter and the fourth vowel letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''o'' (pronounced ), plu ...
to Arkhangelsk?), ''på Arkangel reisom'' (go to Arkhangelsk).


Morphology

Russenorsk does not have extensive morphology, but has some unique characteristics. The ending ''-om'' does not come from Russian nor Norwegian, but it may come from
Solombala English Solombala-English, or Solombala English–Russian Pidgin, is a little-known pidgin, derived from both English and Russian, that was spoken in the port of Solombala in the city of Arkhangelsk (Archangel), Russia in the 18th and 19th centuries. T ...
. The ending ''-mann'', from Norwegian, is used to indicate nationality or profession, for example (Russian), (Norwegian), or (trader). Other morphological features are
reduplication In linguistics, reduplication is a morphological process in which the root or stem of a word (or part of it) or even the whole word is repeated exactly or with a slight change. The classic observation on the semantics of reduplication is Edwa ...
, such as ''morra-morradag'' (after tomorrow), and
compounding In the field of pharmacy, compounding (performed in compounding pharmacies) is preparation of a custom formulation of a medication to fit a unique need of a patient that cannot be met with commercially available products. This may be done for me ...
, such as ''kua'' (cow) and (shirt) to (cowhide).


Syntax

One characteristic syntactical attribute of Russenorsk is the tendency to move the verb to the final position when the sentence has adverbs. This is found in neither Russian nor Norwegian. Another is that the negator (''ikke'', ''njet'') precedes the verb, but can be separated from the verb. This is unlike negation in either Russian or Norwegian, but it may have come from Finnish, in which this syntax was probable. Moreover, the use of barter focused language established frequent use of interrogative speech in sentences.


Examples

marks Russian origin, marks Norwegian. : :


Sentences


See also

*
Languages of Svalbard Svalbard has a population of approximately 2,395 people as of 2011. Approximately 70% of the people are Norwegians; the remaining 30% are Russian and Ukrainian. The official language of Svalbard is Norwegian. Russian is used in the Russian settlem ...
* Kola Norwegians * Bjarmaland * Pomors *
Kyakhta Russian–Chinese Pidgin Kyakhta Russian–Chinese Pidgin was a contact language (specifically a pidgin) used by Russian and Chinese traders to communicate during the 18th-early 20th century. The pidgin owes its name to the town of Kyakhta, a Russian town on the border ...
* Mednyj Aleut language


Notes and references


Notes


References


Bibliography

*Broch, I. & Jahr, E. H. 1984. ''Russenorsk: Et pidginspråk i Norge'' (2. utgave), Oslo: Novus. *Broch, I. & Jahr, E. H. 1984. "Russenorsk: a new look at the Russo-Norwegian pidgin in northern Norway." In: P. Sture Ureland & I. Clarkson (eds.): Scandinavian Language Contacts, Cambridge: C.U.P., pp. 21–65. *Jahr, E. H. 1996. "On the pidgin status of Russenorsk", in: E. H. Jahr and I. Broch (eds.): Language contact in the Arctic: Northern pidgins and contact languages, Berlin-New York: Mouton de Gruyter, 107-122. *Lunden, S. S. 1978. Tracing the ancestry of Russenorsk. ''Slavia Orientalis'' 27/2, 213–217. {{Authority control Extinct languages of Europe Norwegian language Russian-based pidgins and creoles Pomors Languages attested from the 18th century Languages extinct in the 19th century