Silesian language

Silesian, occasionally called Upper Silesian, is an ethnolect of the Lechitic group spoken by part of people in Upper Silesia. Its vocabulary was significantly influenced by Central German due to the existence of numerous Silesian German speakers in the area prior to World War II and after. The first mentions of Silesian as a distinct lect date back to the 16th century, and the first literature with Silesian characteristics to the 17th century.

Linguistic distinctiveness of Silesian has long been a topic of discussion among Poland's linguists, especially after all of Upper Silesia was included within the Polish borders, following World War II. Some regard it as one of the four major dialects of Polish, while others classify it as a separate regional language, distinct from Polish. According to the official data from the 2021 Polish census, about 500 000 people consider Silesian as their native language. Internationally, Silesian has been fully recognized as a language since 2007, when it was accorded the ISO 639-3 registration code ''szl''.

Several efforts have been made to gain recognition for Silesian as an official regional language in Poland. Shortly before the 2007 Polish parliamentary election, the MPs of Self-Defence of the Republic of Poland, League of Polish Families, People's National Movement and the Polish People's Party submitted a bill recognizing Silesian as a regional language in Poland, but the Sejm was dissolved before the bill could have been passed. In April 2024, the Polish Sejm took a significant step by passing a bill recognizing it as such, however, the bill was vetoed by President Andrzej Duda on 29 May 2024.

Distribution

Silesian speakers currently live in the region of Upper Silesia, which is split between southwestern Poland and the northeastern Czech Republic. At present Silesian is commonly spoken in the area between the historical border of Silesia on the east and a line from Syców to Prudnik on the west as well as in the Rawicz area.

Until 1945, Silesian was also spoken in enclaves in Lower Silesia, where the majority spoke Lower Silesian, a variety of Central German. The German-speaking population was either evacuated en masse by German forces towards the end of the war or deported by the new administration upon the Polish annexation of the Silesian Recovered Territories after its end. Before World War II, most Slavic-language speakers also knew German and, at least in eastern Upper Silesia, many German speakers were acquainted with Slavic Silesian.

According to the last official census in Poland in 2021, about 460,000 people declared Silesian as their native language, whereas in the country's census of 2011, the figure was about 510,000. In the censuses in Poland, the Czech Republic, and Slovakia, nearly 900,000 people declared Silesian nationality; Upper Silesia has almost five million inhabitants, with the vast majority speaking Polish in the Polish part and declaring themselves to be Poles and the vast majority speaking Czech in the Czech part and declaring themselves to be Czechs.

Grammar

Although the morphological differences between Silesian and Polish have been researched extensively, other grammatical differences have not been studied in depth.

A notable difference is in question-forming. In standard Polish, questions which do not contain interrogative words are formed either by using intonation or the interrogative particle . In Silesian, questions which do not contain interrogative words are formed by using intonation (with a markedly different intonation pattern than in Polish) or inversion (e.g. ); there is no interrogative particle.

Example

According to Jan Miodek, standard Polish has always been used by Upper Silesians as a language of prayers.
The Lord's Prayer in Silesian, Polish, Czech, and English:

Dialects of Silesian

Silesian has many dialects:
* Dialects spoken in areas which are now part of Poland, former Prussian Silesia:
** Kluczbork Silesian dialect (1)
** Opole Silesian dialect (2)
** Niemodlin Silesian dialect (3)
** Prudnik Silesian dialect (4)
** Gliwice Silesian dialect (5)
** Sulkovian Silesian dialect
** Borderland Silesian-Lesser Polish dialect (6a & 6b)
** Borderland Silesian-Lach dialect (9)
* Dialects spoken on both sides of the Czech–Polish border, former Austrian Silesia:
** Cieszyn Silesian dialect (7)
** Jabłonków Silesian dialect (8)
* Lower Silesian dialect group
** Chwalim dialect
* Lach dialects spoken in areas which are now part of the Czech Republic, often considered linguistically apart from the ones mentioned above:
** Opava subdialect
** Ostrava subdialect
** Frenštát subdialect

Dialect vs. language

Politicization

Opinions are divided among linguists regarding whether Silesian is a distinct language, a dialect of Polish, or, in the case of Lach, a variety of Czech. The issue can be contentious, because some Silesians consider themselves to be a distinct nationality within Poland. When Czechs, Poles, and Germans each made claims to substantial parts of Silesia as constituting an integral part of their respective nation-states in the 19th and 20th centuries, the language of Slavic-speaking Silesians became politicized.

Slavicist of Upper Silesian extraction, Rudolf Abicht, who worked at the University of Breslau and proposed an early standardization of the Belarusian language, clearly recognized that standardizing and making Silesian into a language is a socio-political process. In 1920, he expressed his opinion on the subject in an extensive essay on the 'Upper Silesian language question.'

Some, like Óndra Łysohorsky (a poet and author in Czechoslovakia), saw the Silesians as being their own distinct people, which culminated in his effort to create a literary standard which he called the "Lachian language". Silesian inhabitants supporting the cause of each of these ethnic groups had their own robust network of supporters across Silesia's political borders which shifted over the course of the 20th century prior to the large-scale ethnic cleansing in the aftermath of World War II.

In 2011, Tomasz Kamusella and Andrzej Roczniok published a Silesian-language article on the standardization of the Silesian language.

Views

Some linguists from Poland, such as Jolanta Tambor, Juan Lajo, Tomasz Wicherkiewicz, philosopher Jerzy Dadaczyński, sociologist Elżbieta Anna Sekuła, and sociolinguist Tomasz Kamusella, support its status as a language. According to Stanisław Rospond, it is impossible to classify Silesian as a dialect of the contemporary Polish language because he considers it to be descended from Old Polish. According to Kamusella, "between the mid-1990s and mid-2000s, several popular Silesian-Polish dictionaries were published, some of which were quite extensive. Initially, they referred to Silesian as a gwara (dialect) but then increasingly termed it a language."

Other Polish linguists, such as Jan Miodek and Edward Polański, do not support its status as a language. Jan Miodek and Dorota Simonides, both of Silesian origin, prefer to see the preservation of the entire range of Silesian dialects rather than standardization.
The German linguist Reinhold Olesch was greatly interested in the "Polish vernaculars" of Upper Silesia and other Slavic varieties such as Kashubian and Polabian. Miodek argues that "there is no major grammatical feature within Silesian, which would not function simultaneously in the dialects of Lesser Poland or Greater Poland, Mazovian or Kashubian".

The United States Immigration Commission in 1911 classified it as one of the dialects of Polish. In their respective surveys of Slavic languages, most linguists writing in English, such as Alexander M. Schenker, Robert A. Rothstein, and Roland Sussex and Paul Cubberley list Silesian as a dialect of Polish, as does ''Encyclopædia Britannica''. On the question of whether Silesian is a separate Slavic language, Gerd Hentschel wrote that "Silesian ... can thus ... without doubt be described as a dialect of Polish" ("").

In contrast, Silesian linguist Henryk Jaroszewicz who codified Silesian, argues that Silesian constitutes a separate language, and bases his view on the need to prioritize extralinguistic factors of the intralinguistic ones:

Polish linguist Kazimierz Polański wrote: "The problem of distinguishing languages from dialects is not a purely linguistic problem, it is rather a sociological, psychological problem. To a certain extent, it is also political. It is not possible to establish linguistic criteria to distinguish between a language and a dialect. The main issue here is linguistic awareness, which causes a linguistic community to mature at a certain point and decide to become independent: it develops a dictionary of its language, codifies the rules of its use, its spelling, choice of alphabet, etc. From this point onwards, it is possible to speak of a separate language. From this point onwards, it is possible to speak of a distinct language."

Among the linguists who argue that Silesian is a language, Witold Mańczak wrote that "the defining feature between ethnolects is lexical, not grammatical, convergence". In this context, Silesian has a lexical similarity of 53% with Polish; similarly, English language was evaluated to have a lexical similarity of 60% with the German language. Percentages higher than 85% usually indicate that the two languages being compared are likely to be related dialects.

In Czechia, disagreement exists concerning the Lach dialects which rose to prominence thanks to Óndra Łysohorsky and his translator Ewald Osers. While some have considered it a separate language, most now view Lach as a dialect of Czech.

Phonology

Vowels

Consonants

Writing system

There have been a number of attempts at codifying the language spoken by Slavophones in Silesia. Probably the most well-known was undertaken by Óndra Łysohorsky when codifying the Lachian dialects in creating the Lachian literary language in the early 20th century.

Ślabikŏrzowy szrajbōnek is the relatively new alphabet created by the Pro Loquela Silesiana organization to reflect the sounds of all Silesian dialects. It was approved by Silesian organizations affiliated in Rada Górnośląska. Ubuntu translation is in this alphabet as is some of the Silesian Wikipedia, although some of it is in Steuer's alphabet. It is used in a few books, including the Silesian alphabet book.Mirosław Syniawa: Ślabikŏrz niy dlŏ bajtli. Pro Loquela Silesiana.

: Letters: A, Ã, B, C, Ć, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, Ł, M, N, Ń, O, Ŏ, Ō, Ô, Õ, P, R, S, Ś, T, U, W, Y, Z, Ź, Ż.

One of the first alphabets created specifically for Silesian was ''Steuer's Silesian alphabet'', created in the Interwar period and used by Feliks Steuer for his poems in Silesian. The alphabet consists of 30 graphemes and eight digraphs:

: Letters: A, B, C, Ć, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, Ł, M, N, Ń, O, P, R, S, Ś, T, U, Ů, W, Y, Z, Ź, Ż
: Digraphs: Au, Ch, Cz, Dz, Dź, Dż, Rz, Sz

Based on the Steuer alphabet, in 2006 the was proposed:

: Letters: A, B, C, Ć, Č, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, Ń, O, P, R, Ř, S, Ś, Š, T, U, Ů, W, Y, Z, Ź, Ž.

Silesian's phonetic alphabet replaces the digraphs with single letters ( Sz with Š, etc.) and does not include the letter Ł, whose sound can be represented phonetically with U. It is therefore the alphabet that contains the fewest letters. Although it is the most phonetically logical, it did not become popular with Silesian organizations, with the argument that it contains too many caron diacritics and hence resembles the Czech alphabet. Large parts of the Silesian Wikipedia, however, are written in Silesian's phonetic alphabet.

Sometimes other alphabets are also used, such as the "Tadzikowy muster" (for the ''National Dictation Contest of the Silesian language'') or the Polish alphabet, but writing in this alphabet is problematic as it does not allow for the differentiation and representation of all Silesian sounds.

Culture

Silesian has recently seen an increased use in culture, for example:
* , online news and information platform (founded in January 2018)
* YouTube personalities such as Niklaus Pieron
* TV and radio stations (for example: TV Silesia, Sfera TV, TVP3 Katowice, Slonsky Radio, Radio Piekary, Radio Silesia, Radio Fest);
* Music groups (for example: , Krzysztof Hanke, Hasiok, , FEET);
* Theatre (for example: ''Polterabend'' in Silesian Theatre);
* Plays
* Film (for example: ' ("''Grzeszny żywot Franciszka Buły''")
* Books (for example, the so-called ; poetry: "Myśli ukryte" by Karol Gwóźdź)
* Teaching aides (for example, a Silesian basal reader)

Recognition

In 2003, the National Publishing Company of Silesia () commenced operations. This publisher was founded by the Alliance of the People of the Silesian Nation () and it prints books about Silesia and books in Silesian language.

In July 2007, the Slavic Silesian language was given the ISO 639-3 code szl.

On 6 September 2007, 23 politicians of the Polish parliament made a statement about a new law to give Silesian the official status of a regional language.

On 7 September 2007, the MPs of Self-Defence of the Republic of Poland, League of Polish Families, People's National Movement and the Polish People's Party submitted a bill recognizing Silesian as a regional language in Poland. The bill did not pass because the Sejm was dissolved before it could be voted on, triggering a snap election.

The first official National Dictation Contest of the Silesian language () took place in August 2007. In dictation as many as 10 forms of writing systems and orthography have been accepted.

On 30 January 2008 and in June 2008, two organizations promoting Silesian language were established: Pro Loquela Silesiana and .

On 26 May 2008, the Silesian Wikipedia was founded.

On 30 June 2008 in the edifice of the Silesian Parliament in Katowice, a conference took place on the status of the Silesian language. This conference was a forum for politicians, linguists, representatives of interested organizations and persons who deal with the Silesian language. The conference was titled "Silesian – Still a Dialect or Already a Language?" ().

In 2012, the Ministry of Administration and Digitization registered the Silesian language in Annex 1 to the Regulation on the state register of geographical names;Dz.U. 2012 nr 0 poz. 309
– Internet System of Legal Acts however, in a November 2013 amendment to the regulation, Silesian is not included.

On 26 April 2024, the Sejm voted 236-186 with five abstentions to recognise Silesian as a regional language. On 29 May 2024, President Andrzej Duda vetoed the bill.

On 26 June 2024, Silesian was added to the languages offered in the Google Translate service.

Gallery

File:Czerwony Hasiok - kontener z napisem po śląsku.jpg, A waste container with the inscription in Silesian ''Czerwony Hasiok'' (red trash can)
File:Galeria Katowicka, reklama po śląsku.jpg, An advertising billboard of Galeria Katowicka shopping mall that means "Black Friday. Buy something and get a bag with a graphic designed by Roobens"
File:Gryfnyj rajzy po Rybniku - język śląski w przestrzeni publicznej.jpg, A promotional poster of the ZTZ Rybnik bus company with the phrase ''Gryfnyj rajzy po Rybniku,'' which means "Have a nice trip around Rybnik"
File:Helios, reklama po śląsku.jpg, An advertising billboard in Silesian which means ''"True comfort in the cinema returns to Katowice! Helios"''
File:Jeżech na sztrom - język śląski w Rybniku, komunikacja miejska.jpg, Public transport bus in Rybnik with the inscription "''Jeżech na sztrom''" (I'm electric)
File:Rebel Garden Cafe - język śląski 02.jpg, "''Leave the empty glasses here so there is no mess''" as a cartoon speech of Jerzy Ziętek (former general and governor of Katowice) in Rebel Garden Café in Chorzów

See also

* List of Silesian-language films
* Silesian German
* Texas Silesian
* Wymysorys, West Germanic language in Wilamowice, Silesian Voivodeship
* Alzenau, East Central German dialect spoken in the former village of Hałcnów, which is now a district of Bielsko-Biała, Silesian Voivodeship
* Cieszyn Silesian

Notes

References

Further reading

* Paul Weber. 1913.
Die Polen in Oberschlesien: eine statistische Untersuchung
'. Verlagsbuchhandlung von Julius Springer in Berlin (in German)

Norbert Morciniec
1989. ''Zum Wortgut deutscher Herkunft in den polnischen Dialekten Schlesiens''. Zeitschrift für Ostforschung, Bd. 83, Heft 3 (in German)
* Joseph Partsch. 1896.
Schlesien: eine Landeskunde für das deutsche Volk. T. 1., Das ganze Land
' (''die Sprachgrenze 1790 und 1890; pp. 364–367''). Breslau: Verlag Ferdinand Hirt. (in German)
* Joseph Partsch. 1911.
Schlesien: eine Landeskunde für das deutsche Volk. T. 2., Landschaften und Siedelungen
'. Breslau: Verlag Ferdinand Hirt. (in German)
* Lucyna Harc et al. 2013.
Cuius Regio? Ideological and Territorial Cohesion of the Historical Region of Silesia (c. 1000–2000) vol. 1., The Long Formation of the Region Silesia (c. 1000–1526)
'. Wrocław: eBooki.com.pl
* Lucyna Harc et al. 2014.
Cuius regio? Ideological and Territorial Cohesion of the Historical Region of Silesia (c. 1000–2000) vol. 2., The Strengthening of Silesian Regionalism (1526–1740)
'. Wrocław: eBooki.com.pl
* Lucyna Harc et al. 2014.
Cuius regio? Ideological and Territorial Cohesion of the Historical Region of Silesia (c. 1000–2000) vol. 4., Region Divided: Times of Nation-States (1918–1945)
'. Wrocław: eBooki.com.pl
* Tomasz Kamusella. 2014. ''Ślōnsko godka / The Silesian Language''. Zabrze: NOS, 196 pp.
* Tomasz Kamusella and Motoki Nomachi. 2014. The Long Shadow of Borders: The Cases of Kashubian and Silesian in Poland (pp 35–60). ''The Eurasia Border Review''. Vol 5, No 2, Fall.
** Review: Mark Brüggemann. 2013. Ślōnsko godka. The Silesian languageTomasz Kamusella (2013): "Ślōnsko godka. The silesian language" - Review by Mark Brüggemann
/ref>
** Review: Michael Moser ( uk). 2013. ''Zeitschrift für Slawistik'' (pp 118–119). Vol 58, No 1. Potsdam: Universität Potsdam.
* Tomasz Kamusella. 2014. ''Warszawa wie lepiej Ślązaków nie ma. O dyskryminacji i języku śląskim'' arsaw Knows Better – The Silesians Don't Exist: On Discrimination and the Silesian Language Zabrze, Poland: NOS, 174 pp. .
** Review: . 2013. ''Zeitschrift für Slawistik'' (pp 118–119). Vol 58, No 1. Potsdam: Universität Potsdam.
* Tomasz Kamusella. 2013. The Silesian Language in the Early 21st Century: A Speech Community on the Rollercoaster of Politics (pp 1–35). '' Die Welt der Slaven''. Vol 58, No 1.
* Tomasz Kamusella. 2011. Silesian in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: A Language Caught in the Net of Conflicting Nationalisms, Politics, and Identities (pp 769–789). 2011. '' Nationalities Papers''. No 5.
*
* Tomasz Kamusella. 2009. Échanges de paroles ou de coups en Haute-Silésie: la langue comme 'lieu' de contacts et de luttes interculturels xchange of Words or Blows in Upper Silesia: Language as a "Place" of Contacts and Intercultural Struggles(pp 133–152). ''Cultures d'Europe centrale. No 8: Lieux communs de la multiculturalité urbaine en Europe centrale'', ed by Delphine Bechtel and Xavier Galmiche. Paris: CIRCE.
* Tomasz Kamusella. 2007. ''Uwag kilka o dyskryminacji Ślązaków i Niemców górnośląskich w postkomunistycznej Polsce'' Few Remarks on the Discrimination of the Silesians and Upper Silesia's Germans in Postcommunist Poland Zabrze, Poland: NOS, 28 pp. .
* Tomasz Kamusella. 2006. ''Schlonzsko: Horní Slezsko, Oberschlesien, Górny Śląsk. Esej o regionie i jego mieszkańcach'' chlonzsko: Upper Silesia. An Essay on the Region and Its Inhabitants(2nd, corrected and enlarged edition). Zabrze, Poland: NOS, 148 pp. .
** Review: Anon. 2010. ''The Sarmatian Review''. Sept. (p 1530).
** Review: Svetlana Antova. 2007. ''Bulgarian Ethnology / Bulgarska etnologiia''. No 4 (pp 120–121).
* Tomasz Kamusella. 2009. Codzienność komunikacyjno-językowa na obszarze historycznego Górnego Śląska he Everyday Language Use in Historical Upper Silesia(pp 126–156). In: Robert Traba, ed. ''Akulturacja/asymilacja na pograniczach kulturowych Europy Środkowo-Wschodniej w XIX i XX wieku'' cculturation/Assimilation in the Cultural Borderlands of East-Central Europe in the 19th and 20th Centuries(vol 1: Stereotypy i pamięć tereotypes and memory. Warsaw: Instytut Studiów Politycznych PAN and Niemiecki Instytut Historyczny.
* Tomasz Kamusella. 2009. Czy śląszczyzna jest językiem? Spojrzenie socjolingwistyczne s Silesian a Language? A Sociolinguistic View(pp 27–35). In: Andrzej Roczniok, ed. ''Śląsko godka – jeszcze gwara czy jednak już język? / Ślōnsko godko – mundart jeszcze eli już jednak szpracha''. Zabrze: NOŚ.
* Tomasz Kamusella. 2006. ''Schlonzska mowa. Język, Górny Śląsk i nacjonalizm'' (Vol II) ilesia and Language: Language, Upper Silesia and Nationalism, a collection of articles on various social, political and historical aspects of language use in Upper Silesia Zabrze, Poland: NOS, 151 pp. .
* Tomasz Kamusella. 2005. ''Schlonzska mowa. Język, Górny Śląsk i nacjonalizm'' (Vol I) ilesia and Language: Language, Upper Silesia and Nationalism, a collection of articles on various social, political and historical aspects of language use in Upper Silesia Zabrze, Poland: NOS, 187 pp. .
*
Review: Kai Struve. 2006. ''Zeitschrift für Ostmitteleuropa-Forschung''. No 4. Marburg, Germany: Herder-Institut (pp 611–613).
** Review: Kai Struve. 2007. Recenzyjo Instituta Herdera erder-Institute’s Review(pp 26–27). ''Ślůnsko Nacyjo''. No 5, Jul. Zabrze: NOŚ.
** Review: Jerzy Tomaszewski. 2007. Czy istnieje naród śląski? oes the Silesian Nation Exist(pp 280–283). ''Przegląd Historyczny''. No 2. Warsaw: DiG and University of Warsaw.
** Review: Jerzy Tomaszewski. 2007. Czy istnieje naród śląski? oes the Silesian Nation Exist(pp 8–12). 2007. ''Ślůnsko Nacyjo''. No 12, Dec. Zabrze: NOŚ.
* Tomasz Kamusella. 2004. The Szlonzokian Ethnolect in the Context of German and Polish Nationalisms (pp. 19–39). '' Studies in Ethnicity and Nationalism''. No 1. London: Association for the Study of Ethnicity and Nationalism. .
* Tomasz Kamusella. 2001. ''Schlonzsko: Horní Slezsko, Oberschlesien, Górny Śląsk. Esej o regionie i jego mieszkańcach'' chlonzsko: Upper Silesia. An Essay on the Region and Its Inhabitants Elbląg, Poland: Elbląska Oficyna Wydawnicza, 108 pp. .
** Review: Andreas R Hofmann. 2002. ''Zeitschrift für Ostmitteleuropa-Forschung''. No 2. Marburg, Germany: Herder-Institut (p 311).
** Review: Anon. 2002. Esej o naszym regionie n Essay on Our region(p 4). ''Głos Ludu. Gazeta Polaków w Republice Czeskiej''. No 69, 11 June. Ostrava, Czech Republic: Vydavatelství OLZA.
** Review: Walter Żelazny :eo:Walter Żelazny. 2003. Niech żyje śląski lud ong Live the Silesian People(pp 219–223). Sprawy Narodowościowe. No 22. Poznań, Poland: Zakład Badań Narodowościowych PAN.
* Tomasz Kamusella. 1999. Język a Śląsk Opolski w kontekście integracji europejskiej anguage and Opole Silesia in the Context of European Integration(pp 12–19). ''Śląsk Opolski''. No 3. Opole, Poland: Instytut Śląski.
* Tomasz Kamusella. 1998. Das oberschlesische Kreol: Sprache und Nationalismus in Oberschlesien im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert he Upper Silesian Creole: Language and Nationalism in the 19th and 20th Centuries(pp 142–161). In: Markus Krzoska und Peter Tokarski, eds. . ''Die Geschichte Polens und Deutschlands im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert. Ausgewählte Baiträge''. Osnabrück, Germany: fibre.
* Tomasz Kamusella. 1998. Kreol górnośląski he Upper Silesian Creole(pp 73–84). ''Kultura i Społeczeństwo''. No 1. Warsaw, Poland: Komitet Socjologii ISP PAN.
* Andrzej Roczniok and Tomasz Kamusella. 2011. Sztandaryzacyjo ślōnski godki / Standaryzacja języka śląskiego he Standardization of the Silesian Language(pp 288–294). In: I V Abisigomian, ed. ''Lingvokul’turnoe prostranstvo sovremennoi Evropy cherez prizmu malykh i bolshikh iazykov. K 70-letiiu professora Aleksandra Dimitrievicha Dulichenko'' (Ser: Slavica Tartuensis, Vol 9). Tartu: Tartu University.
* Robert Semple. London 1814
Observations made on a tour from Hamburg through Berlin, Gorlitz, and Breslau, to Silberberg; and thence to Gottenburg
(pp. 122–123)

External links

*

{{DEFAULTSORT:Silesian Language

Languages of Germany
Languages of Poland
Languages of the Czech Republic
Lechitic languages
Slavic languages written in Latin script
Culture of Silesian Voivodeship
Culture of Opole Voivodeship