Norwegian dialects

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The 4 main groups of Norwegian dialects:
  • Nordnorsk (Northern Norwegian)
  • Trøndersk (Tronderian)
  • Vestnorsk (Western Norwegian)
  • Austnorsk (Eastern Norwegian )

    • In addition to the written languages Bokmål and Nynorsk, the Norwegian language includes a large number of Norwegian dialects .

    Dialect boundaries

    Subdivision into dialect groups

    The dialect borders in Norway came about in different ways:

    • An important dialect border is the high mountains in central Norway, the Langfjella. These high mountains were a major obstacle to traffic between the west and east of the country ( Vestland and Austland / Østland ). Language changes could hardly be disseminated this way.
    • In some cases, old administrative boundaries determined today's dialect boundaries.
    • In other cases there are settlement movements that create new dialect boundaries. So at the end of the 18th century a language island was created near Bardu and Målselv ( Troms fylke ), because people from Østerdalen ( Hedmark fylke ) settled there. Another example: It is assumed that northern Norway was inhabited by people from the west of the country (Vestland) in prehistoric times . This means that these two areas are linguistically closely related, although the Trøndelag area is in between, where different dialects are spoken and spoken.

    use

    In Norway, dialects and regiolects are widely used in public. There are two official writing languages ​​in Norway ( Nynorsk and Bokmål ), but no generally accepted pronunciation. But even where a certain choice of words, ending or pronunciation is specified, there are relatively many deviations from these regulations in Norway. There are also politicians and professors who use their native dialect in public.

    In Norway there is always the phenomenon that precisely those dialects that have a low reputation are spreading. This has been shown in studies in the cities of Stavanger , Bergen and Ålesund , among others . There new general city dialects are emerging on the basis of old lower- class dialects ( gatespråk "street language"). These old lower-class dialects generally had a low reputation. The new general urban languages ​​in the cities examined are spoken by larger parts of the population and by different social classes than the old lower-class dialects. These new urban dialects are spreading increasingly into the rural surroundings of the cities examined.

    In Oslo , too, it is not so much the “elegant” dialect from the west of the city that is spreading, but the less highly regarded dialect from the east of the city (vikamålet) . The language in the new suburbs of Oslo is essentially an evolution of the old dialect from the east of the city. One could have assumed that a big city acts like a linguistic melting pot, and that with such a mixture the “noble” dialect would prevail - but that's not what happens here.

    There is a similar development in Denmark. There the “street language” of Copenhagen spreads among the young people on the island of Zealand , on which Copenhagen is located.

    Linguistic peculiarities

    The Norwegian dialects can be classified according to the following characteristics:

    East Nordic

    Monophthongization

    The monophthongization is a sound development in which diphthongs become monophthongs . In the North Germanic languages, this concerns the three Old Norse diphthongs ei, au and ey . The Old Norse ey is the result of the i umlauts from the Old Norse au .

    • Examples of Old Norse diphthongs: steinn ("stone"), kaupa ("buy"), reykr ("smoke").
    • Examples of Danish monophthongs: sten ("stone"), købe ("buy"), røg ("smoke").

    The North Germanic monophthonging originated in Old Low German . It reached Old Danish before the year 1000. It spread further through Skåne, which was then still Danish, into other Swedish and Eastern Norwegian dialects. In northern Østerdalen and the area around Røros , monophthonging did not take place until the 17th century. On the island of Gotland and in Finland-Swedish and in the vast majority of Norwegian dialects, monophthongization has not occurred to this day.

    Old Norse hv, kv and v

    Old Norse made a distinction between hv, kv and v at the beginning of the word. In Standard Swedish, Standard Danish, and almost all Swedish dialects, hv has become v . In almost all Norwegian dialects, in Faroese and Icelandic, hv has become kv .

    Examples: Danish hvad (“was”) [vað] , nynorsk kva, both originated from Old Norse hvat .

    Present tense of strong verbs

    Almost all Norwegian dialects have some strong verbs with alternating vowels. Many Norwegian urban dialects and the dialects in the greater Oslo area do not have this vowel change, nor do Swedish and Danish (and all of their dialects).

    South Scandinavian

    Pharynx r

    The Rachen- R [ʁ] (Norwegian skarre-r ) is a dialect identifier of Sørland, southern Vestland, Denmark and southern Sweden (south of the Gothenburg - Kalmar line ). The remaining areas have tongue tip R.

    This sound may come from Paris and spread from there. By 1780 he had come to Copenhagen and by 1800 to Bergen and Kristiansand . From these cities the sound has spread to the rural areas. By 1900 large parts of the Sørland coast already had the Rachen-R. In the process, it spread from larger to smaller places, skipping over the even smaller places that lay in between.

    reduction

    Reduction of full vowels in the final to Schwa ( [ə] ) or to [æ] occurs to different degrees. Southwest Norway , for example, has the infinitive ending in -a throughout , e.g. B. å vera (“to be”), å kasta (“to throw”), Eastern Norway, on the other hand, only recognizes it in verbs with a so-called light stem, e.g. B. å vera (“to be”), but å kaste (“to throw”).

    Soft consonants

    Soft, i.e. voiced consonants where the written language has voiceless ones. This is about b, d and g after vowels in words like skip [ʃiːp] , bløt [bløːt] and bok [buːk] (“ship”, “soft”, “book”). These words would then be pronounced something like skib [ʃiːb] , blød [bløːd] and bog [buːg] .

    This is the characteristic of a southern Norwegian coastal strip between Stavanger and Arendal . See also Sørlandet .

    Central Scandinavian

    balance

    Balance (in Norwegian jamvekt ) means that in certain words the stress is evenly distributed over the first two syllables, thus creating a balance of stress.

    Words with balance used to be found in the central Norwegian and Swedish dialects. Today the phenomenon is only alive in Gudbrandsdalen ( Oppland fylke ), but traces of former occurrences can also be found elsewhere, especially in Eastern Norway (Østland) and in Trøndelag.

    A clear consequence of equilibrium is the occurrence of two different infinitive endings: one for infinitives that used to have equilibrium and another for infinitives that never had equilibrium. See “ Infinitive Ending ” below .

    Vowel harmony

    In certain areas there is a phonetic balance between the vowels of certain parts of speech, called jamning or jevning in Norwegian . The ending vowel then influences the vowel before to a greater or lesser extent. This phonetic equalization only occurs with words that used to have equilibrium. There is a complete balance between the vowels in two areas: one includes the east of Telemark , the other Indre Trøndelag , Namdalen and North Østerdalen . There is incomplete compensation in large parts of Østland and Trøndelag. Examples: The dialect word veta (“to know”) becomes vætta , vatta or våttå; the dialect word viku ("the week") becomes vukku .

    Thick L

    The so-called “thick L” (IPA [ɽ] , in Norwegian tykk l or tjukk l ) is a type of retroflex L. See Voiced retroflex flap . Instead of retroflex , it is also said cakuminal or cerebral .

    This "thick L" is derived from the old Norwegian rð and the old Norwegian l . Examples: Old Norwegian orð ("word") and sól ("sun"), modern Norwegian ord and sol . In Østland, Trøndelag and large parts of Sweden these words can have a “big L”. In Vestland and Northern Norway they would be pronounced with r and l , e.g. B. [uːʁ] and [suːl] .

    Retroflex consonants

    Retroflex consonants also appear where there is the “thick L” . The “thick L” [ɽ] then merges with a following l, d, t, r or n to form a retroflex consonant [ɭ] , [ɖ] , [ʈ] , [ɽ] or [ɳ] . Example: måltid ("meal") with retroflex consonant [moːʈiː] , without retroflex consonant [moːltiː] .

    Det as a formal subject

    In modern Norwegian, Swedish and Danish, a sentence must have a subject . In certain types of sentences there is therefore a formal subject. In the following examples, det and der are the formal subject. The German translations also have formal subjects at this point, namely es .

    Examples:

    • Det regnar (Nynorsk) or Det regner (Bokmål) "It's raining"
    • Der er komne tre nye båtar inn i hamna i dag "Today three new boats entered the port"

    Swedish, Eastern Norwegian and Trøndersk have det (“es”, “das”) as a formal subject in such sentences . In Vestland , Sørland , west of Telemark and most of Northern Norway, such sentences have the (“da”), sometimes her (“here”).

    Particle and Direct Object

    A syntactic difference between dialects is the order of direct object (dO) and verb particles (Part) in verb groups (spurious compound verbs). Trøndelag and the eastern parts of Østlandet have first the verbal particle and then the direct object. In these dialects, the verb and particle often become a tonem group. This means that they are pronounced like a single polysyllabic word, so the particle is appended ( enclitic ). The stress is then on the first syllable, with accent 2.

    S. V do part do
    Danish: De tog the ind
    De tog cykelen ind
    Swedish: De tog in the
    De tog in cycle
    Eastern Norwegian: Dem tok inn the
    Dem tok inn sykkelen
    Standard Norwegian (nynorsk): Dei tok han inn
    Dei tok inn sykkelen
    Standard Norwegian (bokmål): De tok the inn
    De tok inn sykkelen

    S = subject; V = verb; dO = direct object; Part = particle

    The sentences in the overview mean:

    • "They brought it in"
    • "They brought the bike in"

    North Scandinavian

    Soft ll and nn

    Soft or mouillier means that ll or nn (as in fjell or mann ) have a palatal pronunciation, i.e. are pronounced roughly like lj and nj . See also Voiced Palatal Nasal and Voiced Lateral Palatal Approximant .

    These two soft consonants are characteristics of northern areas ( Opplandsk , northern Midtlandsk, Northvestlandsk and the areas further north).

    Apocopes

    The apocope is a linguistic change in which the ending vowel at the end of the word is omitted. Example: han [haːn] instead of hane [haːnə] ("rooster"). This can also affect the infinitive endings of a dialect. The apocope occurs in Northern Norway: in Nordmøre ( Møre og Romsdal fylke), Trøndelag and parts of Nordland . See “Infinitive Ending”.

    West Nordic and West Norwegian

    dl and dn

    In Iceland, in the Faroe Islands and in western Norway there is the phenomenon of differentiation. This means that Old Norse rl becomes dl and rn becomes dn . Old Norse fn ( [vn] ) becomes bn . The phonetic difference (the difference) becomes greater. The Norwegian areas where this phenomenon can occur are Rogaland , Hordaland , Midtre Sogn, Indre Sogn, Hallingdal and Valdres . However, the details of this differentiation are quite different in the languages ​​and dialects mentioned above.

    Examples:

    Segmentation is a similar phenomenon. This means that a sound is segmented, i.e. split up. This is about the Old Norse long consonants ll and nn as in kalla ("to call") and finna ("to find"). These sounds typically become dl and dn, respectively . This phenomenon occurs in Icelandic, Faroese and southern Vestland .

    Examples:

    Diphthongization

    Diphthongization is a phonetic development in which a monophthong becomes a diphthong . This development occurred in several parts of the Nordic language area: Iceland, the Faroe Islands, parts of western Norway, Jutland, southern Sweden (south of the Gothenburg - Kalmar line ), Gotland and some other Swedish areas. The diphthongization affects the Old Norse long vowels á, é, í, ó and ú .

    Examples:

    • Old Norse bátr ("boat") becomes [baʊːt] (Voss)
    • Old Norse sól ("sun") becomes [sɔʊːl] (Voss, Sunnmøre, Setesdal)
    • Old Norse tré ("tree") becomes [træɪː] (Sunnmøre, Setesdal)
    • Old Norse bíta ("bite") becomes [beɪːtə] (Setesdal)
    • Old Norse skúta ( a light sailing ship ) becomes [skeʊːtə] (Setesdal)

    Others

    Infinitive ending

    In western and southern Norway there is a uniform infinitive ending, e.g. B. to -a or -e , so å kasta or å kaste ("throw"). In Northern Norway this ending can also be completely missing, i.e. å kast instead of z. B. å kasta .

    In the rest of the country there are two different infinitive endings ( kløyvd infinitive , "divided infinitive"). There the ending depends on the quantity of stem vowelism valid in Old Norse: If this was long, the verb today has the ending [ə], if it was short, the verb today has the ending [a]. Old Norse abbreviations were later expanded into open syllables, but today's vowel quantity has no influence on the ending. Example: Old Norse bíta (“bite”) becomes bite ( [biːtə] ) with [ə], but Old Norse vita (“to know”) becomes veta ( [veːta] ) with [a].

    Certain female article

    In the North Germanic languages, the definite article is usually attached to the noun . This is the indefinite feminine article in Nynorsk ei and in Bokmål ei or en , e.g. B. ei bok or en bok ("a book"). The specific feminine article is -a, in Bokmål also -en , e.g. B. boka or boken ("the book").

    Weak feminines are feminine nouns with an e ending in the written languages, e.g. B. jente ("girl"), kvinne ("woman") etc. Strong feminine nouns are feminine nouns without this e- ending, e.g. B. bok ("book"), sol ("sun"), bru ("bridge") etc.

    In most parts of the country this has no effect on the article; Here are frequently a -like endings before as boka and sola , jenta and kvinna etc. dialects that make a difference to know an additional item; here it's about kvinna, but soli .

    structure

    The classification of the dialects depends heavily on which language characteristics are considered important. Therefore, there are often several options for structuring dialects.

    Balance, apocope and reduction

    A frequently made classification uses the three criteria balance, apocope and reduction.

    Another criterion is the divided feminine, so the distinction between two endings in feminine specific nouns (see above).

    This classification looks like this:

    • with balance
      • with apocope
        • Trøndersk
      • without apocopes
        • with divided feminine
          • Midlandsk
        • without a divided feminine
          • Austlandsk / Østlandsk
    • without balance
      • with apocope
        • Nordlandsk
      • without apocopes
        • with reduction
          • Sørlandsk
          • Northvestlandsk
          • Troms- and Finnmarksmål
        • without reduction
          • Sørvestlandsk

    "Big L" and infinitive

    Another possibility is to use the number of infinitive endings, the “big L” and the specific feminine article as criteria. Then the classification of the Norwegian dialects looks like this:

    a) Western Norwegian (Vestnorsk)

    The main characteristics of these dialects are that they only have a single infinitive ending and that the so-called "thick L" (tykk l / tjukk l) does not appear.

    b) Eastern Norwegian (Østnorsk / Austnorsk)

    The main characteristics of these dialects are that they have two different infinitive endings and that the "thick L" occurs there.

    c) Northern Norway (Nordnorsk), north of Trøndelag

    Northern Norwegian has some characteristics in common with western Norwegian, but others with eastern Norwegian, more precisely with Trøndsk

    Old Norwegian dialect structure

    There were already dialect differences in the old Norwegian language. These dialect differences are partly evident in the old manuscripts. However, these manuscripts are not pure dialect texts, because even then there were certain writing traditions to which the scribes partly adhered.

    For the 13th century, there is a structure that is essentially similar to the structure of today's Norwegian dialects. A distinction is made between a western and an eastern main dialect for the 13th century. The border was the high mountains in central Norway, the Langfjella. The main western dialect had most of the characteristics in common with Old Icelandic as the Icelandic settlers mostly came from southern western Norway. The main eastern dialect shared many characteristics with Old Danish and Old Swedish. Western Old Norwegian is further divided into Nordvestlandsk (northern western Norwegian) and Sørvestlandsk (southern western Norwegian). Eastern Old Norwegian is divided into Trøndsk and Østlandsk.

    It is not known what linguistic peculiarities Northern Norwegian had during this time, i.e. the language north of Namdal (in northern Trøndelag). There are not enough old texts from this part.

    History of Norwegian Dialectology

    Pre-scientific time

    Norwegian dialectology has its roots in the 17th and 18th centuries. At that time, several glossaries of Norwegian words appeared. For example, in 1697 the Norwegian pastors were asked to compile word collections from the dialect of their parishes and send them to the royal Danish chancellery. Mathias Moth (1649–1719) worked a good part of it into his 60-volume Danish dictionary. The most important work from the period before 1800 was a manuscript containing 4000 dialect words from around 1740, which was only published in 1923 under the title Professor Knud Leems Norske Maalsamlingar fraa 1740-aari .

    National romance

    Scientific dialectology began at the time of national romanticism , when in Norway, which had belonged to Denmark for centuries, specifically Norwegian elements gained the upper hand in cultural life. The researchers, influenced by national romanticism, were interested in the history of their country, especially in the country's “ golden age ”, that is to say in what they called the country's “great” and “glorious” times. So they noticed that the Norwegian dialects came from Old Norwegian, and not from the written language. Because the old Norwegian was the language of this “Golden Age”, the dialects derived from it also gained a greater reputation.

    Dialects also played an important role in the language debate in the 1830s; see also Norwegian language . However, the Norwegian dialects had hardly been explored at the time, and the linguists belonging to the urban bourgeoisie were socially very far removed from the dialect speakers. The first thorough scientific description of the Norwegian dialects comes from Ivar Aasen (1813-1896). In the 1840s he traveled through large parts of Norway and collected language samples, which he found in two dictionaries ( Ordbog over det norske Folkesprog from 1850 and Norsk Ordbog from 1873) and in several dialect grammars (including Det norske Folkesprogs Grammar from 1848 and Norsk Grammar from 1864). He was also very interested in the linguistic-historical context, i.e. in the origin of the dialects from Old Norwegian.

    The connection between the dialects and Old Norwegian led to a new appreciation of the dialects. But it also led to a particular interest in the old-fashioned and archaic features of the language. Newer developments within a dialect were therefore often hidden because they were not “original” enough.

    The Norwegian dialects also served as an argument in political debates. The existence of their own time-honored dialects should be proof that the Norwegians are a people of their own, and in no way belong to the Danes or Swedes. Norway had been part of the Danish Empire for centuries. In 1814 it entered a personal union with Sweden. In the course of the 19th century, resistance to the personal union with Sweden grew in Norway. In 1905 it was dissolved at the urging of the Norwegians. See also History of Norway .

    Young grammar and traditional dialectology

    The most important representatives of the Norwegian young grammarians were Johan Storm (1836-1920), Marius Hægstad (1850-1927) and Amund B. Larsen (1849-1928). The latter is considered to be the “old master of modern dialectology”. His study of the dialects in Selbu and in the Guldal in 1881 was already praised as “the first strictly scientific work on a Norwegian dialect that meets modern demands”. In a series of dialect monographs, he not only compared the sounds of the living dialect with those of Old Norwegian, but also tried to summarize the development of the individual sounds in a systematic representation, thus approaching the structuralism that was emerging towards the end of his life . It was also modern that he examined not only rural dialects but also urban dialects and published a monograph on the language in Kristiania / Oslo, Bergen and Stavanger, in which the social side of the language also played an important role.

    Until well into the second half of the 20th century, numerous, mostly smaller and often popular science-oriented dialect monographs appeared, all of which were more or less in the Young grammar tradition. Some of the best papers have been included in the series Bidrag til nordisk filologi av studerende ved Kristiania (Oslo) universitet (1914 ff.) And Skrifter frå Norsk Målførearkiv (1952 ff.). In addition, Norway is considered to be “the country with the best-researched city dialects” within the Germanic area. The most important publication organs for dialectological essays were Maal og Minne and the Norsk Tidsskrift for Sprogvidenskab . The long adherence of Norwegian dialectology to the traditional questions (phonology and theory of forms) was sharply criticized by Einar Haugen in an article in the Journal of English and Germanic Philology in 1948 .

    Word research

    Word research found its way into Norwegian dialectology late. The two most important contributions are Oskar Bandle's studies on West Nordic language geography . Pet terminology in Norwegian, Icelandic and Faroese from 1967 and the twelve-volume Norsk Ordbok from 1950 to 2016 .

    Dialect change

    One focus of current Norwegian dialectology is language change and the associated transition from locally based to regional dialects. A nationwide project is TEIN - Talemålsendring i Noreg, the results of which have been published in the series Målbryting: skrifter frå prosjektet Talemålsendring in Noreg , which has been published since 1998 .

    Historical dialect research

    A special feature of Norwegian dialectology is the well-developed historical research into dialect. This shows that even in old Norwegian times a distinction can be made between a Tröndische, a Northern Norwegian, a northwest Norwegian, a Rygian and an "inner southwest Norwegian" language area.

    literature

    • Oskar Bandle : The Norwegian dialect research. An overview of their history and their current situation. In: Zeitschrift für Mundartforschung 29, 1962, pp. 289-312.
    • Oskar Bandle: The structure of the North Germanic. With 23 cards (= contributions to Nordic philology. Volume 1). Helbing & Lichtenhahn, Basel / Stuttgart 1973, 2nd edition Tübingen 2011.
    • Hallfried Christiansen: Norske dialekter. Book I – III. Tanum, Oslo 1946–1948 (in one volume: Tanum Norli, Oslo [no year]).
    • Helge Sandøy: Talemål. 2., revised. Edition Novus, Oslo 1996.
    • Martin Sjekkeland: Dei norske dialektane . Tradisjonelle særdrag i jamføring with skriftmåla. Høyskole Forlaget, Kristiansand 1997.

    See also

    swell

    1. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x Helge Sandøy: Talemål. Novus Forlag, Oslo 1993, ISBN 82-7099-206-2 .
    2. ↑ a b c d e Olav Næs: Norsk Grammar - I. Ordlære. Fabritius & Sønners Forlag, Bergen 1952.
    3. ↑ a b c Hallfrid Christiansen: Norske Dialekter. Tanum Norli, Oslo 1972.
    4. ↑ a b c d e f Oskar Bandle: The Norwegian dialect research. An overview of their history and their current situation. In: Zeitschrift für Mundartforschung 29, 1962, pp. 289-312.
    5. ↑ Christoph Landolt : Dialectal Morphology and Morphonology in Transition - Example Zurich German. In: Alemannic dialectology: ways into the future. Contributions to the 16th conference for Alemannic dialectology in Freiburg / Friborg from September 7th to 10th, 2008 (= ZDL supplement. Volume 141). Edited by Helen Christen, Sibylle Germann, Walter Haas, Nadia Montefiori, Hans Ruef. Stuttgart 2010, pp. 97–113, here p. 111.