Foreign accents and linguistic varieties

[pjotr]

Dear friends,

In the Netherlands, Germany and Belgium various regional languages, heavy dialects or more humble dialects play a role. In my country and some neighbour countries some people have a hard time to understand eachother. For instance the French speaking Walloons from Liège or Brussels don't understand a compatriot from Antwerp, Gent or Brugge, who speaks Flemish Dutch. I myself have a hard time understanding some of the heavy Frisian or Saxon (Low Saxon) dialects in the North of the Netherlands and some heavy Limburg and Zeelandish dialects. Especially the heavy Limburg dialects, when Heavy German words, sentences and accents merge with a difficult South-Eastern Southern-Dutch regional language and with heavy Flemish Belgian Limburg elements. They simply speak a different language, have a strong regional and local identity which nearly could be labeled as regio nationalism. In their culture they are closer to the Belgian Limburg Flemish, Walloon and German people than with the Dutch people of the West, East (above the South) and North.

As a standard Dutch (called general civilized Dutch; Algemeen Beschaafd Nederlands) speaker, reader and writer I have some difficulties with the locals, but in the same time see some charm, richness and cultural value in the regional languages and dialects of my own country and language. Languages that or officially recognised in the Netherlands are Dutch, Frisian, English and Papiamento (the language of our Dutch Antilles Islands in the Caribbean. Next to that Limburgish and Dutch Low Saxon are recognised as regional languages.

In Poland like in the Netherlands and Germany you will have Standard Polish or HochPolnisch, the general civilized Polish language, the national language of Polish next to Polish dialects or regional languages as Greater Polish, spoken in the west; Lesser Polish, spoken in the south and southeast; Masovian, spoken throughout the central and eastern parts of the country and Silesian, spoken in the southwest (also considered a separate language, see comment below). Kashubian or Cassubian (Kashubian: kaszëbsczi jãzëk, pòmòrsczi jãzëk, kaszëbskò-słowińskô mòwa; Polish: język kaszubski, język pomorski, język kaszubsko-słowiński) a language variety of the Lechitic group, of the Slavic languages, is also spoken in North-Western Poland.

The distinctive dialect of the Gorals (Góralski) occurs in the mountainous area bordering the Czech Republic and Slovakia. The Gorals ("Highlanders") take great pride in their culture and the dialect. It exhibits some cultural influences from the Vlach shepherds who migrated from Wallachia (southern Romania) in the 14th–17th centuries. Some urban Poles find this very distinct dialect difficult to understand.

The Poznanski dialect, spoken in Poznań and to some extent in the whole region of the former Prussian annexation (excluding Upper Silesia), with characteristic high tone melody and notable influence of the German language. I remember that my Polish mother, born in Warsaw, who was forced by the war to move to Poznań with her parents, was not fond of Poznań due to the German atmosphere and the German influence in the Poznanski dialect. My mother was born in Warsaw in 1934 and moved with her parents to Poznań at the end of the war after her city was systematically destroyed by the Germans. They went to Poznań in 1945. My mother prefered Warsaw, because it was and is more Polish in atmosphere, and moved back to that city of her birth and childhood as an adult woman druing the fifties. I remember Poznań from my babcia (grandmother) who lived their with mu dziadek (grandfather). And I loved the city or you can say I was fond of that city during the seventies and eighties. Have a good memory of our holidays there during the seventies and eighties.

In the northern and western (formerly German) regions where Poles from the territories annexed by the Soviet Union resettled after World War II, the older generation speaks a dialect of Polish characteristic of the Kresy that includes a longer pronunciation of vowels. The territory of Kresy was composed of voivodeships of Lwów, Nowogródek, Polesie, Stanisławów, Tarnopol, Wilno, Wołyń, and the Białystok. Today, these territories are divided between Western Ukraine, Western Belarus, and south-eastern Lithuania, with such major cities as Lviv ( Lwów ), Vilnius ( Wilno ), and Grodno no longer in Poland.

Poles living in Lithuania (particularly in the Vilnius region), in Belarus (particularly the northwest), and in the northeast of Poland continue to speak the Eastern Borderlands dialect, which sounds "slushed" (in Polish described as zaciąganie z ruska, "speaking with a Russian drawl") and is easily distinguishable.
Some city dwellers, especially the less affluent population, had their own distinctive dialects - for example, the Warsaw dialect, still spoken by some of the population of Praga on the eastern bank of the Vistula. (Praga remained the only part of Warsaw where the population survived World War II relatively intact.) However, these city dialects are now mostly extinct due to assimilation with standard Polish. (That is a huge difference with for instance Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium, where different languages, regional languages, city, town and regional and local dialects exist. But also in the Netherlands the influence and dominance of Standard Dutch is repulsing regional languages and dialects. The Standard Dutch education system and the use of Standard Duch on television, Radio, Press & Media -newspapers and magazines- theatre and Dutch movies also plays a role. Despite the fact that I am a Standard Dutch speaker myself, I regret it when linguistic variety disappears or shrinks. ) People whose families left Poland just after World War II, retain a number of minor features of Polish vocabulary as spoken in the first half of the 20th century that now sound archaic, however, to contemporary visitors from Poland.

Cheers,
Pieter

Source: Wikipedia

[pjotr]

Foreign accents or differences between people have always been a subject for comedy, irony, mockery and cabaret.

In the Netherlands we for instance have the Indo-European accent and stereotype of the Indo aunt, the Moroccan Dutch
accent or slang, Turkish Dutch, Surinamese Dutch whith it's Sranang influences, Chinese Dutch and we have the
heavy slavic accents of Polish, Czech, Russian, Serb, Croat, Bosnian, Slovenian, Slovak, Ukrainian and other people.

Famous is the Czech Dutch tv interviewer Martin Šimek:

Slavic people often have difficulties with the Northern Dutch hard G and the H, they often speak G in H words and G
in H words. Which sounds very funny in Dutch.

Czech Dutch accent of Martin Šimek


A Dutch comedy show mocking Šimek's Czech slavic accent and his exentric behaviour


Martin Šimek



Martin Šimek (Prague, November 7, 1948) is a Dutch radio and television presenter, cartoonist and columnist of Czech descent.

Biography
Šimek fled during the Prague Spring in 1968 the then Czechoslovakia and came to the Netherlands. He studied economics and worked initially as a tennis coach. His love of tennis began at the age of nine. Rather, he wanted to be a tennis player himself, but in his own words, he had little talent for it. As a coach he has reached the top. For example, he coached Michiel Schapers in 1988 from nowhere to number 25 goes in the world.

Later he made his name as an interviewer for various radio and television programs for the RVU (Dutch public educational tv broadcaster). Following the VPRO program Color confess where he was a guest. Between 1991 and 2008 he presented each night from Saturday to Sunday between noon and one at Radio 1 program Šimek in the night. His listening figures were remarkable; the market share of this program fluctuated between 33 and 36%. In 2009 he was on television again:. for the Evangelical Christian Broadcast corporation EO program Šimek he presented the call for change.

Šimek does interviewing more than an un-Dutch way guests. This creates a controversy with critics in 1999 when he interviewed Katja Schuurman physically live. Another incident in the VARA World Turns Around program running by when he is a guest in May 2015 and speaks about the refugee question in terms of 'these little blacks', something that offended table lady Sylvana Simons. Simons is a black Dutch tv personality and politician. Under the pseudonym anone (Czech words for yes and no to another), he draws cartoons for De Groene Amsterdammer magazine (a leftwing intellectual Dutch magazine about politics, society, culture, literature, poetry, world affairs and media) and writes columns for various media. In the summer he likes to enjoy the Italian countryside.


Sylvana Simons

In person
Šimek lives alternately in Prague, Amsterdam and Isca Capoluogo, in the extreme south of the Italian mainland. He lives with a Surinamese-Dutch woman (also black like Sylvana Simons) , with whom he has two sons. His brother was the Czech comedian and actor Miloslav Šimek (1940-2004).



Comical; Comedy - Dutch people learn Moroccan Dutch


Funny, Moroccan Dutch is a mix of Berber and Dutch, Dutch with a Berber accent


Parody, typical black Dutch aunt, played by a Dutch Surinamese comedian


Comedy about multi-cultural differences between neighbours and misunderstanding due to accents and different language backgrounds
jagahost.proboards.com/thread/20229/foreing-accents?page=1&scrollTo=104500
Spanish neigbour talks about the hooker subsidy, instaid of rent subsidy. This Moroccan comedian mocks clearly with foreign accents and
some minor failures or misunderstandings that occur due to that. He is very funny, very famous and liked very much by native Dutch.
He holds a mirror in the front of both Native Dutch people and Moroccans. Mocks both of them.

Indonesian taxi driver and Moroccan client

[pjotr]

Dear Bonobo and Jeanne,

I had my fair share of difficulties with accents and being different in the Netherlands, because of my accent and the regional language and dialects on the Peninsula of my childhood. I was different at my Zeeland peninsula as a child, because I did't had the regional provincial Zeeland accent, the Walcheren dialect of the Walcheren people, nor the Vlissingen harbor city dialect. And I was aware of my mothers slavic accent of Dutch (not so different from Martin Šimek accent), and the fact that my Polish grandmother (babcia) often stayed in our home for several months, made the feeling of being different than the 100% Duch locals and even the 100% import Dutch from other parts of the country larger. I have said it before and say it again, we were different, but that is ok. We dealt with it as children my sister and I and made the Peninsula Walcheren and the city Vlissingen our own. I lived there for 20years.

Fact is that due to my parents and my Dutch family in the other provinces South-Holland (Rotterdam -several uncles and aunts and cousins -male and female- and The Hague -a cousin of mine-), North-Holland (Amsterdam; Uncle and aunt), the Eastern, Saxon province of Drenthe (an uncle and aunt of mine), the Saxon Province of Overijssel (in the Twente part, bordering Germany), and my Dutch grandmother in Northern-Gelderland (where my grandparents moved to after my grandfathers retirement, they moved there in 1948) and in a town in the Utrecht province ( a cousin of mine and his wife) we were no locals, nor regional people. We were as we say in Dutch import people. People who come to a region or province from another region or province, who settle in a new province (region), and live, work and go to school there. We did our best to integrate and assimilate there, but we stayed import people.The fathers family of mine was and is spread over the Netherlands. We (my sister and I) lived in the far South-Western corner of the Netherlands. Karl, already spoke about his past in Esbjerg, Cuxhaven, Hamburg and abroad. He had a tougher time then me probably, because he had to switch from one country to another and there are significant differences between Denmark and Germany. I know that Germans with a North-German Frisian accent, Bavarian accent or East-German Saxon accent (Erich Honecker's accent) faced some mockery and still face some mockery.



German comedian plays the former East-German communist leader Erich Honecker, who speaks in a typical East-German Saxon Prussian manner.


In the Netherlands the toughest and rudest jokes are made about Southerners (Southern-Dutch) with their soft-G accent of Dutch (especially Limburgers are mocking birds and outlaws for sharp mocking, ridicule, contempt (which is bad in my view, but Amsterdam and other Western Holland people can be rude towards compatriots from other parts of the country). I have to say that I am not a saint and am not fond of the Limburg regional language and dialects either. I have some slight irritation about it. I would never live in Limburg. I am Roman-Catholic like them, but totally different than them. I am a minority Roman-Catholic who grew up on a Protestant, predominantly Calvinist, Dutch Reformed Peninsula with Gereformeerde and Nederlands Hervormde (= various versions of Calvinist Dutch reformed) churches (Presbyterian in American and British/Scottish context). Being Calvinist-Catholic like me makes you different than majority Roman-Catholics like Limburgers (in the past), Brabanders (in the past), Flemish people, many Walloons, Baviarians, Poles, Italians and Irish people. The Limburg province region and province lies in a three countries corner. So the Limburgian regional language, Limburgs, has Southern-Dutch (Limburgs, Brabant and Flemish) soft-G elements, German elements and probably some Flemish and Wallon elements. I can't understand heavy versions of it and due to the regional and provincial identity and locked (local) mentality, atmosphere and use of it you feel locked out as an outsider. To make it more complicated, The Limburg people feel different than the Holland Dutch people and Dutch people of the North in general and secondly they feel different than their fellow Southern-Dutch people, the Brabanders, who live West of Limburg. Limburgers can have some arrogance and feel themselves better than the Brabant people. In some aspects (culture, mentality, life style, dialect) the Limburg people are closer to the German neighbours in the East and the Belgian neighbours in the South. (In the Belgian case that is logical, because on the other side of the border is the Belgian province Limburg. And Belgian Limburg people speak Limburgian in staid of Flemish, or Flemish with a clearly Limburg accent). The popular Duthc musician and conductor Andre Rieu is a Limburger, and he speaks the Limburg dialect of the city of Maastricht. Fact is that many wellknown Dutch people with a Limburg background (actors, actresses, showbiz people, politicians and tv personalities) who moved to the West, North of Limburg (to Holland cities like Leiden -university-, Amsterdam, The Hague or Rotterdam), learned Algemeen Beschaafd Nederlands (Standard Dutch; the Northern-Dutch hard G accent language, Pieters language and accent) to be accepted. In fact they hid their Southern-accent. Going back to their parents, family and friends in their towns or cities in Limburg they use the Limburg regional language or dialect in the place they came from. The same is the case with some Brabant people. But studying in Amsterdam I recognised all the different accents of people coming from various provinces and regions. Frisians are proud and in general accepted people in the Netherlands, and their language sounds strong and stubborn in the eyes of the Holland, Utrecht, Saxon, Limburg, Brabant and Zeeland people. We learned about the many wars between the Holland people and the Frisians during the middle ages. Today still some mild competition between Frisians and Holland people exist in Friesland between the Frisians and the import Dutch (most often Holland people). Famous is the story of the medieval Frisian worrier Grutte Pier ( en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pier_Gerlofs_Donia )



Frisians today have a dual identity, they are loyal to the Netherlands, but in the same time have a strong regional/provincial identity as Frisians with their own language, culture, press/media, mentality and have some autonomy. They have some mild Nationalism or patriotism. But most Frisians reject separatism, extremism and militant Frisian Nationalism. They like being part of the Netherlands and in the same time have their own Frisian identity and region. Due to the fact that in the Netherlands Friesland (Frisia) has positive role models and a clear positive image as a region of skating in the winter, the Frisian lakes, Frisian agriculture, the wonderful Frisian cities and towns, Frisian soccer clubs and the Frisian Friese dairy company, the Frisian people and identity is less ridiculed and mocked than in Germany, where the Frisians form a tiny minority which can be easily mocked by the German majority of Hochdeutsch (Standard German) speakers. But like with Limburg people Frisians sometimes irritate Dutch people who don't like regionalism and the separate identity and pride of the Limburgers and Frisians. It is complex for me to talk about the Netherlands. We have the same regional differences and minor tensions that go with that like in other parts of Europe, but we don't have the fierce language, ethnic or cultural clashes like for instance in Belgium (between the Flemish and the Walloons), Basque country and Catalonia in Spain, Northern-Ireland, Silesia in Poland or the tensions in Ukraine or the former Yugoslavian republics Serbia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Macedonia and Kosovo. But mind you, I am not a Dutch Frisian, so I can't say what Frisian people like Fokke de Haan, Abe Lenstra, Dieuwke Postma, Bengt Riemersma or Feyoena Haarsma feel like if they live outside Friesland, with their Frisian names and accents?


Selfmockery of a The Hague comedian about his own The Hague peoples dialect. About that in Spain he heard a Dutch mother talking to her son in The Hague dialect behind him while he was talking with an English chap, that he should swim with his head above the water and not with his head in the water.


A fake far right party exercise from people speaking in the The Hague working class peoples dialect. Also these comedians are The Hague people themselves who know exactly how to speak the The Hague peoples dialect perfectly. They had to stop this comedy show, because it was so good that some Dutch people didn't saw the irony and sarcasm of this show and started to support this ridiculous party and it's leaders, who are comic characters.

I realise that my own difficulties and probably mocking of some heavy regional dialects and accents isn't good nor applaudable. From the other side regional locals will always see or treat us Standard Dutch speakers as outsiders, import and not locals. I am used to that now and developed a thick skin. But being regarded or seen not as a local Arnhemmer (not born and raised in the city) is sometimes difficult. Therefor I have developed a social network of friends, colleagues, artists, and professional contacts with people who are import too. Most contacts in Arnhem and my social life is with people who came from Amsterdam, The Hague, Rotterdam, Nijmegen, Apeldoorn, de Achterhoek region in Eastern-Gelderland -near the German border- (for some reason I can get along very well with the Saxon Achterhoek people), Flemish people, Dutch people with a German background. I only have close relationships with very few real local Arnhem people.


An Eastern Dutch comedian has a show in his own Saxon Twente dialect, and also speaks about the half German Limburg dialect, which he can't understand, except a few words he recognises. Brabant people when they are drunk sound like the Saxon Twente people in the eyes of Finkers, the comedian.

Very funny

Herman Finkers, the Twente (Saxon) comedian talks with a Dutch telephone operator, who can't understand his dialect. This is an exellent example about the misunderstanding between Dutch people due to dialect differences, and for instance a Standard Duch speaker and a dialect speaker.

Fortunately a lot of Arnhem people (media/press colleages, politicians, artists, entrepreneurs, teachers, civil servants, students of the vocational universities and etc.) came from other parts of the Netherlands like me. People with a different accent in the Netherlands face the same problems my mother had during the second half of the sixties and early seventies. People with a German accent of Dutch, people with a British accent, Flemish Dutch speakers, foreign migrants who speak Berber Dutch, Turkish Dutch, Kurd Dutch, Asian Dutch, Slavic Dutch. I have an Afghan colleage who has a very limited understanding of Dutch and that gives him and us quite some challenges. He is somewhat insecure or vulnerable due to the language difficulties. Like the Moroccan comedian with his Spanish neighbour joke (hooker subsidy instaid of rent subsidy) there are quite some misunderstandings in the professional, social and medical field. Often migrant children who speak Dutch well have to go with their Moroccan-Dutch, Turkish-Dutch, Tunesian-Dutch or Algerian-Dutch parent to the hospital to translate and mediate between Dutch doctors or hospital specialists and their parents.

Turkish friends of mine told me that I have an understanding of other cultures and thus migrants many other Dutch don't have. After they got to know me they said that I have that understanding, because one of my parents is a migrant herself, a person who wasn't born in the Netherlands. They told me that I was born and raised inbetween or within two cultures, that of my father and that of my mother. It is true that I have an interest in differences between cultures, sociology (without being an expert in the field of sociology), anthropology (Karl studied that back in the days), history and the psychology and personal stories of people. I have learned a great deal from contacts and thus talking with (conversations, discussions and even debates with) people from Egypt, Iraq, Poland, Russia, Bosnia, Serbia, Croatia, Turkey, Suriname, the Dutch Antilles, Germany, Afghanistan, Palestine, Israel and Iran.

It is sad that people (including me) don't see the richness and diversity of our national language due to the regional and local accents in it. With successful integration of foreign migrants in our societies even some of their words, expressions and even funny migrant accents have enriched our national languages and given our comedians a rich source for comedy. Due to the fact that everybody and anything is a source and target of mockery, comedy and satire no group should feel targeted. Standard Dutch people are targeted due to their posh, arrogant, Western or North-Dutch hard G accent, and sometimes snobbish or snotty use of Dutch. Southerners with their clear Soft G accent and due to that clear Brabant or Limburg identity or labeled as Southern peasants or less trustworthy by the Holland people. Holland people are seen by the Southerners, the Eastern-Saxons and the Northern Frisians as to direct, to fast speaking and to blunt. And I can go on and on about the differences, mutual insults and mockery, comedy about these differences and etc. Fact is that still people from abroad with a foreign accent have the largest difficulties with both standard Dutch speakers (Holland/Haarlem accent) and the regional Dutch dialect speakers. Their slavic (Polish, Czech, Russian, Ukrainian, Slovak, Serb, Bosnian, Slovenian or Croat), Moroccan Berber or Arab, Turkish, Kurd, Afghan or Iranian accent makes them vulnerable, insecure, uncertain, unsettled or doubtful. Also Western people with an English-, German- or French speaking background can be uncertain, due to the fact that they are not fluent in Dutch or have a heavy accent. But these Westerners don't face the difficulties non-Westerners face. The non-Westerners also do not look European and therefor more often have eyes on them or are watched carefully by colleagues, neighbours or the police. There is discrimination, xenophobia and racism today in our societies in Europe. Probably the Netherlands and Denmark are more difficult for migrants and expats today than Germany which is more tolerant, despite the rightwing populist Alternative for Germany party.

An accent in in the Netherlands can destroy the accuracy of the message or conversation of the speaker to the receiving person, in as well as a carry over in the manner of written communication. For with this is a serious fault, for as how so many instances, misunderstandings due to accents, come into play that should never have been. I heard this several times at private parties and at conversations with politicians, civil servants and people in different parts of the country. Dutch people who can't understand the heavy dialect or the regional language of other Dutch people coming from other parts of the country, or even within the same region, due to the different local dialects of different cities, towns and villages. For instance in Dutch Frisia, Friesland, you have the general Dutch Frisian lanuage of Friesland (Influenced by Dutch and Low Saxon, because you can't understand Dutch Frisian), but in the same time you have different cithy dialects of the Frisian cities. Leeuwarden (Frisian name Ljouwert), the capital of Friesland for instance has a different city dialect than Drachten, and Drachten has a different city dialect than Sneek (Frisian name Snits), and the other Frisian cities and towns like Heerenveen (It Hearrenfean), Harlingen (Harns), Joure (De Jouwer), Franeker (Frjentsjer), Wolvega (Wolvegea), Dokkum (Dokkum), Lemmer (De Lemmer) each have their own local Frisian city dialect. It is like the different Frisian languages you experienced in Denmark and Northern-Germany.


Here you see the different Dutch provinces and thus regional differences. You see that the historical dominant and most important part of the Netherlands Holland contains only a small part of the Netherlands, Zuid-Holland and Noord-Holland. Now I look at it I realise that the Saxon part of the Netherlands is quite huge and larger than I realized myself. It is a large part of the Netherlands, but less densly populated than the West, the Randstad.

Bonobo, Maybe our nations are quite the same in the regional diversity and the fact that our nations linguistically are segregated in Northern, Western, Eastern, Southern and Central regional languages and dialect groups and that both our countries have strong city dialects, like your Krakow dialect, the Warsaw dialect and the Poznan dialect with it's German elements for instance.

Accuracy in language is important, and maybe it is important for regional language speakers and migrant people to be become very good in the national languages like Standard Dutch, Hochdeutsch and Polish (National or standard Polish). Why? Because the financial-economical, political, state, education, health care and society elites and both the private and state sectors are dominated by Standard Dutch, Polish and Hochdeutsch speakers in the Netherlands, Polish and Germany. That's why many Limburg, Frisian, Zeeland and Saxon people learned Standard Dutch very well on their primary school, highschool and on the vocational universities and universities or in their professions. I wonder if you have this dual identity in Germany too. Germans who for instance speak Frisian at home and Hochdeutsch at work, or Bavarian at home and Hochdeutsch at work, and Probably Kashubian Polish people who speak Kashubian at home and Polish at work? I learned from Swiss German fellow students and a Swiss German art teacher at the art academy in Arnhem that they speak Swiss German with family and friends, but Hochdeutsch in professional circumstances. For instance in civil service, banks, international companies with German managers and other German colleages. That was quite a surprise to me. Fortunately there are institutions, organs, organisations who take care of the protection of the regional languages in Europe. Why is that important? In the Netherlands regional dialects and dialects decrease due to the inlfuence of Standard Dutch education and the use of Standard Dutch on national and regional television, muncipalities, press and media, at companies and in the social sphere. Standard Dutch is also dominant in movies, sitcoms, theatre, and as communication tool between young people (pupils, students and young working people). Even children with regional language or dialect speaking parents and grandparents prefer to speak Standard Dutch. Due to that fact some regional languuages and dialects are threatened with decay. You see the power, influence and dominance of the National government, the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science; and the influence of National political parties and organisation who promote Standard Dutch and keep empathising the importance of Dutch language education.

We should be compassionate towards our fellow country men, who speak in a different regional language or dialect and realise that history has shaped them. Therefor I should accept Limburg, Brabant, Flemish, Frisian and Saxon people. And I have to coop with an accept my own Calvinist-Catholic identity and maybe should put more effort in examening and understanding real Roman-Catholicism, a faith with a rich history, lithurgy, spirituality and people. Fellow Roman-Catholics should accept me and other people like me who were raised in a protestant majority environment with a secular catholic culture. You could invite us and make us feel welcome in your Roman-Catholicism or alienate us further. In contrast with me some minority catholics build a very strong Roman-Catholic minority community, parish and faith based culture in their Calvinist majority region.

In the Netherlands I also see the curiosity factor in the Dutch people questioning foreigners or people from a different region of their own for the source of the accent of people they encounter. Dutch also like to place people in linguistic, cultural and ethnic corners, to place people with a different accent into 'their rightful place' where they are. Also in the Netherlands an accent was and is mostly questioned on the street, but not so much in a professional setting. In a professional setting people look more at skills, experience, the tools of a person and if a person does his or her job well. But language and linguistic differences play a role there too. because communication problems sometimes cause some misunderstanding and failures. For instance I use my exellent Afghan colleage for filming jobs (he is good with a professional video camera), and for some editing jobs. But there has to be someone with him if subtitles, titles or language is used in the tv interviews or programs. I respect him but release some stress for and off him by releasing him from Dutch language tasks like titles and subtitles. And in such we have an exellent cooperation.

Cheers,
Pieter

[pjotr]

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The dialect of Polish characteristic of the Kresy has two main dialect groups according to Wikipedia

The regional differences correspond mainly to old ethnic or tribal divisions from around a thousand years ago. As a result of expulsions and other displacements of Poles during and after World War II, as well as language policy in the People's Republic of Poland, the Polish language became far more homogeneous in the second half of the 20th century.

Polish linguistic tradition includes three more dialect groups, for a total of seven:

- Kashubian, spoken in an elongated band of territory in the Pomorze region west of Gdańsk on the Baltic Sea; now usually considered a separate language
- Northern Kresy, spoken along the border between Lithuania and Belarus
- Southern Kresy, spoken in isolated pockets in Ukraine

This traditional division is still cited, especially in Polish sources. Current linguistic consensus, however, tends to consider Kashubian to be a separate language, or at least as a Slavic variety that cannot be grouped at the same level as the four major modern Polish dialects. Prior to World War II, Kashubian speakers were surrounded on both sides by German speakers, with only a narrow border to the south with Polish speakers. Kashubian contains a number of features not found in Polish dialects, e.g. nine distinct oral vowels (vs. the five of standard Polish) and (in the northern dialects) phonemic word stress, an archaic feature preserved from Common Slavic times and not found anywhere else among the West Slavic languages.

The two Kresy dialects are spoken in the Kresy, the former eastern Polish territory annexed by the Soviet Union in 1945 and currently forming part of Lithuania, Belarus and Ukraine. Both dialect groups have been in decline since World War II as a result of Soviet expulsions of millions of Poles from the Kresy. Poles living in Lithuania (particularly in the Vilnius region), in Belarus (particularly the northwest), and in the northeast of Poland continue to speak a Northern Kresy dialect, which sounds "slushed" (in Polish described as zaciąganie z ruska, 'speaking with a Russian drawl'), and is easily distinguishable.

The majority of Poles expelled from the Kresy were settled in newly annexed regions in northern and western Poland, adopting so-called new mixed dialects. However, among the older generation is still found a type of Kresy dialect which resembles Ukrainian or Rusyn in some ways, especially in the "longer" pronunciation of vowels.

Silesian

Many linguistic sources about the Slavic languages describe Silesian as a dialect of Polish. However, many Silesians consider themselves a separate ethnicity and have been advocating for the recognition of a Silesian language. According to the last official census in Poland in 2011, above 0.5 million people declared Silesian as their native language. Many sociolinguistic sources (e.g. by Tomasz Kamusella, Agnieszka Pianka, Alfred F. Majewicz, Tomasz Wicherkiewicz) assume that whether something is considered to be a language or a dialect ultimately is a matter of extralinguistic criteria, such as the sentiment of its users or political motivations, and thus changes over time. Also, language organizations like SIL International and various linguistic resources like Ethnologue, and others, like Poland's Ministry of Administration and Digitization, recognize the Silesian language. In 2007, Silesian was assigned the language code szl within the ISO 639-3 standard.


Hershl Hartman, native Yiddish speaker and educational director at the Sholem Community in California, recalls his first encounter with the Polish Yiddish dialect.

Ofcourse you had a Polish version of Yiddish, the language of the Ashkenazi Central- and Eastern-Jewish people. The Polish jews had their Yiddish with their ow Polish Yiddish words and expressions related to life in Poland. Minority languages and dialects or regional language are always influenced by the majority languages, regional languages or dialects that surround them and often also influence by the languages of other minorities. In the Yiddish case German, Ukrainian, Russian and possibly Lithuanian, Czech (Bohemian) and Slovak?


Daivd Slucki, Professor of Jewish Studies at Austraila's Monash University, discusses the tension between the Polish Yiddish accent he heard at home growing up and the Litvak accent he encounters in academic settings.

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In the Netherland the West Germanic language Duch gets some influence from English and German, we for instance speak about Germanisms in the Dutch language.
I love to use them but sometimes receive criticism of Dutch compatriots such as "Why do you use that Germanism or German expression, can't you find a Dutch word for that?"

Germanism in the Dutch language, German words used in Dutch sentences:

- Überhaupt (anyway, generally, absolutely, ever, altogether, after all)
- Fingerspitzengefühl (= is a German term, literally meaning "finger tips feeling" and meaning intuitive flair or instinct, which has been appropriated by the English and Dutch languages as a loanword. It describes a great situational awareness, and the ability to respond most appropriately and tactfully. It can also be applied to diplomats, bearers of bad news, or to describe a superior ability to respond to an escalated situation. The term is sometimes used to describe the instinctive play of certain football players. In social context, fingerspitzengefuhl suggests a combination of "tact, diplomacy and a certain amount of sensitivity to the feelings of others". It is a quality that can enable a person to "negotiate tricky social situations".)

Some Dutch words clearly have a German background:

- beduidend (German bedeutend) for "signifficant;
- begeestering (Begeisterung) voor "enthousiasm";
- meerdere (mehrere) for "several or various";
- eenduidig (eindeutig) for "unambiguous or unequivocal".

Other words with a clear German infuence:
- autobaan - Autobahn for highway
- bemerking - Bemerkung for a remark
- beroepsmatig - berufsmäßig for professional
- de zestiger jaren - die sechziger Jahre for the sixties
- eerstens - erstens for First
- geëigend - geeignet for appropriate, decent, suited
- hij leve hoog! - er lebe hoch for he lives high (long)!
- inschatten - einschätzen for judging
- instelling - Einsteillung for attitude, mentality, outlook
- keelkop - Kehlkopf for larynx
- maatgevend - maßgeblich for decisive ; determinant ; normative
- middels - mittels for by means or through ; by way of
- omkleden - umkleiden for to change ; to put other clothes on ; to cover ; to sheathe
- onderbouwen - unterbauen for to found, to build, substantiate, to base ; to ground ; to lay foundatios of; to corroborate
- steekwoord - Stichwort for keyword; the entry; the headword; reference word heading; descriptor; subject heading; subject word
- steenrijk - steinreich for wealthy; very rich; immensely rich; opulent; rolling in money
- technieker - Techniker for technician; technical expert; technicist; technical engineer; engineer; laboratory technician
- zich vertypen - vertippen for to make a typing error; to make a typo; to make an error type; to make a typographical error

Do you have in Poland something like Slavicism, Rusicism or Protoslavic influences in Polish. Are there Eastern-Slav and Southern-Slav (Yugoslavian) influences in Poland or influences of other Western slav languages like Czech (Bohemian), Slovak, Lechitic, Silesian, Pomeranian language (Polish: Grupa pomorska języków lechickich, German: Pomoranische Sprache), Kashubian, Sorbian ((Lusatian), Lower Sorbian and Upper Sorbian?

Lusatia



Lusatia (German: Lausitz, Upper Sorbian: Łužica, Lower Sorbian: Łužyca, Polish: Łużyce, Czech: Lužice) is a region in Central Europe. The region is the home of the ethnic group of Lusatian Sorbs, a small Western Slavic nation. It stretches from the Bóbr and Kwisa rivers in the east to the Pulsnitz and Black Elster in the west, today located within the German states of Saxony and Brandenburg as well as in the Lower Silesian and Lubusz voivodeships of western Poland.

Historically, Lusatia belonged to several different countries. Being part of the Lands of the Bohemian Crown (the so-called Czech Lands) for three hundred years, alongside them it passed to the Habsburg Monarchy and from it to the Electorate of Saxony. The greater part passed to the Kingdom of Prussia in 1815 and the whole region merged into Germany in 1871. After the conquest of Eastern Germany (the later DDR) by the Soviet Red Army and the partition in 1945, the eastern part of Lusatia along the Lusatian Neisse river was given to Poland where the boundary is called the Oder–Neisse line.

In the Polish part today Polish is spoken, and in the German part German, Upper- and Lower Sorbian. The biggest Lusatian town is Cottbus (Lower Sorbian: Chóśebuz).

Bonobo, have you ever heard of Lusatian Sorbs in Polish Silesia? Have you ever heard their language. They are a very tiny, small minority in both Germany and Poland, but still hold their traditions, customs, folklore (dress, markets, festivals) and language.


This is procession of Easter Riders in Upper Lusatia, April 2011. They belong to the autochthonous Slavic minority in Germany, the Lusatian Sorbs), and the ride is one of their most important folk traditions. You can hear them singing in the Upper Lusatian Sorbian language. The filmed event took place in Radwor (Radibor) in Saxony, Germany.

Mass in the Sorbian language

Can you understand any of it Bonobo?

[pjotr]

[pjotr]

This stupid Dutch grocery store owner talks in a very primitive fake Dutch Turkish migrant slang to this guestworker, who speaks back with a Turkish accent, but with an exellent Dutch vocabulary. It shows the habit of Dutch people to take over a conversation of migrant or foreigners with a heavy accent. This Turkish fellow is an example of a perfect integrated Turkish-Dutch person. He has a Turkish accent, but speaks Dutch perfectly with clear Dutch words and sentences. Maybe a little bit old fasionate and perfect, but clearly. The funny thing is that the Duch chap speaks very primitively!

At the end the Turkish fellow says: "I consider the Netherlands to be one of the most civilized countries of Western-Europe, but one thing keeps getting my attention, and that is that Dutch people increasingly use their language inaccurately, with pleasure, dear gentlemen, cheers!"

[pjotr]

[pjotr]

This is something in the middle between Dutch and German

It is also close to some Dutch and German Frisian dialects

[pjotr]

How about Standard Polish, Standard Czech, Standard Slovak, and the Sorbian (Lustetian), Kashubian, Goral, Silesian, Ruthenian, Wend, Russyn, Baltic (Lithunanian), Gypsy (Sinti language), Yiddish, and German and Dutch settler (Mennonites in Poland) and Polish Tartar infuences on the West-Slavic languages. (In that context Sorbian-Lusetian seen as a fellow Western-slav minority language close to Polish and Czech languages)

[pjotr]

The Polish language became far more homogeneous in the second half of the 20th century, in part due to the mass migration of several million Polish citizens from the eastern to the western part of the country after the Soviet annexation of the Kresy in 1939, and the acquisition of former German territory after World War II. This tendency toward a homogeneity also stems from the vertically integrated nature of the authoritarian Polish People's Republic.

The inhabitants of different regions of Poland still speak "standard" Polish somewhat differently, although the differences between regional dialects appear slight. First-language speakers of Polish have no trouble understanding each other, and non-native speakers may have difficulty distinguishing regional variations.

The following languages have the status of national minority's language;
- Armenian
- Belarusian
- Czech
- German
- Hebrew
- Lithuanian
- Russian
- Slovak
- Ukrainian
- Yiddish

And Languages that have the status of ethnic minority's language are:
- Karaim
- Kashubian
- Rusyn, called Lemko in Poland - in Polish: "Łemkowski"
- Romani languages: official recognition is granted to the languages of two groups: Polska Roma and Bergitka Roma.[3]
- Tatar, called Tartar by the Act

Languages without officially recognised status:
- Wymysorys - is an endangered language with very few speakers, native to Wilamowice, but contrary to Karaim language having a similar situation, it was practically unknown of in the time of preparation of the forementioned Act.
- Silesian - status severely disputed, question whether a dialect of Polish or separate language considered a political issue. Ethnologue distinguishes two Silesian languages, Silesian and Upper Silesian.

Languages of new diasporas and immigrant communities

These languages are not recognised as minority languages, as the Act of 2005 defines minority as "a group of Polish citizens (...) striving to preserve its language, culture or tradition, (...) whose ancestors have been living on the present territory of the Republic of Poland for at least 100 years":

Greek - language of the big Greek diaspora in Poland of 1950's.
Vietnamese - the biggest immigrant community in Poland, since 1960's, having their own newspapers, schools, churches etc.

History of Slavic languages

Differentiation

The Proto-Slavic language existed until around AD 500. By the 7th century, it had broken apart into large dialectal zones.

There are no reliable hypotheses about the nature of the subsequent breakups of West and South Slavic. East Slavic is generally thought to converge to one Old Russian or Old East Slavonic language, which existed until at least the 12th century.

Linguistic differentiation was accelerated by the dispersion of the Slavic peoples over a large territory, which in Central Europe exceeded the current extent of Slavic-speaking majorities. Written documents of the 9th, 10th, and 11th centuries already display some local linguistic features.

Division of the Slavic languages

The tripartite division of the Slavic languages does not take into account the spoken dialects of each language. Of these, certain so-called transitional dialects and hybrid dialects often bridge the gaps between different languages, showing similarities that do not stand out when comparing Slavic literary (i.e. standard) languages. For example, Slovak (West Slavic) and Ukrainian (East Slavic) are bridged by the Rusyn of Eastern Slovakia and western Ukraine. Similarly, Polish shares transitional features with both western Ukrainian and Belarusian dialects. The Croatian Kajkavian dialect is more similar to Slovene than to the standard Croatian language.

Although the Slavic languages diverged from a common proto-language later than any other group of the Indo-European language family, enough differences exist between the various Slavic dialects and languages to make communication between speakers of different Slavic languages difficult.

Bilingual communes in Poland


Polish/Kashubian street name sign in Jastarnia

The bilingual status of gminas (communes) in Poland is regulated by the Act of 6 January 2005 on National and Ethnic Minorities and on the Regional Languages, which permits certain gminas with significant linguistic minorities to introduce a second, auxiliary language to be used in official contexts alongside Polish. So far 44 gminas have done this.

[pjotr]

Dear Bonobo,

Language is both something very personal and thus individual and subjective and in the same time very communal, collective and to a certain degree objective in the sense of Jurisdiction, law, regulations, rules, guidelines, customs, certain traditions which are described by language.

I find the history of linguistics, the heritage and roots of languages, language philosophy and Hermeneutics fascinating. The history of language goes back far. I wonder if the first speaking, writing and reading people had a common language, or if the division between languages was there since the beginning of time. Language can be a unifyer, but it can also be a cultural, religious, political and philosophical force for division, segregation, tension and conflict (war).

Europe is a continent of language and cultural borders, between various language groups and within these language groups between languages of the same group (Russian vs Ukrainian, Spanish vs French -in the sense of the dominant latin/romanesque world language, Standard Dutch vs Flemish in Belgium, Hochdeutsch vs Austrian/Bavarian/Schweitzerdeutsch), Polish vs Silsesian, Low Saxon vs Frisian).

Culture, tradition, customs, folklore, saga's, reiglious habits, Patriotism, Nationalism, and even Socialism and communism are related to language, and the way language is used by different kind of people, classes, generations and nationalities.

How closely are Polish, Czech and Slovak related. Do they have a shared West-Slavic history? What effect do the regional languages and dialects have on these languages? The language of the Goral people, the Silsesians, the Kashubians, the Sorbs (Lusetians), the Tartars, the Jewish minorities with their Yiddish, ladino and Hebrew languages.

What foreign languages doe most Poles speak? Or what foreign language should Poles be able to speak and they do not?

Cheers,
Pieter

[pjotr]

The Tower of Babel

The Babylonian language confusion caused by human megalomania created the linguistically divided world according to the bible.

The Tower of Babel (Syriac: ܡܓܕܠܐ ܕܒܒܠ‎, Maḡdlā d-Bāḇēl; Hebrew: מִגְדַּל בָּבֶל‎‎‎, Migdal Bāḇēl) is a Near Eastern etiological myth that is recorded in the Jewish Tanakh's first book (Genesis); it is meant to explain the origin of different languages. According to the story, a united humanity of the generations following the Great Flood, speaking a single language and migrating eastward, came to the land of Shinar (Hebrew: שנער‎‎). There they agreed to build a city and a tower "tall enough to reach heaven"; seeing this, God confounded their speech so that they could no longer understand each other and scattered them around the world.


The Tower of Babel by Pieter Bruegel the Elder (1563)

Story

The story of the city of Babel is recorded in Genesis 11:1–9. Everyone on earth spoke the same language. As people migrated east, they settled in the land of Shinar. People there sought to make bricks and build a city and a tower with its top in the sky, to make a name for themselves, so that they not be scattered over the world. God came down to look at the city and tower, and remarked that as one people with one language, nothing that they sought would be out of their reach. God went down and confounded their speech, so that they could not understand each other, and scattered them over the face of the earth, and they stopped building the city. Thus the city was called Babel. As it appears in the King James version of the Bible:

- 1.Now the whole world had one language and a common speech. As people moved eastward, they found a plain in Shinar and settled there.

- 2.They said to each other, “Come, let’s make bricks and bake them thoroughly.” They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar.

- 3. And they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower whose top is in the heavens; let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth.”

- 4. But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men had built.

- 5. And the Lord said, “Indeed the people are one and they all have one language, and this is what they begin to do; now nothing that they propose to do will be withheld from them."

- 6. "Come, let Us go down and there confuse their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech.”

- 7. So the Lord scattered them abroad from there over the face of all the earth, and they ceased building the city.

8 Therefore its name is called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of all the earth; and from there the Lord scattered them abroad over the face of all the earth.

— Genesis 11:4–9

Composition

Themes

The story of the Tower of Babel explains the confusion of tongues: variation in human language. The story's theme of competition between God and humans appears elsewhere in Genesis, in the story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. The 1st-century Jewish interpretation found in Flavius Josephus explains the construction of the tower as a hubristic act of defiance against God ordered by the arrogant tyrant Nimrod. There have, however, been some contemporary challenges to this classical interpretation, with emphasis placed on the explicit motive of cultural and linguistic homogeneity mentioned in the narrative (v. 1, 4, 6). This reading of the text sees God's actions not as a punishment for pride, but as an etiology of cultural differences, presenting Babel as the cradle of civilization.

Source: Wikipedia

[Bonobo]

Apr 5, 2017 23:29:53 GMT 1 pjotr said:

Dear Bonobo,
I find the history of linguistics, the heritage and roots of languages, language philosophy and Hermeneutics fascinating. The history of language goes back far. I wonder if the first speaking, writing and reading people had a common language, or if the division between languages was there since the beginning of time. Language can be a unifyer, but it can also be a cultural, religious, political and philosophical force for division, segregation, tension and conflict (war).
Pieter

Yes, I love it too and I always add such info when we come across various words in class. Students seem to enjoy extra explanations, I hope it helps them remember the vocabulary better.
My favourite is a wind eye.

[Bonobo]

Apr 5, 2017 23:29:53 GMT 1 pjotr said:

1 How closely are Polish, Czech and Slovak related. Do they have a shared West-Slavic history? What effect do the regional languages and dialects have on these languages? The language of the Goral people, the Silsesians, the Kashubians, the Sorbs (Lusetians), the Tartars, the Jewish minorities with their Yiddish, ladino and Hebrew languages.
Cheers,
Pieter

1 I am not such an expert, so let me refer to this site
www.quora.com/To-what-extent-are-Polish-Czech-and-Slovak-languages-mutually-intelligible



Updated Aug 5, 2016

In a nutshell:

Speakers of Slovak and Czech typically have little trouble understanding each other; speakers of Slovak and Polish may only have somewhat more difficulty communicating. Yet depending on their educational and social background, speakers of Polish and Czech, especially those from areas distant from the common border, may find that they do not completely understand the other language.

(Kevin Hannan, “Borders of Language and Identity in Teschen Silesia”, p.3)

Obviously it depends on the dialect since all three languages are linked by dialect continua and have some quite diverse dialects including ones where the language boundaries meet.

Czechs and Slovaks generally understand each other. Some young Czechs are struggling to understand Slovak since they're not exposed to the language much nowadays, but both languages are still similar enough to be used in both countries.

Czechs often say that Slovak sounds "softer" and Polish sounds like rustling paper. There is some truth in this - Slovak uses soft consonants more often than Czech and Polish uses them more often still, so this probably contributes to Slovaks understanding Polish more easily than Czechs. I've hung out with groups of all three nationalities in London and the Slovaks say they generally have little trouble understanding the Poles but the Poles have a harder time understanding them when they speak Slovak. I really think it depends heavily on where in Poland the speaker is from since it is a big country - I can make myself understood in Czech in Kraków or Silesia but not in Warsaw.

Phonetically there's a small but important difference between Czech/Slovak and Polish in that the stress of a word falls systematically on a different syllable - the first in Czech/Slovak and the penultimate in Polish. So even if you listen to a sentence with words that are similar in the two languages, this can be enough to confuse you.

And yes, there are the false friends. The absolute best one is the sentence "szukam was na zachodzie" / "šukám vás na záchodě" - the Polish means "I am looking for you in the west" and the Czech means "I'll f**k you in the toilet" - and all the words are cognates! A lot of the most confusing things are the words which have slightly different meanings, rather than completely different, for example I love the "no smoking" signs in Poland because it really looks closer to "don't start any fires" to me.


asier, Slovak language or the Czech language?

David Kopecký
David Kopecký, native Czech speaker
Written Mar 3, 2016

For Czech and Slovak, it depends on the generation. If you had asked perhaps 10 years ago, the answer would be that everyone understands pretty much perfectly, apart of some difficult or special words that are not quite necessary. The two languages sound a bit different, but are essentially the same. Many words are different, but a large portion is essentially the same, just accented differently.

The Czech and Slovak speaking people have lived in union for quite a long time (essentialy since the 9th century, however, the languages were quite different from those today), and for the past century in one country.

However, since the split (1993), the people born in the second half of the '90s and later were not so exposed to Slovak and are starting to lose the ability to understand. You meet more and more people that get lost when Slovaks talk to them.

However, universities help. There are floods of Slovak students in Czech universities (there are many more good universities in CZE than in SVK).

So, to summarize if a Czech person lives in isolation from Slovaks, he/she would have issues understanding Slovak. And vice versa. But because we have lived close and interacted quite actively, the awareness is generally quite good. We (Czechs and Slovaks) call each other "brothers".

As far as Polish is concerned, for both Czechs and Slovaks it's mostly incomprehensible. However, it doesn't take that much effort to learn it, since the structure is very similar and the sounds are as well.
5.6k Views · View Upvotes
Jędrek Kostecki
Jędrek Kostecki
Written Oct 14, 2014
I'm Polish, have been to both Czech (four times) and Slovakia (twice).

Polish and Czech have a massive number of false friends, words that sound alike but mean different things. Thousands of them, there are entire dictionaries on the subject, here's just a short list: False Friends of the Slavist/Polish-Czech. In practice, I don't understand Czech at all. Singular words, sure. Signs, yeah ok. Sentences? Nope.

The worst part of my visit was always someone finding out I'm from Poland and saying, "oh, so we're neighbors" and just switching into Czech. I'd have to ask them to go back to English.

All that said, I'm friends with a couple who moved to Prague about 10 years ago and they are so fluent that they'll often speak Czech with each other and forget Polish words. They took half a year of classes before they moved and were able to get around in the language from day one. I took three years of German and still mainly use gesticulation when I head out to Deutschland.
9.4k Views · View Upvotes
Tomasz Rapacz
Tomasz Rapacz, Speaks Polish, English, and Spanish
Updated Jan 16, 2016

Hi! This is a great question, and I hope that my answer will help you!

For some background information, I'm a 16 year old Polish-American. I speak Polish at home, and English with some of my friends. Luckily, I live in a town in western Massachusetts where much of the population is Polish, so I'm able to communicate in either language and still be understood, so I think that my Polish skills are fluent or at least near-fluent.

Recently, I went on a school trip to Prague and was able to communicate with nearly everyone I encountered. They told my that my accent made me sound Russian (which I thought was strange), but I guess there are worse accents to have. Communication was fairly easy. For example, I was able to translate from English to Polish for an American couple in a bookstore that I went to, and the woman at the counter understood me fine. Obviously, she could tell I was Polish, but we could easily understand each other and communicate without problems; even if there was a misunderstanding, I could usually explain the idea in a different way and they would understand me.

Also, I went to a bazaar-type marketplace close to the Astronomical Clock, and I was able to speak Polish to many of the vendors. I began speaking to one woman in Polish, but afterward I heard her speaking to someone in English, so I kind of gradually switched into English so she would understand me better. She said "No, no! Please speak in Polish, I need to understand it better," except in Czech and something to that extent (sorry, I'm not a Czech expert). She didn't have a thick accent at all. I found this astounding, and we ended up having a fairly lengthy conversation in Polish/Czech. It was wonderful, and we understood each other with no major problems. I threw in some Czech words I knew, and she spoke some Polish that she knew. One small hiccup we encountered, however, is the word "sklep". In Polish, it means a "shop", but in Czech apparently it means a "basement". That was just a bit strange.

No matter how different Polish and Czech are, I learned, there's no doubt the similarities are astounding. If you speak to a Czech person in Polish, he or she will most likely understand you. If you to me in Czech, I will most likely understand you. By fostering relationships with real people of another language and culture, you will become more able to easily understand and interpret the ideas you two are trying to portray.

I hope I helped, and have a wonderful day!

Tomek

P.S. My family is from a suburb of Rzeszów, which is in the southeast of Poland. My language is probably more similar to Czech or Slovak than my friend from Gdańsk, so I guess I had it easier!

8.6k Views · View Upvotes
Petr Melechin
Petr Melechin, <insert something witty>
Written Oct 11, 2014
I'm Czech and I've worked with Polish people, tried reading Polish texts here and there and I don't find it easy to understand. Reading it is easier than just listening to it, in my opinion. Many words are similar enough so you often figure out the general meaning of a sentence but it's not particularly easy.

My father who speaks both Czech and Russian finds Polish easy to understand. So I suspect the more Slavic languages you know, the easier it is to understand the other ones.
5.2k Views · View Upvotes
Rudolf U. Rosa
Rudolf U. Rosa, works at Univerzita Karlova
Written Oct 16, 2014
I am Czech. After watching Polish films throughout an annual week-long film festival for a few years (with subtitles), I can more-or-less understand Polish texts (I usually get the main message, and often much more than that); it is harder with spoken Polish, as I cannot re-read it several times before understanding ;-) But I often get the main message, although definitely not always. So I think this is mainly about exposure -- the languages are pretty close, but Czechs are typically not exposed to Polish and vice versa, so it's the same problem as with young Czechs not understanding Slovak because of a lack of exposure.

Czech and Slovak -- enough has been said by others.
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Milan Falešník
Milan Falešník, I am Czech and I am generally interested in languages so I know about Czech.
Written Feb 24, 2016

I will just add my observations to all these answers. When I was studying abroad and met polish people, I lerned to understand it quite well and I have built a sort of "filter" which filters the words for me. I would say "czech-izes" them .

Let's have this example (EN/CZ/PL):

Train - Vlak - Pociąg

From what I have figured out, polish people have no clue when we say word "vlak", because they don't have any similar word for it. But for me and my "czechizer", the flow is as follows:

Pociag -> po-ciąg

po- is a prefix

ciąg is a noun from the verb "ciągnąć", which means "to pull" and it is "táhnout" in czech.

There are some rules to try. Like g -> h, ci -> something with t or ť, ą -> ou. ć at the end of the word is most likely a verb as you may have learned over time. Also Ć is basically CI and that makes sense with the rule I wrote.

And that looks similar, doesn't it? So filtered: pociąg -> pota

This is "koňský potah" (a horse-drawn carriage). Which makes sense. It has a tractor (horse) and it has a carriage(s). I have heard that train transport is not so good in Poland, now I know why (sorry my polish friends ).

Or the word "empty". In czech, we would say "prázdný", polish person would say "pusty". But we have "pustý" too, it is just not used so much in the daily language because you would use it for an abandoned place for example. But the polish "pusty" can be applied even to a fridge, it is a quite common word and we will understand that. And this goes on and on ...

I must say that as the slavic languages have very flexible grammar, this approach is about comparing Czech and Polish, let it be spoken or written and it requires some time, to figure out these "filtering" rules and they never apply in 100% of cases. This approach is possible only on Polish (and Slovak, where such rules are easy to figure out for us, that is basically what Czechs do when they hear Slovak). This does not work so well for east slavic and south slavic languages, because they are more different.

I have read somewhere that until 14th century, Czech and Polish were mutually intelligible. And since then the languages slowly diverged in grammar and vocabulary.
4.7k Views · View Upvotes
Pavel Vitsoft Šrubař
Pavel Vitsoft Šrubař, Old beaver eager for new knowledge. From the Czech Republic, Europe.
Written Oct 12, 2014
Media in the former Czechoslovakia used to mix both official languages fifty-fifty, so people brought up in theese days were in fact bilingual,
at least passively. As far as Polish is concerned, inhabitants near the northern border were in similar situation. I used to listen to Polish radio and TV very much in the 80's, as their programs were more attractive. Unlike German or English, though I have never learn Slovak and Polish at school, I didn't need a dictionary to fully understand, after having been listening to theese languages for couple of years.

The situation is different with young people growing up after the split of Czech and Slovak Republic in 1993. I dare to estimate that young Czechs understand mere 50 % of Slovak and 30 % of Polish speech without adequate training. However, thanks to similarity of Slavonic languages, all they need to do to make themselves understand is to listen to one another patiently for a long time.
5.6k Views · View Upvotes
Małgorzata Niemcewicz
Małgorzata Niemcewicz, Polish-English translator now living in Slovakia
Written Nov 18, 2015
Overall, Poles consider Slovak "easier" while Czech is "funnier" but more difficult to understand. During a regular, fast conversation it is possible to grasp maybe 20% of its meaning, mostly out of context.

When it comes to similarities between Czech and Slovak, at first I perceived those languages as nearly identical. But soon I've learned that there are considerable differences in vocabulary, and the two nations understand each other well due to cultural reasons - being a one country back in the day, broadcasting Czech films in Slovak TV and so on. Without this exposure to the neighbour's culture, Slovak and Czech kids are now struggling to understand each other.

Talking from experience, it took me a couple of months among Slovaks to learn the language passively and understand up to 90% of what is being said. I'd imagine that if you share culture and borders for several years, this assimilation has even better results.
5.1k Views · View Upvotes
Juliana Juričková
Juliana Juričková, lived in Poland
Written Nov 2

Ok right. If two Slovaks talk to each other, both, Czech and Polish will understand, although Polish a little bit less. Czechs talking to each other, Slovaks will understand, Polish won't. If two Polish are talking to each other, Slovak will understand, Czech only a bit.

The thing is, that Czechs and Slovaks understand the languages between each other, so there's no problem in the communication (they were one country). The same is when they see the language written, they can read it with no complications.

Polish is a slight bit similar to the Czech, but very small bit. They won't understand Czech very much, I think they'll understand few words and that's all. Polish understand a bit more from Slovak, since Slovak is Slavic Esperanto, so they'll understand, but not fully like Czechs do. If they see something written in Czech or Slovak, they won't understand.
1.8k Views · View Upvotes
Dušan Janiš
Dušan Janiš, born and raised in Ostrava, Czech Republic.
Written Oct 12, 2014
It really depends a lot. Czech and Slovak are usually almost fully intelligible but younger children (especially Czech children) can have great problems. But after a while of listening to each other, even children can speak without much problems. Written language is quite easy to understand.
About Czech and Polish, despite being born in Ostrava region (Poland is just a few dozen kilometres away), I don't understand Polish much. I can make out like 1 word out of 3 and get the general meaning of a sentence but my level of understanding is really low. It's the same for written language. However older generations usually understand Polish quite well because Polish TV used to have much better cartoons so they watched these a lot.
I don't know how it is between Slovak and Polish, I guess it might be similar to Czech and Polish but I am not really sure.
5.1k Views · View Upvotes
Martin Zurada
Martin Zurada
Written Apr 19, 2015
I am Polish living in the US. Some of my friends were native Slovak speakers and my ex who is American learned Slovakian extremely well while she lived there. I had very little problems communicating in Polish-Slovakian even on a relatively complex level. This probably works only IF you know Polish and the other person knows Slovak very well.

In fact, my ex an I would often switch from English to Polish-Slovak when we didn't want people in the US to understand us or just for fun. We would often crack ourselves up about how funny the languages sounded to the other because the words are used very differently but you can absolutely connect the meaning.

For example in Polish we would say "Do you want some tea?" In Slovak you would say something that sounds to a Polish person like "Are you asking yourself for chai?" Very different way of saying the same thing but very understandable if you know that tea and chai are synonyms and that the word for ask and want are interchangeable. I find that we have the same words but use them differently or use words that have fallen out of usage in the other language.

To me personally Slovak is one of the coolest languages to listen to. Different enough to be fascinating but similar enough to be understandable.

Czech is a much different story. I can hardly understand it but I could communicate with a Czech person on a very basic level, could follow a Czech movie, and could probably learn the language quickly if I lived there.
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Wojciech Kostowski
Wojciech Kostowski
Written Feb 7, 2016

I'm a native speaker of Polish, and I know both Czech and Slovak languages at an intermediate level. I understand formal Czech and Slovak very well (sometimes I need to check a single word). I also understand eastern Slovak / Rusyn dialects fairly well.

Even though I know Czech, I have a problem understanding informal Czech (obecná čeština), it contains too many particular expressions.

In general, Polish speakers who never had closer contact to Czech understand it only to some basic extent, I'd say, 50%. With Slovak, it's easier, I'd say 70%.

Slovak grammar is nice: 'main street' is hlavná ulica (SK) vs. główna ulica (PL), similar in Serbian, Russian etc. but in Czech they have non-typical endings: 'hlavní ulice' which sounds like "the main streets' for a Polish ear.

Also I think the generation of our grandfathers (say, 1930), had less problems in understanding Czech/Slovak due to a slower way of speaking. Also, at that time dialects were present in all countries, so people were 'trained' to some variations in the pronunciacion. Hence, listening to Czech was like listening to a more distant dialect. Now, due to the impact of TV, almost everybody speaks standard Polish/Czech/Slovak, and standard Polish has really different vocabulary than standard Czech/Slovak, which are close to each other.

I think that some classes of Czech, Slovak and Russian (say, 1 year for each of them) could be obligatory at schools, because it's much easier to better understand the structure and rules of our complex Polish language if you know the neighboring ones.
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Sam Woodman
Sam Woodman, Self-studying Polish and Spanish, language afficionado
Written Oct 28

I’m very much still learning Polish, and there are several other fantastic answers, so I just want to share my experience.

I cannot understand a word of Czech, to the point that I can’t even tell which Slavic language it is that I’m hearing. However, with Slovak, I had nearly a full minute of listening in on a nearby conversation before realizing they were speaking Slovak and not Polish! I can barely understand anything from written Slovak, but when I hear it being spoken, I can understand it probably 75% as well as I can understand Polish. I’d compare it to the similarly large overlap between Spanish and Italian.

Also, for some weird reason, I tend to speak Polish with an absolutely flawless Slovak accent, despite never having heard or studied a word of it prior to my travels. Nearly everybody I spoke with in Poland asked if I was from Slovakia, then were completely shocked when I told them I’m American.
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Tom Anakhia
Tom Anakhia, lived in Brno, Czech Republic
Written Dec 27

The intelligibility is asymmetrical.

Czech and Slovak are fully mutually intelligible as their standard forms and nearly all their dialects are part of Czecho-Slovak dialect continuum. This excludes Eastern Slovakian dialects which are part of a continuum with Ukrainian, but this dialect is incomprehensible to both, Slovaks too. Czech and Slovak are probably the most mutually intelligible languages in Europe, similar example could be Galician and Portuguese.

Slovaks do understand Polish a bit better than Czechs do. This is because Slovak shares more vocabulary with Polish than Czech does and also Slovak declension as well as conjugation is phonetically closer to Polish than the Czech ones are. Also Slovaks have exposure to Czech and generally understand it which is beneficial to understanding other closely related Slavic languages. Czech shares certain grammar features with Polish which Slovak does not.

Polish understand Slovak a bit better than Czech for the same reasons Slovaks understand Polish better. But they do not have the added benefit of knowing or being exposed to other closely related Slavic language, so they understand it less than Slovaks do understand them.

And finally, Czechs understand Polish more than Polish understand Czech, but less than Slovaks do. This is because Czechs are exposed to Slovak and understand it, and knowledge of other closely related Slavic language helps with intelligibility of another related language.
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Jack Pockley
Jack Pockley, bilingual
Written Feb 18, 2016

Czech and Slovak are really just different dialects of the same language. It's like a Londoner speaking to someone with a thick Scottish accent. You won't understand all the words, but you will understand the vast majority of sentences.

Polish is rather different, to the extent that you might get the gist of what they are trying to say, but not the whole time. Like an Australian bushman speaking to a Mexican with bad English.
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Alec Covaltshik
Alec Covaltshik, 10+ Years working as Developer, most of the time doing Freelance
Written Feb 20, 2016
As a Polish I undestand a little bit of Slovak, the Slovak understands Polish a little bit better than me his language, but maybe it's because he knows some Polish words.
Czech I understand almost nothing, whereas the Czech people understand a little bit Polish. At least that is how I see it when traveling to our lovely neighbours
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Pavel Šaman
Pavel Šaman, A student of myself and others, passionate about travelling, languages, and HR
Written Apr 19, 2015
Well, I'm Czech and I've met some Polish people, so I can answer this question.

I'd say I can understand about 30-40% of Polish. Of course depends on what we're talking about, but some basic phrases are almost the same, maybe with different pronunciation. When I met some Polish people this year, I was literally surprised how much we can understand each other without using English.
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Brian Collins
Brian Collins, I'm a linguist; one of my BAs is in theoretical linguistics
Written Apr 5, 2015
Linguists are generally very dubious of the claims by native speakers of Slavic languages in understanding each other.

For example, Bosnian and Serbian are almost identical and yet they "cannot" understand each other (probably because they do not like each other at all).

From my experience as a second language learner of Polish, it is somewhat intelligible with Czech and Slovak. I watch a television show called Stargate Atlantis, and one of the characters is Czech and I can frequently understand his angry rants. I have been to Poland but never to Czech or Slovakia.

I think most of the differences between the two languages are probably with verbal morphology and phonology. The noun and adjectival morphology seems to be about the same, but I have looked at Czech grammar just for fun and their verbal conjugations are often different.

For example the conjugation of be-future (will):
Czech:

Person Singular Plural
1st budu budeme
2nd budeš budete
3rd bude budou

Polish: singular plural
1st będę będziemy
2nd będziesz będziecie
3rd będzie będą

Polish conserves the Proto-Slavic nasal vowels and uses them in conjugations, whereas in Czech ę seems to be 'u' and ą seems to be 'ou' (not sure exactly what sounds these correspond to as I do not know Czech)

Another verb czytać in Polish
czytam
czytasz
czyta
czytamy
czytacie
czytają

in Czech is conjugated as
čtu
čteš
čte
čteme
čtete
čtou

I would guess, because for some reason verbs seem to be much more different in Czech and Slovak from Polish, than nouns, that sentences with more complex verb forms would be harder to understand.
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Danijel Daxx Chalupka
Danijel Daxx Chalupka, studied at Univerzita Pavla Jozefa Šafárika V Košiciach
Written May 25, 2015
I'm Slovak living in Serbia and I find it very easy to understand Czech, even that I never learned it in school or used it in Serbia, learned it from Slovak television, where Czech dubed movies are very widespread. Also understanding Polish is not so much a problem, when read, but I find it quite hard to hear words when spoken by Poles, cannot find spaces when spoken. But from linguistic point of view it's similar to Slovak, only difference is that we use more of Ď Ť Ľ Ň... and all soft letters while Poles more often use C,Z,S,Š,Č... which when spoken in row can be very hard to understand. Can understand Polish when spoken slowly.
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Kýta 끼타
Kýta 끼타, Born in the Czech republic
Written Aug 22, 2015
Hi. I am czech. And I dont understand when polish people speak. I only figure some words out and their meaning. But if I see something written in polish, its a lot easier for me to understand. Even though I still dont understand fully... just a bit here and there.
I can understand slovak really well... You just know what they said. Its kind of funny. We have different words but still understand each other. But if the slovak person is from the east slovakia and they speak in their dialect is imposible for me to understand But! For slovak person from west its hard too... so yeah
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Jakub Wysocki
Jakub Wysocki, did comparision studies on Czech and Polish
Written May 27, 2016

Well, the main point here is that understanding every related to yours language is a personal issue. Once I met two guys from Czech Republic. I made an experiment. I spoke to them in Polish, they spoke to me in Czech. One of them understood me perfectly, we could have a small talk, speaking maybe slower, explaing more than usually, but still, we needed only our languages. With the other guy it was just impossible. He didn’t seem to get what I was saying.

Might be that I understood more of what they said, because I was comparing once Czech with Polish, so it might be easier for me to understand, but there’s also one more thing you should bear in mind: a Polish speaker might understand Czech and Slovak better, basically because of the fact that they currently use the words we used to have or which we consider old-fashiones now. Of course, it doesn’t mean they don’t get at all what we say - they do. The point is that we may understand them less efortlessly. But it’s obviosuly just my observation.
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Filip Tran
Filip Tran, Speaker of 4 languages
Written Dec 27

Czech speakers and Slovak speakers usually understand each other pretty well and they can have a decent conversation. Also, Slovak speakers claim to understand Czech better than Czech speakers understand Slovak. As a Czech speaker I can say, that if I hear a Polish sentence, I can probably tell what the Polish speaker is talking about, but the complete meaning of the sentence would be mysterious to me.