Talk:Lithuanian language
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Prevailing attitudes about lexical borrowings
In the article section, "The lexical borrowings in the language" the following phrases are troublesome (from neutrality standpoint):
"However, there are many words which have Lithuanian counterparts, hence they should not be used."
"...many words have recently flooded the language (like dispenseris, hakeris or singlas) and they are not to be tolerated."
Perhaps a discussion about the prevailing attitudes toward recent lexical borrowings could be included instead. Also, are there any official government activities (like those in France or Iceland, for example) to discourage use of these loanwords?
--Theodore Kloba 19:54, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)
There are no official government activities to discourage use of loanwords.
This article may seem troublesome when you take it out of context and try to analyze "as is". However, it is not. You must understand the problems that arise every day to the Lithuanian language to understand what this means.
In Lithuania, no one thinks that a loan word should not be used only because it is a loan word. But barbarisms certainly should be avoided. English can take new words equally easily from Japanese and German whereas in Lithuanian it would be impossible. Simply to add Lithuanian endings to nouns, verbs etc. is not enough. I think this is what the article means.
On the other hand, I myself think that this article should be re-written and I think I will do that one day.--213.226.138.241 19:31, 19 Nov 2004 (UTC)
- I believe the present qualifying statement, "Like with any other language, there is a category of people, known as language purists who strongly oppose foreign influence on their native language. This section presents their point of view;" is a "weasel term." --Theodore Kloba 15:43, Dec 10, 2004 (UTC)
Different viewpoints in Lithuanian phonology
Lithuanian population isn't big, Lithuanian language is surrounded mostly by Slavic languages, so influence on phonetic and different tendencies of articulation also exist. Another source of different treatment is usage of different phonologic systems by different scholars, but it's unessential in our case. The treatment of Lithuanian sounds, accepted in Lithuanian schools, mass-media and so on, also exist. For shortening purposes we'll call it official here.
Two points of view with some comments are presented in the table below, the first one according to Dr. A. Girdenis (from: Lietuvių kalbos enciklopedija by Institute of the Lithuanian Language. Vilnius, 1999) and the second one according to Dr. W.R. Schmalstieg (from the site of journal Lituanus, 1982.1.,Vol 28). Lithuanian sounds in the table are denoted by Lithuanian letters, which are normally pronounced as corresponding sounds.
Consonant table
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Sounds (indicated by Lithuanian letters) |
Definition according to A. Girdenis |
Definition according to W. R. Schmalstieg |
Other points of view |
Comments |
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c, č, dz, d˛ |
Affricates (*) |
Affricates (*) |
Two different sounds (t+s, t+š , d+z, d+˛), which can be divided into different syllables. |
Traditionally affricates. However, tendency to separate a stop from a fricative exists in Lithuanian spoken language, especially in unpalatalized variant. |
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Alveolar sounds |
Retracted alveo-palatal sounds |
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Difference of terms, which isn't essential here. |
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Nasal and fricative sounds |
Continuant sounds (with voiced, unvoiced and nasal subdivision) |
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Caused by systematic differences. |
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h |
Voiced velar fricative (*) |
Voiceless glottal continuant (diff!). |
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Tends to voiced more than to unvoiced in spoken Lithuanian. Officially considered as voiced pair of ch (SAMPA x). See note (2) below. |
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l |
Dental lateral (*). |
Lateral |
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r |
Alveolar trill (*). |
Apical trill |
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There is no essential difference, I think. |
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v |
(Voiced) labial spirant (*). |
Voiced continuant. (diff!) |
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Pronounciation of v tends to short vowel u (SAMPA u), reduced to consonant (not semivovel as w in SAMPA). Fricative tendencies are rare. See note (3) below. |
Vowel table
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Sounds (indicated by Lithuanian letters) |
Definition according to A. Girdenis |
Definition according to W. R. Schmalstieg |
Comments |
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ę |
Low front (+) |
Low mid front |
There is a tendency to articulate ę as more middle than ą in spoken language. Many scholars keep this tendency inessential. In this case ę is considered low with back pair ą. |
Notes
(1) The point of view, analogous to official one, is marked by (*), by (+) prevalent point of view is marked. By (diff!) an essential difference between A. Girdenis and W. R. Schmalstieg is marked.
(2) Sound h in Lithuanian has its specific history. It wasn't used in spoken Lithuanian till the beginning of XX century. Maybe for this reason Dr. Schmalstieg gives more common pronunciation of Western Indo-European languages? But in reality this sound has been used for more than 70 years (in school, theatre, mass-media), so it has a tradition as other sounds do. Officially it's considered as voiced velar fricative, the voiced pair of voiceless ch. In its pronouncing the tendency to glottal, maybe, exist, but practically there are no tendencies to voiceless.
(3) Sound v in Lithuanian has a difference from languages, where it's fricative. Its tendencies to fricative in Lithuanian are weak. The sound is pronounced as u (SAMPA u), reduced to consonant (not semivowel as SAMPA w). It's considered voiced, but has no voiceless pair ( the same situation as with j, l, n). Its “voicedness” is low and v does not make consonants before them voiced. Dr. Schmalstieg's system doesn't points up this thing. Considering v as continuant may imply fricative. Continued Lithuanian v gives short vowel u (as j gives i in this case).
Comparison of the official classification with X-SAMPA and SAMPA systems.
Note: For comparing X-SAMPA and SAMPA charts of wiki's articles were used.
Consonant table
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Letter of sound |
Official definition of sound |
The closest sound in X-SAMPA |
The closest sound in SAMPA |
Comments |
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z, ˛, h, (s, š, ch) |
Voiced (voiceless) fricatives |
Voiced (voiceless) fricatives: z, z\, G, (s, s\, x) |
Voiced (voiceless) fricatives: z, Z, G, (s, S, x). |
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dz, d˛, (c, č) |
Voiced (voiceless) affricates |
Voiced (voiceless) affricates: ts\ etc. |
Voiced (voiceless) affricates: tS etc. |
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b, d, g, (p, t, k) |
Voiced (voiceless) plosives |
Voiced (voiceless) plosives: b, d, g, (p, t, k) |
Voiced (voiceless) stops: b, d, g, (p, t, k) |
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b (p) |
Voiced (voiceless) labial plosive |
Voiced (voiceless) bilabial plosive: b (p). |
Voiced (voiceless) bilabial plosive: b (p). |
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f |
Voiceless labial fricative |
Voiceless labiodental fricative: f |
Voiceless labiodental fricative: f |
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z, dz, (s, c) |
Voiced (voiceless) dental |
Voiced (voiceless) alveolar: z, dz, (s, ts) |
Voiced (voiceless) alveolar: z, dz, (s, ts) |
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˛, d˛, (š, č) |
Voiced (voiceless) alveolar |
Voiced (voiceless) alveopalatal: z\, dz\, (s\, ts\) |
Voiced (voiceless) postalveolar Z, dZ, (S, tS) |
The better distinction in X-SAMPA (Lithuanian ˛ (š) differs from more palatal sound in other languages, being closer to z_a (s_a)). |
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v |
Labial spirant |
Labial approximant: v\ |
- |
No distinction from v fricative in SAMPA chart |
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j |
Palatal spirant |
Palatal approximant: j |
- |
No distinction from j semivowel in SAMPA chart |
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m |
Labial nasal |
Bilabial nasal: m |
Bilabial nasal: m |
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n |
Dental nasal |
Alveolar nasal: n |
Alveolar nasal: n |
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l |
Dental lateral |
Alveolar lateral flap: l\ |
(alveolar lateral: l) |
No distinction between “West-European” and “East-European” articulation of l in SAMPA |
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r |
Alveolar trill |
Alveolar trill: r |
Alveolar trill: r |
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Vowel table
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Letter of sound |
Official definition of sound |
The closest sound in X-SAMPA and SAMPA |
Comments |
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i |
Short high front unrounded vowel |
Lax close front unrounded vowel (short): I |
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į or y |
Long high front unrounded vowel |
Tense close front unrounded vowel (long): i: |
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ė |
Long mid front unrounded vowel |
Close-mid front unrounded vowel (long): e: |
The short variant of this sound (having no own letter and denoted by letters ė, e or i) is very rare in Lithuanian. It also hasn't a different sign in X-SAMPA (closest to i, but more mid). |
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e |
Short low front unrounded vowel |
Open-mid front unrounded vowel (short): E |
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ę |
Long low front unrounded vowel |
Open front unrounded vowel (long): {: |
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a |
Short low back unrounded vowel |
Open-mid back unrounded vowel (short): V |
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ą |
Long low back unrounded vowel |
Open back unrounded vowel (long): A: |
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o |
Long mid back rounded vowel |
Open-mid back rounded vowel (long): O: |
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o (variant) |
Short mid back rounded vowel |
Close-mid back rounded vowel (short): o |
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u |
Short high back rounded vowel |
Lax close back rounded vowel (short): U |
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ų or ū |
Long high back rounded vowel |
Tense close back rounded vowel (long): u: |
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- Linas 08:19, 2004 Mar 14 (UTC)
Some other phonetic rules in standard Lithuanian
Diphtongs
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Rule |
Definition |
Examples |
Comments |
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1. Diphtongs. |
There are eight diphtongs in Lithuanian: ai, au, ei, (eu), ie, (oi), ui, uo. |
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Diphtongs eu and oi are wery rare in the language, and used mostly in borrowings (As 'Europa'). |
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2. Diphtong pronouncing (1). |
Pronouncing diphtong, one should pronounce quickly both vowels one after the other. Pronouncing of vowels is the same as in the case of single, short pronouncing is more often. |
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3. Diphtong pronouncing (2) |
Diphtongs mostly are pronounced lax, as if they were short vowels. There are some positions in standard Lithuanian, when they are pronounced tense. |
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1) The lax pronouncing of diphtongs is more often, then tense. |
Palatalization
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Rule |
Definition |
Examples |
Comments |
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1. All consonants have their palatalized variants. |
Every consonant have palatalized and unpalatalized, variants, except j (which is palatalized only). |
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2.Before front vowels |
If consonant goes directly before front vowel , it's pronounced palatalized. |
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This rule is more or less clear for Slavic speakers. Other language speakers could have problems with it. By the way, 'e' denotes front vowel. |
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3. Before back vowels |
Consonants directly before back vowels may be unpalatalized or palatalized. In this case the palatalized form is labeled by letter i before the back vowel letter. |
Rašau (ra s\au, I write) – rašiau (ra s\_jau, I wrote) |
1)'i' as palatalization mark is used in some other languages
(e. g. Polish) too. |
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4. The regressive chain rule of palatalizing. |
If consonant goes directly before palatalized one, it is pronounced palatalized. |
Smeigsiu (s_jm_jei g_js_ju, I will stab) |
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5. Other situations with palatalizing (1) |
Before non-palatalized consonant sometimes (mostly in proper names and borrowings) 'l' may be palatalized and always 'j' is. |
Polka (pol_j ka, polka, name of a Chech dance) |
However this palatalization of l stays not marked in written form. So it's proposed to use as rare as possible in standard Lithuanian. |
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6. Other situations with palatalization (2). |
In other cases than 2 – 5 consonants are non-palatalized. |
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This rule must be given also as “regressive chain rule of unpalatalizing” with exception of rule nr. 5, and it would sound: If consonant goes directly before unpalatalized one, it is pronounced unpalatalized. |
- Linas 13:06, 2004 Mar 20 (UTC)
Notes
I'm a little unsure about the statement "Some linguists have speculated that proto-Baltic languages split from other Indo-European languages before 1000 BCE." Unless I've misunderstood, that seems awfully late - many other distinct Indo-European languages had developed many hundred years before 1000 BC, and even the written records of Mycenaean Greek and Hittite go back well before that date. Is it a typo? --MockTurtle 01:38, 8 Sep 2004 (UTC)
- Looking generally, this statement is incorrect. To split isn't true word in this case, and even if it were, we perhaps should speak about other languages splitting from the Baltic proto-language, but not vice versa. The date is very dubious too. A way, in which the Baltic languages developed from the primary proto-Indoeuropean one is still under a dispute, except the fact, that Baltic languages have many archaic features and even modern Lithuanian and Latvian still retain many of them. And, after all, this statement should depend to other article, the one about the Baltic languages.
- So, I had to revise it earlier, but it was as if defended with the Some linguists have speculated. Now, I have revised it.
- Linas 14:07, 2004 Nov 3 (UTC)
I would like to see some sources quoted in this section. What evidence is being used to make these statements? Perhaps a stronger caveat is also necessary. Indo-European linguistics is not an exact science and the theoretical nature of scholarly opinions ought not to be stated as fact.
- Well, generally You are right, we surely must include description of sources. But, I think, it's common practice not to include sources, when a statement is considered as axiom or it is well-known in a certain branch. And there are many such statements in this article. But what concerns other statements, which are more disputed or dubious hypothetic or tending to pseudo scientific approach, this article doesn't contains much of them, and few existing are supplemented by suitable remarks (except, if I didn't overlooked some new in newer revisions).
- But when You speak about reliability of Indo-European linguistics, it's, perhaps, question of other article. If You mean something from Lithuanian linguistics, couldn't You type your question here? Being more concrete, this question will be more useful for further article writing too. We have put very few information here, concerning both Indo-European and Lithuanian language. And these sentences reflect prevailing point of view and not one concrete separated speculation. I can give many sources in many languages, but it didn't thought it was necessary, what concerns these few and very common sentences about relations of hypothetic I.-Europ. to Lithuanian.
- Linas 18:21, 2005 Mar 21 (UTC)