Interslavic

Interslavic
Меджусловjaнски
Writing	w:Cyrillic script
Region:	w:Slavisphere
Genders:	3
Cases:	6
Alignment	Nominative-Accusative
Proto-language:	w:Proto-Slavic
Typology:	Fusional
Word-Order	SVO
Languages:	w:Belarusian language, w:Russian language, w:Ukrainian language w:Czech language w:Slovak language w:Polish language
Population:	300 million
Africa: SEDES • Middle Semitic • Kintu • Guosa Central Asia: Jalpi • Caucas • Zens • Dravindian • Neo-Sanskrit Europe: Intralingua • Folksprak • Interslavic • Balkan • Samboka Far East: Dan'a'yo • IM • MSEAL

Anthropology

More than almost any other Universal Language, Slavs have a pre-existing unity, and indeed were a common language 1,000 years ago, known as w:Common Slavic and later w:Old Church Slavonic. It is a well documented fact that the Slavic languages have fractured into three families: Eastern, Western, and Southern. Our procedure is to consider the contributions of the Eastern languages as one vote in vocabulary, since they are almost mutually intelligible and they have won the orthography battle. Czech and Slovak are broadly similar. Polish (and Silesian) have diverged quite radically (and no one else has retroflex consonants, so those are excluded). Sorbian is not even really unified, with Upper and Lower being exceedingly different from each other.

The following languages, as well as w:Proto-Slavic are consulted at every stage.

1. Czech, Slovakian
2. Polish (and Silesian)
3. Sorbian
4. Russian, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Rusyn

Southern Slavic may be consulted, but doesn't vote, because it votes in Balkan.

Phonology

Vowels

Interslavic has the five cardinal vowels (a e i o u) and the near-high, front vowel /ɪ/. /ɑ/ should be just /a/. /ə/ can be just /ɛ/. There also syllabic /r/, which can be prepended with a schwa as needed for no difference.

Consonants

• Nasal: m, n, ñ
• Stops: p, t, k, b, d, g
• Fricatives: f, s, š, h, v, z, ž
• Affricates: ts, tš, dz, dž
• Trill: r
• liquids: l~ɫ, j, ʎ~lʲ

There are no other palatalized consonants

Phonotactics

• Hard: the labials p b f v m, the alveolars t d s z n r l and the velars k g h
• Soft: the postalveolars š ž č dž, the affricates c dz, and j

/ɪ/ can only occur after a hard, but never after a velar

Palatalization

Palatalization means that under certain circumstances the velar consonants k g h are changed to the postalveolar consonants č ž š. This happens when they are followed by an ending with -e-, -i- or -j-, as well as before the prefixes -ny, -ski, -nik, -stvo, -ok, -ka, -ko. For example: mog- + -eš > možeš, ruk- + -ny > ručny, muh- + ka > muška.

Softening

Softening is the process of adding a [ʲ] to a consonant, resulting in a more palatal pronunciation. The number of soft consonants in the phoneme inventory varies greatly from one language to another. In Interslavic only two soft consonants are obligatory: ʎ and ñ.

Iotation

• The combinations s+j and z+j become š ž.
• The velars k g h, when followed by j, palatalize into č ž š.
• In the sequences sk st zg zd, the s and z are iotated along with the following consonant
• š ž č j simply swallow the following j.

Orthography

Six vowels = The Big 5 + /ɪ~ɨ/, p/t/k, b/d/g, f/s/š, h~x, v/z/ž, c/č, dz/dž, m/n/ñ, r, l~ʎ, j

Russian comparison

Vowel Letters

Аа Ёё Ии (=i) Оо Уу (=u) Ыы (=y) Ээ (=e)

Consonantal Letters

Бб (=b) Вв (=v) Гг Дд Жж (=ž) Зз (=z) Кк Йй (=j) Лл (=l) Мм Нн (=n) Пп Рр Сс (=s) Тт Фф Хх Цц Чч (=č) Шш (=š) Щщ

Other

Ъъ Ьь

Ligatures

Ее=je Юю=ju Яя=ja Њњ=nj

Digraphs

ДЗ/дз ДЖ/дж

Morphology

3 genders, 2 numbers, six cases. Adjectives agree in gender, number, and case. The o/e y/i rule

First Person Pronoun

	Full	Short
Nom.	Я	Я
Acc.	Мзнз	Мз
Gen.	Мзнз	Мзнз
Dat.	Мнз	Ми
Ins.	Мною	Мною
Loc.	Мнз	Мнз

Morphosyntax

Word order is almost free, but most often SVO. Modifiers precede nouns, generally.

Lexicography

• кава - coffee