Alska/Dialects

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Dialect Classification

Alska has six primary dialects. Four of these form a continuum across the main island of Alsland; the fifth and sixth dialects are not related to each other, but are easily recognizable as Alska.

On Alsland Proper, there are four dialect regions: East, West, North, and South. Southern Alsla is the standard, and Eastern Alska is the farthest from it. The two colonial dialects are even further, but are not spoken on the main island. These regions in turn have their own dialects, but they are far too small to be recognized by non-speakers as such.


Sydalska

<url=http://linguifex.com/index.php?title=Alska>Southern Alslandic<url> - Will fix later

Nordalska

Northern Alska is one of the least spoken of all the dialects, and while it looks somewhat similar to Standard Alska in its orthography, the pronunciation is quite different. Many times, native speakers of SA have a hard time understanding Northern Alska, and they describe it as if 'one is speaking with marbles in their mouth.' On the other hand, speakers of Eastern Alska can understand Northern Alska the best, follows by Western Alska speakers.

Phonology

Letters Pronunciation Further information
a [a:]/[ɑ] can make two different sounds, but has no short version
b [b] -
d [d] -
e [ɛ] / [e:] -
f [f] -
g [g] -
h [h] -
i [i] No short version
j [j] corresponds to y in English you
k [k] -
l [l] -
m [m] -
n [n] -
o [ɔ]/[o̞] -
p [p] -
r [ʁ]
s [s]/[ʃ] -
t [t] -
u [ʉ] has no short version
v [f] -
y [i:] pronounced like 'e' in English 'me'
å [au] -
ø [ø] -
æy [aj] -
ey [ei:] -
uy [u:i] -
iy [i:j] Mid-closed version of [i:]
øy [øy] -

The Northern Alska alphabet has 28 letters. The five digraphs, æy, ey, ui, iy, and øy, are counted as single letters. All of these sounds can be made with Standard Alskan (SA) orthography, with the exception of [au], which is represented by the letter å in Northern Alska.

The letter iy is also known as 'creaky i' because of it's pronunciation.


Certain letters, such as å and y do not correspond to their Standard counterparts. Compare the SA versions of å and y ([ɔ] and [y:]) to NA's [au] and [i:].

The letter s is also pronounced [ʃ] in many cases, and the digraph sj is pronounced [sj]

Another overarching rule for NA pronunciation is that most consonants switch with their voiced or unvoiced versions when they are used in a word, but are pronounced normally when they start a word.

  • [k] - [d]
  • [g] - [k]
  • [d] - [b]

And so forth.

Pronunciation Differences/Spelling Differences

Many words are spelled the same in both dialects, but can be pronounced very differently from each other:

Word Pronunciation (NA) Pronunciation (SA) Meaning
Alsland [alʃ'lɑ:nt] [als'la:nd] alsland
Flyge [fli:'kɛ] [fly:'gɛ] girl, woman
Vadr [fa:'tɛʁ] [fa:'r] father


There are certain common words that are spelled differently but are pronounced the same:

Word (SA) Word (NA) Pronunciation (Both) Meaning
Hej Hæy [haj] hello
Sju Su [ʃu] shoe
Dig Dæyg [dajg] you (acc.)


Finally, there are many words that are spelled differently and pronounced differently:

Spelling (SA) Pronunciation (SA) Spelling (NA) Pronunciation (NA) Meaning
Ja [ja] Jå [jau] yes
Nej [naj] Ney [nei:] no
ett Vere [et vɛrɛ] i Ve [i: ve:] to be

Grammar

Grammar is largely the same in Northern Alska as it is in Standard Alska, with a few execptions.

When verbs are in the infinitive, i is placed in front of them instead of SA's ett:

  • i køyke (NA) - ett kyke (SA) - to cook

Notice the spelling change from 'y' to 'øy' to accommodate the missing [y:] phoneme in NA.

Verbs

The formation of past tense endings also changes in NA. Words that have an '-r' ending in the past tense in Standard Alska have a '-kk' ending in Northern Alska:

  • gikk (NA) - gir (SA) - went
  • fikk (NA) - fir (SA) - found

This change applies only to '-r' words and the other past tense suffixes are the same in Northern Alska as they are in Southern Aslka.


Definite/Indefinite Articles

The definite and indefinite articles are different in Northern Alska than they are in Southern Alska. The neuter indefinite article changes from et to ey, but the common articles stay the same.

Definite article Common Neuter Plural Indefinite Article Common Neuter Plural
Nom. / Acc. den dey denne/deye Nom./Acc. en ey -
Dat. dan day danne/daye Dat. an ay -

This also changes the enclitic article ending for the Neuter Gender: Neuter nouns now end in '-ey' instead of '-et'

Personal Pronouns

Standard Alska first, Northern Alska second:

Case 1st person
Singular Plural
Nominative jeg/jæyg vi/vi
Accusative mig/mæyg oss/uss
Dative mig/mæyg oss/uss
Genitive minn/mæyn osser/usser
Case 2nd person
Singular Plural
Nominative du/du i/enne
Accusative dig/dæyg ig/enneg
Dative dig/dæyg ig/enneg
Genitive - -
Case 3rd person
Masculine Feminine Neuter Plural
Nominative han/han hun/hun den/det / den/det disse/disse / disse/disse
Accusative han/han hun/hun den/det / den/det disse/disse / disse/disse
Dative ham/ham hum/hum dan/dat / dan/dat dasse/dasse / dasse/dasse
Genitive - - - -


Comparison

Here is the Lord's Prayer, first in English, then in Standard Alska, and finally in Northern Alska: 

   Our Father in heaven,                             Osser vadr i himmell,                                    Usser vadr i himell                  
   hallowed be your name.                            helighet er din Nafn.                                    helighet e dæyn Nafn
   Your kingdom come,                                din konngdøm kommer,                                     dæyn kunngdum komme                       
   your will be done,                                din will gør,                                            dæyn vil gør
   on earth as it is in heaven.                      på jorden hvorden somm det er i hemmell.                 po jorden hvordan sum det e i himell
   Give us this day our daily bread,                 giver oss disse dagligen brød,                           giv uss disse dagligen brød
   and forgive us our debts,                         ok tillgive oss osser skulder,                           o tilgiv uss usser skulder 
   as we also have forgiven our debtors.             hvorden vi har tilgivedde osser skuldmanner.             hvordan vi har
   And lead us not into temptation,                  ok leder oss ikke i på frissthellse,                     o led oss ikje i po fristhelse
   but deliver us from evil.                         men tillever oss fra ande.                               men tilev uss frå ande

There are several noteworthy differences in this translation:

  • The dropping of double consonants where appropriate in himell and fristhelse. (The double consonant-short vowel length rule still applies in NA, but there is no short version of i
  • på to po ([pɔ] - [pɔ])
  • ok to o ([o̞] - [ɔ])
  • ikke to ikje ([ɪg'gɛ] - [i:ʃ'jɛ]) Normally, the digraph kj is pronounced [ʃ], but in this instance the [j] is realized as well.
  • somm to sum ([sɔm] - [sʉm])
  • fra to frå ([fra:] - [fʁau])
  • din to dæyn ([dɪn] - [dein])
  • er to e ([er] - [e]) ett Vere changes to i Ve in Northern Alska, and the conjugation for all persons in present tense is simply e in NA.
  • giver to giv ([gɪv'ɛr] - [gi:v]). The command form of a verb in SA is the exact same as it's present tense conjugation, but in NA the command form is simply the infinitive without the e attached to it. This also appears with the verbs ett lede, ett tillgive, and ett tilleve (SA versions).

Østalska (Ustalsj')

Eastern Alska, called Østalska in Standard, and Ustalsj' [ʉsd'a:lʃɛ] natively, is the dialect furthest from Standard Alska. It is similar to Northern Alska in phonology, which is why speakers of those two dialects can understand each other. However, the actual orthography differs quite drastically from the straightforward spellings of Standard and Northern Alska.

Phonology

Letters Pronunciation Further information
a [au]
aa [a:] can be long or short
b [b] -
d [d]/[ð] pronounced [d] at the beginning of a word, [ð] elsewhere
e [e:] -
f [f] -
g [g] -
h [h] -
i [aj] -
j [j] corresponds to y in English you
k [k] -
l [l] -
ll [tl] -
m [m] -
n [n] -
o [ɔ]/[o̞] -
p [p] -
r [ɹ]
s [s]/[ʃ] -
t [t] -
u [ʉ] has no short version
v [f] -
y [ɪ]/[i:] short/long
å [ɔ] -
ø [ø] -
' [ɛ] -

Eastern Alska (EA) has 26 letters in its alphabet, including aa, which stands for the phone [a:]. (The letter a in EA is pronounced [au])

There are several letters that do not produce the sound one would expect. Since EA does not have any sort of recognized diphthongs, the letters a and i stand for [au] and [aj] respectively. (These sounds are represented by diphthongs in other dialects)

The apostrophe (') is counted as a full letter in Eastern Alska, and is pronounced [ɛ]. This can be confusing to non-native speakers of EA because words that would normally have a short 'e' are instead spelled with an apostrophe. This also happens in the definite/indefinite articles.

The same voiced-unvoiced consonant switch occurs in Eastern Alska just as it does in Northern Alska.

Pronunciation Differences/Spelling Differences

Here is a table with many confusing examples of the EA orthography:

Spelling (SA) Pronunciation (SA) Spelling (EA) Pronunciation (EA) Meaning
Ja [ja] Ja [jau] yes
Nej [naj] Ni [naj] no
ett Vere [et vɛrɛ] å V'r [ɔ vɛɹ] to be
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