Meskangela: Difference between revisions

Linguistically speaking, Meskangela is not a single language, but a group of closely related languages, divided into three subgroups: Western, Eastern and Southern, based on their relative location. Some dialects within one subgroup may differ more from each other than other dialects belonging to different subgroups, which mostly depends on their geographic isolation and influence of the standard language. Some dialects are mutually intelligible, whereas others are not, not unlike the situation of a typical dialect continuum. Several varieties still use different names for themselves: a relatively divergent far Eastern variety is called ''Khīmła'' [ˈkʰiː.wɑ], Southeastern dialects – ''Majäg'' [ˈma.jɛɣ], Southwestern – ''Gakhō Łatem'' [ɣa.ˈkʰy. ʟa.ˈteʊ]. Most dialects can be described as either "Western", "Eastern" or "Southern", which corresponds to three main islands. It is also important to draw a distinction between later dialects of the New Era (often called "New Meskangela"), the classical variety used as a written, but not a spoken language, and those that are extinct. Thus, it is convenient to classify these dialects as "Modern", "Middle" or "Classical", and "Old", alongside the classification, based on geograhic areas.