Polish Language

The Polish language is the official language of Poland, where it is spoken by about 40 million people. Polish speakers can also be found in many other countries, including Lithuania, Belarus, Ukraine, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, and the United States.

Polish is closely related to Czech and Slovak but differs from these Slavic languages because it has retained nasal sounds, sounds that allow air to escape from both the nose and mouth.

The Polish language has many dialects, most of which differ only in the pronunciation of regional words. Common dialects in the northern region of the country include Mazovian and Great Polish; dialects in the southern regions include Little Polish and Silesian. Controversy exists as to whether Kashubian should be considered a dialect or an independent language. Kashubians are an ethnic minority in Poland.

The Polish language has approximately 200,000 words—more words than the English language. Polish contains many words borrowed from other languages including Belarusian, Czech, German, Latin, and Ukrainian.

Like Czech and Slovak, the Polish language is based on a modified Latin alphabet. The language uses digraphs, pairs of letters representing a single sound, and diacritics, small marks to indicate how a letter should be pronounced. The Polish language has eight vowel sounds and thirty-five consonant sounds. Its pronunciation usually stresses the next-to-last syllable in a word.

History and Classification

The Polish language is a West Slavic language, which is part of the Indo-European linguistic family of languages. Czech, Slovak, and Sorbian are also Slavic languages. Like other Slavic languages, Polish grew out of a Proto-Slavic ancestral language.

The history of the Polish language is often divided into four periods: Old Polish (the ninth century to the sixteenth century), Middle Polish (the sixteenth century to the end of the eighteenth century), New Polish (the end of the eighteenth century until 1930), and Modern Polish (1930 to the present).

During the ninth century, the Polish language began to change in ways that made it distinct from other Slavic languages and the Proto-Slavic language from which it emerged. During this time, the Polish language was influenced by the Latin language. In 966, Meiszko I, prince of Poland, declared Poland a Christian land. He invited Roman Catholic priests to visit the country and build churches and monasteries there. Latin was the official language in these buildings and the language used in religious writings. The Polish language took on some Latin words. For the next six centuries, Polish continued to be influenced by other languages, particularly those spoken in Hungary, the Czech Republic, and Germany.

The first Polish writing appeared in 1136 and included more than four hundred proper names. The first written Polish sentence was day ut ia pobrusa a ti poziwai, which means "I'll grind [the corn] on the quern and you'll rest." Longer Polish writings did not appear until the fourteenth century.

By the fifteenth century, Polish was beginning to become standardized. Around 1440 Jakub Parkoszowic, a professor and rector (academic ruler) at Jagiellonian University attempted to codify the language, meaning he tried to create a series of rules for its use. One of Parkoszowic's proposed changes was to double long vowels to distinguish them from short vowels. While his ideas were not popular or widely implemented, he became the first to publish Polish orthographic rules in Latin.

Middle Polish, which lasted from the sixteenth century to the eighteenth century, is marked by the Polish Renaissance, a movement responsible for significant changes in the Polish language and the way it was used. Because of the renaissance, Polish was now used in literature, instead of only in religious and legal documents. During this time, many works of literature were translated into Polish from classical languages such as Latin, Greek, Hebrew, and Italian. Polish artists and scientists emerged during the Polish Renaissance. Writers, including the poet Jan Kochanowski, influenced the Polish language, eventually changing it into New Polish in the eighteenth century.

The Polish language continued to advance near the end of the eighteenth century under the reign of King Stanislaw II Poniatowski. By the nineteenth century, Polish was a major language in Europe and was more advanced than Russian. Poland became known for its rich literature. In 1797, the country opened the Zalusky Library in Warsaw, the first public library in Europe.

The Modern Polish that was first used in 1930 is very close to the standard Polish that is spoken today. The conflicts that occurred during this period are responsible in part for the many dialects of the language that exist today. During World War II, many Poles had to leave the country because of ethnic cleansing practices put into place by the Nazi Regime. Because of this, the Polish language spread into other regions and was influenced by them.

Geographic Distribution and Modern Usage

About 43 million people worldwide speak the Polish language. Polish is a linguistically homogeneous European country—nearly 97 percent of the people in Poland speak Polish as their primary language. People in other countries also speak Polish. Polish is a second language in Belarus, Lithuania, the Ukraine, and parts of Russia. Polish emigrants and their descendants speak the language in countries such as Australia, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, South Africa, Russia, and Turkey. More than 11 million people in the United States are Polish Americans but only some can speak the language fluently. Some Polish words have been adopted internationally, such as "pierogi," the Polish word for dumpling.

The Polish language is complex and difficult to master. It is based on a Latin alphabet but this alphabet has been heavily modified. It has three tenses (past, present, and future) and three genders (male, female, and neutral). The language does not use articles, such as a, an, and the, but it has seven tenses that identify the usage of nouns within a sentence.

Bibliography

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"Polish Language." Effective Language Learning. Web. 14 Jul. 2015. URL: http://www.effectivelanguagelearning.com/language-guide/polish-language

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"Polish Language History." Pimsleur Approach. Simon & Schuster, Inc. Web. 14 Jul. 2015. URL: YPERLINK "https://www.pimsleurapproach.com/resources/polish/articles/history-of-polish-language/" https://www.pimsleurapproach.com/resources/polish/articles/history-of-polish-language/

"A Short History of the Polish Language and Its Origins." Polish-Dictionary.com. National Resources Library. Web. 14 Jul. 2015. URL: ERLINK "http://www.polish-dictionary.com/history-origin-polish-language" http://www.polish-dictionary.com/history-origin-polish-language

"Slavic Languages and Polish." StayPoland.com. STAYPOLAND. Web. 14 Jul 2015. URL: http://www.staypoland.com/polish.htm