Lach Silesian dialect and Cieszyn Silesian dialect

The Lach dialects, also known as Lachian dialects ( cs, lašská nářečí, laština, pl, gwary laskie), are a group of West Slavic

dialect The term dialect (from Latin , , from the Ancient Greek word , 'discourse', from , 'through' and , 'I speak') can refer to either of two distinctly different types of linguistic phenomena: One usage refers to a variety of a language that is ...

s that form a transition between the Polish and

Czech language Czech (; Czech ), historically also Bohemian (; ''lingua Bohemica'' in Latin), is a West Slavic language of the Czech–Slovak group, written in Latin script. Spoken by over 10 million people, it serves as the official language of the Czech Re ...

. They are spoken in parts of

Czech Silesia Czech Silesia (, also , ; cs, České Slezsko; szl, Czeski Ślōnsk; sli, Tschechisch-Schläsing; german: Tschechisch-Schlesien; pl, Śląsk Czeski) is the part of the historical region of Silesia now in the Czech Republic. Czech Silesia is, ...

, the

Hlučín Region Hlučín Region ( cs, Hlučínsko, german: Hultschiner Ländchen, pl, Ziemia hulczyńska) is a historically significant part of Czech Silesia, now part of the Moravian-Silesian Region in the Czech Republic. It is named after its largest town, H ...

, and northeastern

Moravia Moravia ( , also , ; cs, Morava ; german: link=yes, Mähren ; pl, Morawy ; szl, Morawa; la, Moravia) is a historical region in the east of the Czech Republic and one of three historical Czech lands, with Bohemia and Czech Silesia. The ...

, as well as in some adjacent villages in

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populou ...

. Most Czech researchers consider Lach a dialect of Czech, whereas Polish dialectologists tend to ascribe Polish origins to Lach. Lachian is divided into numerous subdialects (Western, Eastern and Southern), it can therefore also be regarded as a

dialect continuum A dialect continuum or dialect chain is a series of language varieties spoken across some geographical area such that neighboring varieties are mutually intelligible, but the differences accumulate over distance so that widely separated vari ...

, with limited

mutual intelligibility In linguistics, mutual intelligibility is a relationship between languages or dialects in which speakers of different but related varieties can readily understand each other without prior familiarity or special effort. It is sometimes used as ...

between the eastern and western dialects. This dialectal differentiation is not typical for the Czech Republic, where there is a good deal of

dialect leveling Dialect levelling or leveling (in American English) is the process of an overall reduction in the variation or diversity of features between two or more dialects. Typically, this comes about through assimilation, mixture, and merging of certain d ...

, especially in the west of the republic. Most Lachs, especially younger speakers, now speak standard Czech, and use it as a written language, while Lach remains the language of everyday speech. Lachian contains many German

loanword A loanword (also loan word or loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language. This is in contrast to cognates, which are words in two or more languages that are similar because ...

s, according to some sources, up to 8% of the vocabulary. The poet

Óndra Łysohorsky Óndra Łysohorsky was the pseudonym of Ervín Goj (6 July 1905 – 19 December 1989), a Czech poet of Silesian origin and awareness. He is known for his works written in Lach language (intermediate dialect between Czech and Polish) which w ...

is probably the best-known writer in a Lachian dialect. Łysohorsky was notable for refusing to write in Standard Czech, instead writing in the local dialect of Upper Silesia. In doing so, he contributed significantly to the development of the Lach literary language.Hannan 1996, 726.

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* Czech dialects Polish dialects Languages of the Czech Republic Languages of Poland {{Slavic-lang-stub

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