Polish language
| Polish | |
|---|---|
| polski | |
| Pronunciation | [ˈpɔlskʲi] |
| Native to | Poland |
Native speakers | L1: 40 million (2012)[1] L2: 670,000 (2012)[1] Total: 41 million[1] |
Early forms | |
| Dialects | |
| Sign Language System | |
| Official status | |
Official language in | |
Recognised minority language in | |
| Regulated by | Polish Language Council (of the Polish Academy of Sciences) |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-1 | pl |
| ISO 639-2 | pol |
| ISO 639-3 | pol |
| Glottolog | poli1260 |
| Linguasphere | 53-AAA-cc 53-AAA-b..-d |
 Majority of Polish speakers
Polish used together alongside other languages
Majority of Polish speakers outside of Poland | |
Polish (endonym: język polski, [ˈjɛ̃zɨk ˈpɔlskʲi] , polszczyzna [pɔlˈʂt͡ʂɨzna] or simply polski, [ˈpɔlskʲi] ) is a West Slavic language of the Lechitic group within the Indo-European language family written in the Latin script.[13] It is primarily spoken in Poland and serves as the official language of the country, as well as the language of the Polish diaspora around the world. In 2023, there were over 40.6 million Polish native speakers.[14] It ranks as the sixth most-spoken among languages of the European Union.[15] Polish is subdivided into regional dialects and maintains strict T–V distinction pronouns, honorifics, and various forms of formalities when addressing individuals.[16]
The traditional 32-letter Polish alphabet has nine additions (ą, ć, ę, ł, ń, ó, ś, ź, ż) to the letters of the basic 26-letter Latin alphabet, while removing three (x, q, v). Those three letters are at times included in an extended 35-letter alphabet.[17] The traditional set comprises 23 consonants and 9 written vowels, including two nasal vowels (ę, ą) defined by a reversed diacritic hook called an ogonek.[18] Polish is a synthetic and fusional language which has seven grammatical cases.[19] It is one of very few languages in the world possessing continuous penultimate stress (with only a few exceptions) and the only in its group having an abundance of palatal consonants.[20] Contemporary Polish developed in the 1700s as the successor to the medieval Old Polish (10th–16th centuries) and Middle Polish (16th–18th centuries).[21]
Among the major languages, it is most closely related to Slovak[22] and Czech[23] but differs in terms of pronunciation and general grammar. In addition, Polish was profoundly influenced by Latin and other Romance languages like Italian and French as well as Germanic languages (most notably German), which contributed to a large number of loanwords and similar grammatical structures.[24][25][26] Extensive usage of nonstandard dialects has also shaped the standard language; considerable colloquialisms and expressions were directly borrowed from German or Yiddish and subsequently adopted into the vernacular of Polish which is in everyday use.[27][28]
Historically, Polish was a lingua franca,[29][30] important both diplomatically and academically in Central and part of Eastern Europe. In addition to being the official language of Poland, Polish is also spoken as a second language in eastern Germany, northern Czech Republic and Slovakia, western parts of Belarus and Ukraine as well as in southeast Lithuania and Latvia. Because of the emigration from Poland during different time periods, most notably after World War II, millions of Polish speakers can also be found in countries such as Canada, Argentina, Brazil, Israel, Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States.
History[edit]
Polish began to emerge as a distinct language around the 10th century, the process largely triggered by the establishment and development of the Polish state. Mieszko I, ruler of the Polans tribe from the Greater Poland region, united a few culturally and linguistically related tribes from the basins of the Vistula and Oder before eventually accepting baptism in 966. With Christianity, Poland also adopted the Latin alphabet, which made it possible to write down Polish, which until then had existed only as a spoken language.[31] The closest relatives of Polish are the Elbe and Baltic Sea Lechitic dialects (Polabian and Pomeranian varieties). All of them, except Kashubian, are extinct.[32] The precursor to modern Polish is the Old Polish language. Ultimately, Polish descends from the unattested Proto-Slavic language.
The Book of Henryków (Polish: Księga henrykowska, Latin: Liber fundationis claustri Sanctae Mariae Virginis in Heinrichau), contains the earliest known sentence written in the Polish language: Day, ut ia pobrusa, a ti poziwai (in modern orthography: Daj, uć ja pobrusza, a ti pocziwaj; the corresponding sentence in modern Polish: Daj, niech ja pomielę, a ty odpoczywaj or Pozwól, że ja będę mełł, a ty odpocznij; and in English: Come, let me grind, and you take a rest), written around 1280. The book is exhibited in the Archdiocesal Museum in Wrocław, and as of 2015 has been added to UNESCO's "Memory of the World" list. [33]
The medieval recorder of this phrase, the Cistercian monk Peter of the Henryków monastery, noted that "Hoc est in polonico" ("This is in Polish").[34][35][36]
The earliest treatise on Polish orthography was written by Jakub Parkosz around 1470.[37] The first printed book in Polish appeared in either 1508[38] or 1513,[39] while the oldest Polish newspaper was established in 1661.[40] Starting in the 1520s, large numbers of books in the Polish language were published, contributing to increased homogeneity of grammar and orthography.[41] The writing system achieved its overall form in the 16th century,[32][42] which is also regarded as the "Golden Age of Polish literature".[39] The orthography was modified in the 19th century and in 1936.[32]
Tomasz Kamusella notes that "Polish is the oldest, non-ecclesiastical, written Slavic language with a continuous tradition of literacy and official use, which has lasted unbroken from the 16th century to this day."[43] Polish evolved into the main sociolect of the nobles in Poland–Lithuania in the 15th century.[42] The history of Polish as a language of state governance begins in the 16th century in the Kingdom of Poland. Over the later centuries, Polish served as the official language in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, Congress Poland, the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria, and as the administrative language in the Russian Empire's Western Krai. The growth of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth's influence gave Polish the status of lingua franca in Central and Eastern Europe.[44]
Geographic distribution[edit]
Poland is one of the most linguistically homogeneous European countries; nearly 97% of Poland's citizens declare Polish as their first language. Elsewhere, Poles constitute large minorities in areas which were once administered or occupied by Poland, notably in neighboring Lithuania, Belarus, and Ukraine. Polish is the most widely-used minority language in Lithuania's Vilnius County, by 26% of the population, according to the 2001 census results, as Vilnius was part of Poland from 1922 until 1939. Polish is found elsewhere in southeastern Lithuania. In Ukraine, it is most common in the western parts of Lviv and Volyn Oblasts, while in West Belarus it is used by the significant Polish minority, especially in the Brest and Grodno regions and in areas along the Lithuanian border. There are significant numbers of Polish speakers among Polish emigrants and their descendants in many other countries.
In the United States, Polish Americans number more than 11 million but most of them cannot speak Polish fluently. According to the 2000 United States Census, 667,414 Americans of age five years and over reported Polish as the language spoken at home, which is about 1.4% of people who speak languages other than English, 0.25% of the US population, and 6% of the Polish-American population. The largest concentrations of Polish speakers reported in the census (over 50%) were found in three states: Illinois (185,749), New York (111,740), and New Jersey (74,663).[45] Enough people in these areas speak Polish that PNC Financial Services (which has a large number of branches in all of these areas) offers services available in Polish at all of their cash machines in addition to English and Spanish.[46]
According to the 2011 census there are now over 500,000 people in England and Wales who consider Polish to be their "main" language. In Canada, there is a significant Polish Canadian population: There are 242,885 speakers of Polish according to the 2006 census, with a particular concentration in Toronto (91,810 speakers) and Montreal.[47]
The geographical distribution of the Polish language was greatly affected by the territorial changes of Poland immediately after World War II and Polish population transfers (1944–46). Poles settled in the "Recovered Territories" in the west and north, which had previously been mostly German-speaking. Some Poles remained in the previously Polish-ruled territories in the east that were annexed by the USSR, resulting in the present-day Polish-speaking communities in Lithuania, Belarus, and Ukraine, although many Poles were expelled from those areas to areas within Poland's new borders. To the east of Poland, the most significant Polish minority lives in a long strip along either side of the Lithuania-Belarus border. Meanwhile, the flight and expulsion of Germans (1944–50), as well as the expulsion of Ukrainians and Operation Vistula, the 1947 migration of Ukrainian minorities in the Recovered Territories in the west of the country, contributed to the country's linguistic homogeneity.
Dialects[edit]
The inhabitants of different regions of Poland still[update] speak Polish somewhat differently, although the differences between modern-day vernacular varieties and standard Polish (język ogólnopolski) appear relatively slight. Most of the middle aged and young speak vernaculars close to standard Polish, while the traditional dialects are preserved among older people in rural areas.[48] First-language speakers of Polish have no trouble understanding each other, and non-native speakers may have difficulty recognizing the r
