Arvanitika

Arvanitika
Arbërisht
Pronunciation	[aɾ.bəˈɾiʃt]
Native to	Greece
Region	Attica, Boeotia, S Euboea, Salamis Island; Thrace; Arkadia; Athens; Peloponnese; some villages in NW of Greece; N of island of Andros; 300 villages in total.
Native speakers	30,000 - 150,000
Language family	Indo-European Albanian Tosk Arvanitika
Writing system	Greek alphabet (Arvanitic variant) Latin alphabet
Language codes
ISO 639-2	alb (B) sqi (T)
ISO 639-3	aat
ELP	Arvanitika

This article is about a language spoken in Greece. For the related language spoken in Italy, see Arbëresh.

Arvanitika or Arvanitic (native name: arbërisht, Greek: αρβανίτικα arvanitika) is the variety of Albanian traditionally spoken by the Arvanites, a population group in Greece. Arvanitika is sometimes also described as Graeco-Albanian or similarly, although today such designations are considered offensive by many Arvanites themselves, who identify nationally and ethnically as Greeks and not Albanians (GHM 1995). Arvanitika is today an endangered language, as its speakers have been shifting to the use of Greek and most younger members of the community no longer speak it fluently.

Name

Main articles: Albania (toponym) and Arvanites § Names

The name "Arvanítika" and its native equivalent Arbërishte are derived from the ethnonym "Arvanites", which in turn comes from the toponym "Arbëna" (Greek: Άρβανα), which in the Middle Ages referred to a region in what is today Albania (Babiniotis 1998). Its native equivalents (Arbërorë, Arbëreshë and others) formerly were the self-designation of Albanians in general. Both "Arbëna" and "Albania/Albanian" go further back to name forms attested since antiquity, and may be ultimately variants of the same root, although this is debated.

Classification

The place of Arvanitika within Albanian

Arvanitika also called Epiriotika ( the term also was referred to Albanian language generally, both dialects Tosk and Geg ) is part of the Tosk dialect group of Albanian. It was brought to southern Greece during the late Middle Ages by settlers from what is today southern Albania and Epirus. Arvanitika is also closely related to Arbëresh, the diaspora dialects of Albanian in Italy, which largely go back to Arvanite settlers from Greece. Italian Arbëresh has retained some words identical to Greek words (for instance Haristis 'thank you', from ευχαριστώ; dhrom 'road', from δρόμος; Ne 'yes', from ναι, in certain villages). Italo-Arbëresh and Arvanitika-Arbërisht have a mutually intelligible vocabulary base, the unintelligible elements of the two dialects stem from the usage of Italian or Greek modernisms in the absence of native ones.

While linguistic scholarship unanimously describes Arvanitika as a dialect of Albanian many Arvanites are reported to dislike the use of the name "Albanian" to designate it, as it carries the connotation of Albanian nationality and is thus felt to call their Greek identity into question.

Owing to its special social circumstances and ethnolinguistic identity, Arvanitika is currently listed as a separate entry ("Arvanitika Albanian", code "aat") in the draft international ISO 639-3 catalogue of language names, where it is categorised as part of an Albanian "macrolanguage". Similarly, the Ethnologue lists a separate sub-entry for "Albanian, Arvanitika" ([4]), along with parallel entries for Gheg Albanian, Tosk Albanian, and Italian "Arbëreshë" (i.e. Arbëresh) ([5]). There is no entry for Arvanitika in parts 1 and 2 of the international ISO 639 standard of language codes, which only has a single entry for Albanian (codes "alb", "sqi", or "sq").

Sociolinguistic work has described Arvanitika within the conceptual framework of "ausbausprachen" and "abstandssprachen". In terms of "abstand" (objective difference of the linguistic systems), linguists' assessment of the degree of mutual intelligibility between Arvanitika and Standard Tosk range from fairly high (Trudgill 2004: 5, Botsi 2003) to only partial (Ethnologue). The Ethnologue also mentions that mutual intelligibility may even be problematic between different subdialects within Arvanitika. Mutual intelligibility between Standard Tosk and Arvanitika is higher than that between the two main dialect groups within Albanian, Tosk and Gheg. See below for a sample text in the three language forms. Trudgill (2004: 5) sums up that "[l]inguistically, there is no doubt that [Arvanitika] is a variety of Albanian".

In terms of "ausbau" (sociolinguistic "upgrading" towards an autonomous standard language), the strongest indicator of autonomy is the existence of a separate writing system, the Greek-based Arvanitic alphabet. A very similar system was formerly in use also by other Tosk speakers between the 16th and 18th century ([6], [7]) However, this script is very rarely used in practice today, as Arvanitika is almost exclusively a spoken language confined to the private sphere. There is also some disagreement amongst Arvanites (as with the Aromanians) as to whether the Latin alphabet should be used to write their language (GHM 1995). Spoken Arvanitika is internally richly diversified into sub-dialects, and no further standardization towards a common (spoken or written) Standard Arvanitika has taken place. At the same time, Arvanites do not use Standard Albanian as their standard language either, as they are generally not literate in the Latin-based standard Albanian orthography, and are not reported to use spoken-language media in Standard Albanian. In this sense, then, Arvanitika is not functionally subordinated to Standard Albanian as a dachsprache ("roof language"), in the way dialects of a national language within the same country usually are.

Geographic distribution

Map of traditional Modern Greek dialectual isoglosses. The white area in the middle represents where Arvanitika is the common language before the 20th century.

Ethnic map of the Balkans before the First Balkan War. The Albanian-speaking regions (including Arvanitika) are indicated in a shade of very light blue.

See also: Arvanites § Demographics

There are three main groups of Arvanitic settlements in Greece. Most Arvanites live in the south of Greece, across Attica, Boeotia, the Peloponnese and some neighbouring areas and islands. A second, smaller group live in the northwest of Greece, in a zone contiguous with the Albanian-speaking lands proper. A third, outlying group is found in the northeast of Greece, in a few villages in Thrace.

According to some authors, the term "Arvanitika" in its proper sense applies only to the southern group (Botsi 2003: 21) or to the southern and the Thracian groups together (Gordon 2005), i.e. to those dialects that have been separated from the core of Albanian for several centuries. The dialects in the northwest are reported to be more similar to neighbouring Tosk dialects within Albania and to the speech of the former Muslim Cham Albanians (Çamërishte), who used to live in the same region (Euromosaic 1996). These dialects are classified by Ethnologue as part of core "Tosk Albanian", as opposed to "Arvanitika Albanian" in the narrow sense, although Ethnologue notes that the term "Arvanitika" is also often applied indiscriminately to both forms in Greece (Gordon 2005). In their own language, the groups in the north-west are reported to use the term "Shqip" ("Albanian") to refer to their own language as well as to that of Albanian nationals, and this has sometimes been interpreted as implying that they are ethnically Albanians (GHM 1995, quoting Banfi 1994).

The Arvanitika of southern Greece is richly sub-divided into local dialects. Sasse (1991) distinguishes as many as eleven dialect groups within that area: West Attic, Southeast Attic, Northeast-Attic-Boeotian, West Boeotian, Central Boeotian, Northeast Peloponnesian, Northwest Peloponnesian, South Peloponnesian, West Peloponnesian, Euboean, and Andriote.

Estimated numbers of speakers of Arvanitika vary widely, between c.30,000 and 150,000. These figures include "terminal speakers" (Tsitsipis 1998) of the younger generation, who have only acquired an imperfect command of the language and are unlikely to pass it on to future generations. The number of villages with traditional Arvanite populations is estimated to c.300. There are no monolingual Arvanitika-speakers, as all are today bilingual in Greek. Arvanitika is considered an endangered language due to the large-scale language shift towards Greek among the descendants of Arvanitika-speakers in recent decades.

Characteristics

Arvanitika shares many features with the Tosk dialect spoken in Southern Albania. However, it has received a great deal of influence from Greek, mostly related to the vocabulary and the phonological system. At the same time, it is reported to have preserved some conservative features that were lost in mainstream Albanian Tosk. For example, it has preserved certain syllable-initial consonant clusters which have been simplified in Standard Albanian (cf. Arvanitika gljuhë /'glju.hə/ ('language/tongue'), vs. Standard Albanian gjuhë /'ɟu.hə/). In recent times, linguists have observed signs of accelerated structural convergence towards Greek and structural simplification of the language, which have been interpreted as signs of language attrition, i.e. effects of impoverishment leading towards language death (Trudgill 1976/77; Thomason 2001, quoting Sasse 1992).

Writing system

Arvanitika has rarely been written. Reportedly (GHM 1995), it has been written in both the Greek alphabet (often with the addition of the letters b, d, e and j, or diacritics, e.g. [8]) and the Latin alphabet. Orthodox Tosk Albanians also used to write with a similar form of the Greek alphabet (e.g. [9]).

Language samples

Grammar

Source: Arvanitikos Syndesmos Ellados

Pronouns

	Personal pronouns		Possessive pronouns
1Sg.	û	I	ími	mine
2Sg.	ti	you	íti	yours
3Sg.m.	ái	he	atía	his
3Sg.f.	ajó	she	asája	hers
1Pl.	ne	we	íni	ours
2Pl.	ju	you	júai	yours
3Pl.m.	atá	they (m.)	atíre	theirs (m.)
3Pl.f.	ató	they (f.)	atíre	theirs (f.)

Verb paradigms

	The verb HAVE				The verb BE
	Pres.	Imperf.	Subj.Impf.	Subj.Perf.	Pres.	Imperf.	Subj.Impf.	Subj.Perf.
1Sg.	kam	keshë	të kem	të keshë	jam	jeshë	të jem	të jeshë
2Sg.	ke	keshe	të kesh	të keshe	je	jeshe	të jesh	të jëshe
3Sg.	ka	kish	të ket	të kish	ishtë, është	ish	të jet	të ish
1Pl.	kemi	keshëm	të kemi	te keshëm	jemi	jeshëm	të jeshëm	të jeshëm
2Pl.	kine	keshëtë	të kini	te keshëtë	jini	jeshëtë	të jeshëtë	të jeshëtë
3Pl,	kanë	kishnë	të kenë	të kishnë	janë	ishnë	të jenë	të ishnë

Comparison with other forms of Albanian

The Lord's Prayer in Arvanitika Compared with Standard Tosk Albanian (second row), and Gheg Albanian (third row). Áti ýnë që jé ndë qiéjet, ushënjtëróft' émëri ýt. Ati ynë që je në qiell, u shënjtëroftë emri yt. Ati ynë që je në qiell, shejtnue kjoftë emni yt. Our father who art in heaven hallowed be thy name árthtë mbëretëría jóte; ubëftë dashurími ýt, arthtë mbretëria jote; u bëftë dëshira jote, ardhtë mbretnia jote; u baftë vullnesa jote, thy kingdom come thy will be done si ndë qiél, edhé mbë dhét; si në qiell, edhe mbi dhe. si në qiell ashtu në dhe. on earth as it is in heaven búkënë tónë të përdítëshimen' ép-na néve sót; bukën tonë të përditëshme jepna neve sot; Bukën tonë të përditshme epna ne sot; give us this day our daily bread edhé fálj-na fájetë tóna, edhe falna fajet tona, e ndiejna ne fajet e mëkatet tona, and forgive us our trespasses sikúndrë edhé néve ua fáljmë fajtórëvet tánë; sikundër edhe ne ua falim fajtorëvet tanë; si i ndiejmë na fajtorët tanë; as we forgive those who trespass against us edhé mos na shtiér ndë ngásie, pó shpëtó-na nga i ljígu; edhe mos na shtjerë në ngasje, po shpëtona nga i ligu; e mos na len me ra në keq, por largona prej gjith së keq; and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil sepsé jótia është mbëretëría e fuqía e ljavdía ndë jétët të jétëvet. sepse jotja është mbretëria e fuqia e lavdia në jetët të jetëvet. sepse joteja âsht rregjinija e fuqia e lafti në jetët të jetëvet. for thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever and ever. Source: Η Καινή Διαθήκη στα Αρβανίτικα; "Christus Rex" website

Some common phrases

Source: Arvanitikos Syndesmos Ellados

Flet fare arbërisht?	Do you speak Arvanitika at all?
Flas shumë pak.	I speak very little.
Je mirë?	Are you well?
Jam shumë mirë.	I am very well.

Footnotes

References

• Babiniotis, Georgios (1985): Συνοπτική Ιστορία της ελληνικής γλώσσας με εισαγωγή στην ιστορικοσυγκριτική γλωσσολογία. ["A concise history of the Greek language, with an introduction to historical-comparative linguistics] Athens: Ellinika Grammata.
• Babiniotis, Georgios (1998), Λεξικό της Νέας Ελληνικής Γλώσσας ["Dictionary of Modern Greek"]. Athens: Kentro Lexikologias.
• Banfi, Emanuele (1994): "Minorités linguistiques en Grèce: Langues cachées, idéologie nationale, religion." ["Linguistic minorities in Greece: Hidden languages, national ideology, religion."] Paper presented at the Mercator Program Seminar at the Maison des Sciences de l’ Homme, on 6 June 1994, in Paris.
• Banfi, Emanuele (1996), "Minoranze linguistiche in Grecia: problemi storico- e sociolinguistici" ["Linguistic minorities in Greece: Historical and sociolinguistic problems"]. In: C. Vallini (ed.), Minoranze e lingue minoritarie: convegno internazionale. Naples: Universtario Orientale. 89-115.
• Botsi, Eleni (2003): Die sprachliche Selbst- und Fremdkonstruktion am Beispiel eines arvanitischen Dorfes Griechenlands: Eine soziolinguistische Studie. ("Linguistic construction of the self and the other in an Arvanite village in Greece: A sociolinguistic study"). PhD dissertation, University of Konstanz, Germany. Online text
• Breu, Walter (1990): "Sprachliche Minderheiten in Italien und Griechenland." ["Linguistic minorities in Italy and Greece"]. In: B. Spillner (ed.), Interkulturelle Kommunikation. Frankfurt: Lang. 169-170.
• Euromosaic (1996): "L'arvanite / albanais en Grèce". Report published by the Institut de Sociolingüística Catalana. Online version
• Furikis, Petros (1934): "Η εν Αττική ελληνοαλβανική διάλεκτος". ["The Greek-Albanian dialect in Attica"] Αθήνα 45: 49-181.
• GHM (=Greek Helsinki Monitor) (1995): "Report: The Arvanites". Online report
• Gordon, Raymond G. (ed.) (2005): Ethnologue: Languages of the world. 15th edition. Dallas: SIL International. Online database
• Haebler, Claus (1965): Grammatik der albanischen Mundarten von Salamis. ["Grammar of the Albanian dialects of Salamis"]. Wiesbaden: Harassowitz.
• Hammarström, Harald (2005): Review of Ethnologue: Languages of the World, 15th Edition. LINGUIST List 16.2637 (5 Sept 2005). Online article
• Joseph, Brian D. "Comparative perspectives on the place of Arvanitika within Greece and the Greek environment", 1999, pp. 208-214 in L. Tsitsipis (ed.), Arvanitika ke Elinika: Zitimata Poliglosikon ke Polipolitismikon Kinotiton Vol. II. Livadia: Exandas, 1999 PDF.
• Η Καινή Διαθήκη στα Αρβανίτικα: Διάτα ε Ρε ['The New Testament in Arvanitika']. Athens: Ekdoseis Gerou. No date.
• Kloss, Heinz (1967): "Abstand-languages and Ausbau-languages". Anthropological linguistics 9.
• Salminen, Tapani (1993-1999): Unesco Red Book on Endangered Languages: Europe. [10].
• Sasse, Hans-Jürgen (1985): "Sprachkontakt und Sprachwandel: Die Gräzisierung der albanischen Mundarten Griechenlands" ["Language contact and language change: The Hellenization of the Albanian dialects of Greece"]. Papiere zur Linguistik 32(1). 37-95.
• Sasse, Hans-Jürgen (1991): Arvanitika: Die albanischen Sprachreste in Griechenland. ["Arvanitika: The Albanian language relics in Greece"]. Wiesbaden.
• Sasse, Hans-Jürgen (1992): "Theory of language death". In: M. Brenzinger (ed.), Language death: Factual and theoretical explorations with special reference to East Africa. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. 7-30.
• Sella-Mazi, Eleni (1997): "Διγλωσσία και ολιγώτερο ομιλούμενες γλώσσες στην Ελλάδα" ["Diglossia and lesser-spoken languages in Greece"]. In: K. Tsitselikis, D. Christopoulos (eds.), Το μειονοτικό φαινόμενο στην Ελλάδα ["The minority phenomenon in Greece"]. Athens: Ekdoseis Kritiki. 349-413.
• Strauss, Dietrich (1978): "Scots is not alone: Further comparative considerations". Actes du 2^e Colloque de Language et de Litterature Ecossaises, Strasbourg 1978. 80-97.
• Thomason, Sarah G. (2001): Language contact: An introduction. Washington: Georgetown University Press. Online chapter
• Trudgill, Peter (1976-77): "Creolization in reverse: reduction and simplification in the Albanian dialects of Greece", Transactions of the Philological Society, 32-50.
• Trudgill, Peter (2004): "Glocalisation [sic] and the Ausbau sociolinguistics of modern Europe". In: A. Duszak, U. Okulska (eds.), Speaking from the margin: Global English from a European perspective. Frankfurt: Peter Lang. Online article
• Trudgill, Peter, George A. Tzavaras (1977): "Why Albanian-Greeks are not Albanians: Language shift in Attika and Biotia." In: H. Giles (ed.), Language, ethnicity and intergroup relations. London: Academic Press. 171-184.
• Tsitsipis, Lukas (1981): Language change and language death in Albanian speech communities in Greece: A sociolinguistic study. PhD dissertation, University of Wisconsin, Madison.
• Tsitsipis, Lukas (1983): "Language shift among the Albanian speakers of Greece." Anthropological Linguisitcs 25(3): 288-308.
• Tsitsipis, Lukas (1995): "The coding of linguistic ideology in Arvanitika (Albanian): Language shift, congruent and contradictory discourse." Anthropological Linguistics 37: 541-577.
• Tsitsipis, Lukas (1998a): Αρβανίτικα και Ελληνικά: Ζητήματα πολυγλωσσικών και πολυπολιτισμικών κοινοτήτων. ["Arvanitika and Greek: Issues of multilingual and multicultural communities"]. Vol. 1. Livadeia.
• Tsitsipis, Lukas (1998b): A Linguistic Anthropology of Praxis and Language Shift: Arvanitika (Albanian) and Greek in Contact. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-823731-6. (Review by Alexander Rusakov on Linguist List.)
• The bilingual New Testament: H καινη Διαθηκη του Κυριου και Σωτηρος ημων Iησου Χριστου, διγλωττος, τουτεστι γραικικη και αλβανιτικη. Dhjata e re e Zotit sonë që na shpëtoi, Iisu Hrishtoit mbë di gjuhë, do me thënë gërqishte e dhe shqipëtarçe. Epistasia Grêgoriou Archiepiskopou tês Euboias. Korfoi. En tê typografia tês Dioikêseôs. 1827

External links

• Ethnologue entry
• UNESCO's entry on Arvanitika Albanian
• Arvanitic dialogues - Arvanite League of Greece (in Arvanitika and in Greek)
• Study on the third person pronoun of Arvanitika by Panayotis D. Kupitoris, 24 March 1989