Võro language: Difference between revisions

Võro
Võro
võro kiil
Native to	Estonia
Region	Southern Estonia
Native speakers	70,000
Language family	Uralic Finno-Ugric Finno-Lappic Baltic-Finnic South Estonian Võro; ; ; ; ;
Official status
Regulated by	Võro Institute (semi-official)
Language codes
ISO 639-2	fiu
ISO 639-3	; vro – Võro
ELP	Võro
	Võro language area — Võromaa (Võro county) in its historical boundaries between Tartu and Seto areas, Russia (Vinnemaa) and Latvia (Lätimaa)

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File:ABC kiräoppus.jpg

A 1998 ABC-book in Võro language written by Jüvä Sullõv, Kauksi Ülle etc.: "ABC kiräoppus"

The Võro language (Võro: võro kiil, Estonian: võru keel )^[1] is a language belonging to the Baltic-Finnic branch of the Finno-Ugric languages. Traditionally it has been considered a dialect of South Estonian dialect group of the Estonian language, but nowadays it has its own literary language^[2] and is in search of official recognition as an autochthonous regional language of Estonia. Võro has about 70,000 speakers (Võros) mostly in south-eastern Estonia, in the eight parishes of historical Võru County: Karula, Harglõ, Urvastõ, Rõugõ, Kanepi, Põlva, Räpinä, and Vahtsõliina. These parishes are currently centered (due to redistricting) in Võru and Põlva Counties with parts extending into Valga and Tartu counties. Speakers can also be found in the towns of Tallinn, Tartu and the rest of Estonia.

History

Võro is a descendant of the old South Estonian tribal language and is the least influenced by Standard Estonian (which is based on Northern Estonian dialects). Võro was once spoken further south and east of historical Võromaa in South Estonian-speaking enclaves Lutsi, Leivu and Kraasna in what is now Latvia and Russia. In addition to Võro, other contemporary variants of South Estonian include the Mulgi, Tartu and Seto language or dialect.

One of the earliest written evidences of South Estonian is a translation of the New Testament (Wastne Testament) published in 1686. Although the status of South Estonian began to diminish after the 1880s, the language began to undergo a revival in the late 1980s.

Present situation

Today, Võro is used in the works of some of Estonia's most well known playwrights, poets, and authors (Madis Kõiv, Ülle Kauksi, Jaan Kaplinski, Ain Kaalep etc.). One newspaper is printed in Võro: the fortnightly Uma Leht (literally Our Own Newspaper). 26 public schools offer weekly special (mostly extracurricular) classes in modern Võro. Estonia's contribution to the Eurovision Song Contest 2004 was the song "Tii", which was performed by Neiokõsõ in Võro. The language is definitely endangered^[3] by standard Estonian due to the lack of the government's legal commitment to protect the language.

Writing system

Võro employs the Latin alphabet, like Estonian and Finnish.

А /ɑ/	B /p/	C /t͡s/	D /t/	E /e/	F /f/	G /k/	H /h/	I /i/	J /j/	K /kk/
L /l/	M /m/	N /n/	O /o/	P /pp/	Q /ʔ/	R /r/	S /ss/	Š /ʃʃ/	T /tt/	U /u/
V /v/	W /v/	Õ /ɤ/	Ä /æ/	Ö [ø]	Ü /y/	X /ks/	Y /ɨ/	Z /s/	Ž /ʃ/	' /◌ʲ/

Most letters (including ä, ö, ü, and õ) denote the same sounds as in Estonian, with a few exceptions. The letter q stands for the glottal stop /ʔ/ and y denotes /ɨ/, a vowel very close to Russian ы or Polish y (from 2005 marked with õ). The acute accent marks palatalization of consonants (like in Polish): ś, ń, ľ, ť, ḱ, h́, ḿ, and so on.

Phonology

Vowels

	Unrounded	Rounded	Unrounded	Rounded
	Front		Back
Close	i	y	ɨ	u
Mid	e	ø	ɤ	o
Open	æ		ɑ

In Võro there is vowel harmony, typical of many Finno-Ugric languages but lacking in modern standard Estonian.

Consonants

	Bilabial	Labio- dental	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Plosive	p pʲ		t tʲ		k kʲ	ʔ
Affricate			ts tsʲ
Nasal	m mʲ		n nʲ		ŋ ŋʲ
Fricative		v vʲ	s sʲ			h hʲ
Approximant			l lʲ	j
Trill			r rʲ

All Võro consonants (except /j/ and /ʔ/) can be palatalized. The glottal stop (q, IPA [ʔ]) is a very common sound in Võro.

Language example

Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Võro:

Kõik inemiseq sünnüseq avvo ja õiguisi poolõst ütesugumaidsis. Näile om annõt mudsu ja süämetunnistus ja nä piät ütstõõsõga vele muudu läbi käümä.

As comparison the same sentence in Standard Estonian:

Kõik inimesed sünnivad vabadena ja võrdsetena oma väärikuselt ja õigustelt. Neile on antud mõistus ja südametunnistus ja nende suhtumist üksteisesse peab kandma vendluse vaim.

Differences between Võro and Estonian

Significant difference between standard Estonian and the Võro language is vowel harmony. There is no vowel harmony in the majority of North Estonian dialects and standard Estonian, but it exists in the Võro language; compare:

Estonian	Võro	Meaning
küla	külä	village
küsinud	küsünüq	(has been) asked
hõbedane	hõbõhõnõ	(made of) silver

Some morphological features of the Võro language are considered to be very old. For instance the 3rd person singular of the indicative mood can be either without an ending or, alternatively, with a s-ending:

Estonian	Võro	Meaning
kirjutab	kirotas	he writes
annab	and	he gives

Among the Finnic languages, such double verb conjugation can be found only in the South Estonian and Karelian languages.

Võro has a negative particle that is appended to the end of the verb, whereas standard Estonian has a negative verb, which precedes the verb. In standard Estonian, the negative verb ei is used in both present and past negation, whereas in Võro the same is expressed by different particles:

Estonian	Võro	Meaning
sa ei anna	saq anna-aiq	You don't give
ma ei tule	maq tulõ-õiq	I don't come
sa ei andnud	saq anna-as	You didn't give
ma ei tulnud	maq tulõ-õs	I didn't come

Differences in vocabulary between Estonian and the Võro language can be clearly seen in everyday speech (yet a common Estonian is able to understand most everyday Võro words, since many of them exist in Standard Estonian as dialectal synonyms for the words given or in literary language):

Estonian	Võro	Estonian (dialectal) literary word	Meaning
punane	verrev	verev	red
soe	lämmi	lämmi, lämbe	warm
jahe	oigõ	-	cool, chilly
õde	sõsar	sõsar- (in compound words)	sister
uus	vahtsõnõ	vastne	new
koer	pini	peni	dog
pöial	päss	-	thumb
pesema	mõskma	mõskma	to wash
tänavu	timahavva	-	this year
hunt	susi	susi	wolf
mäger	kähr	-	badger
laupäev	puulpäiv	-	Saturday
surema	kuulma	koolma	to die
sõstar	hõrak	-	currant
kask	kõiv	kõiv	birch
nutma	ikma	itkema	to weep
märkama	rõbahtama	-	to notice

Bibliography

Ehala, Martin & Niglas, Katrin (2007): Empirical evaluation of a mathematical model of ethnolinguistic vitality: the case of Võro. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development.
Eller, Kalle (1999): Võro-Seto language. Võro Instituut'. Võro.
Iva, Sulev; Pajusalu, Karl (2004): The Võro Language: Historical Development and Present Situation. In: Language Policy and Sociolinguistics I: "Regional Languages in the New Europe" International Scientific Conference; Rēzeknes Augstskola, Latvija; 20-23 May 2004. Rezekne: Rezekne Augstskolas Izdevnieceba, 2004, 58 - 63.
Iva, Sulev (2007): Võru kirjakeele sõnamuutmissüsteem (Inflectional Morphology in the Võro Literary Language). Dissertationes Philologiae Estonicae Universitatis Tartuensis 20, Tartu: Tartu Ülikooli Kirjastus (online: http://dspace.utlib.ee/dspace/bitstream/10062/4860/1/iva_sulev.pdf, English summary pp 144-146).
Jüvä, Sullõv (2002): Võro-eesti synaraamat (Võro-Estonian dictionary). Publications of Võro Institute 12. Tarto-Võro.
Keem, Hella (1997): Võru keel (Võro language). Võro Instituut ja Eesti teaduste akadeemia Emakeele selts. Tallinn.
Koreinik, Kadri (2007): The Võro language in education in Estonia. Regional dossiers series. Mercator. European Research Centre on Multilingualism and Language Learning (online: http://www1.fa.knaw.nl/mercator/regionale_dossiers/PDFs/vo%CC%83ro_in_estonia.pdf).
Koreinik, Kadri; Pajusalu, Karl (2007): Language naming practices and linguistic identity in South-Eastern Estonia. – Language and Identity in the Finno-Ugric World. Proceedings of the Fourth International Symposium at the University of Groningen, May 17–19, 2006. R. Blokland and C. Hasselblatt (eds). (Studia Fenno-Ugrica Groningana 4). Maastricht: Shaker.

External links

References

[1] Võro language by Kara D. Brown, Phd at Indiana University

[2] Võru kirjakeele sõnamuutmissüsteem (Inflectional Morphology in the Võro Literary Language) by Sulev Iva, Phd at Tartu University, (English summary pp 144-146)

[3] UNESCO Interactive Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger UNESCO

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@@ Line 41: / Line 41: @@
 |}
-Most letters (including ''ä'', ''ö'', ''ü'', and ''õ'') denote the same sounds as in Estonian, with a few exceptions. The letter ''q'' stands for the [[glottal stop]] /{{IPA|ʔ}}/, ''y'' denotes /{{IPA|[[Close central unrounded vowel|ɨ]]}}/ (a vowel very close to [[Russian language|Russian]] ''ы'' or [[Polish language|Polish]] ''y''), the [[acute accent]] marks [[palatalization]] of consonants (like in [[Polish language|Polish]]): ''ś'', ''ń'', ''ľ'', ''ť'', {{unicode|''ḱ''}}, {{unicode|''h́''}}, {{unicode|''ḿ''}}, and so on.
+Most letters (including ''ä'', ''ö'', ''ü'', and ''õ'') denote the same sounds as in Estonian, with a few exceptions. The letter ''q'' stands for the [[glottal stop]] /{{IPA|ʔ}}/ and ''y'' denotes /{{IPA|[[Close central unrounded vowel|ɨ]]}}/, a vowel very close to [[Russian language|Russian]] ''ы'' or [[Polish language|Polish]] ''y'' (from 2005 marked with ''õ''). The [[acute accent]] marks [[palatalization]] of consonants (like in [[Polish language|Polish]]): ''ś'', ''ń'', ''ľ'', ''ť'', {{unicode|''ḱ''}}, {{unicode|''h́''}}, {{unicode|''ḿ''}}, and so on.
 == Phonology ==