Älvdalsmål
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Älvdalsmål (English: lit. "Älvdalen speech; Elfdalian", also Älvdalska, Övdalsk) is a form of Scandinavian spoken in in Älvdalen Municipality in northern Dalarna, Sweden. It is considered to be a dialect of Swedish by many linguists specializing in the taxonomy of the Germanic languages, but it is now also sometimes considered a separate language depending on the definitions of "language" and "dialect" a given linguist uses. Like other dialects spoken around Lake Siljan that are distinct from standard Swedish, Älvdalsmål retains numerous older grammatical and phonological features that have not changed considerably since Old Swedish, the form of Swedish spoken during the Middle Ages.
Recently there have been attempts to create a written standard for Älvdalsmål through the establishment of the Ulum Dalska association with help from the group Råðdjärum (lit. "Let us confer"), whose members include prominent Swedish linguists such as Östen Dahl.
It is esimated that Älvdalska has only a few thousand native speakers left and is at risk of extinction. However, it is possible that it will receive official status as a minority language in Sweden, which would entail numerous protections and encourage its use in schools and by writers and artists.
[edit] External links
- Language Tree - Ethnologue report
- (Swedish) Borlänge Tidning - article on the establishment of the first spelling standard by Ulum Dalska (in Swedish)
- Älvdalska, det lokala språket. - homepage for the Älvdalen speech hosted by the Älvdalen Municipality
[edit] References
- Nationalencyklopedin, entry älvdalsmål, subentry Dalarna
