Speakers Statistics/Speakers’ traits

It is estimated that in the region of Polish Orava and Spis, there live about 10-20 thousand Slovaks that speak local dialects (Moskal 2004: 11Moskal 2004 / komentarz/comment/r /
Moskal, Marta 2004. Policy on Minority and Regional Languages in Poland. Uniwersytet Jagielloński. URL: http://www.aber.ac.uk/mercator/images/Martapaper.pdf [dostęp: 25.09.2012 r.]
).

Number of speakers: native language

The inhabitants of Orava use natively (as their first language) the Oravian dialect – it refers also to people of Slovak origin (Moskal 2004: 2Moskal 2004 / komentarz/comment/r /
Moskal, Marta 2004. Policy on Minority and Regional Languages in Poland. Uniwersytet Jagielloński. URL: http://www.aber.ac.uk/mercator/images/Martapaper.pdf [dostęp: 25.09.2012 r.]
).

Number of speakers: on daily basis

Most of the speakers use Oravian dialect on daily basis since their birth and in many cases it supplanted Polish and Slovak (Moskal 2004: 7Moskal 2004 / komentarz/comment/r /
Moskal, Marta 2004. Policy on Minority and Regional Languages in Poland. Uniwersytet Jagielloński. URL: http://www.aber.ac.uk/mercator/images/Martapaper.pdf [dostęp: 25.09.2012 r.]
). The number of children declaring everyday use of Oravian dialect decreases which is caused by wider access to the standard form of Polish language (Zgama 2003: 189fZgama 2003 / komentarz/comment/r /
Zgama, Barbara 2003. „Leksyka gwarowa w wypracowaniach orawskich gimnazjalistów (na przykładzie Podwilka)”, Biuletyn polskiego towarzystwa językoznawczego LIX. URL: http://www.mimuw.edu.pl/polszczyzna/PTJ/b/b59_189-197.pdf [dostęp: 26.09.2012 r.]
). It is estimated that before the year 2000 the dialect was used by about 40 thousand speakers.

Speakers’ age

Despite the quite high prestige of the dialect, its speakers are mainly adult people. School children are gradually ceasing to use the Oravian dialect and are increasingly speaking the literary languages (Polish and Slovak).

Percentage in the country/territory/region

In some Orava regions (mainly in smaller villages) there are almost 100% native speakers of Oravian dialect. The Orava people constitute less than 1% of population in both countries.

What languages do they use?

The inhabitants of Orava region use the Polish and Slovak languages to a greater extent (on both sides of the border) at the expense of Oravian dialect. The literary forms of these languages are being supplanted


#brak tłumaczenia#Południowy zasięg języka polskiego (zwarty obszar i enklawy) - map ed.: Jacek Cieślewicz.