Southern Russian dialects
Encyclopedia
Southern Russian is one of the main groups of Russian
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...

 dialects.

Territory

  • The territory of the primary formation (e.g. that consist of "Old" Russia of the 16th century before Eastern conquests by Ivan IV) is entirely 11 modern regions (oblasts): Belgorod
    Belgorod Oblast
    Belgorod Oblast is a federal subjects of Russia . Its administrative center is the city of Belgorod. Population: 1,532,670 .-History:...

    , Bryansk
    Bryansk Oblast
    Bryansk Oblast is a federal subject of Russia . Its administrative center is the city of Bryansk. Population: 1,278,087 .-History:...

    , Kaluga
    Kaluga Oblast
    Kaluga Oblast is a federal subject of Russia . Its administrative center is the city of Kaluga.-Geography:Kaluga Oblast is located in the central part of the East European Plain. The Smolensk Highland lays in the western and north-western part of the oblast, while the Central Russian Highland -...

    , Kursk
    Kursk Oblast
    Kursk Oblast is a federal subject of Russia . Its administrative center is the city of Kursk.-Geography:The oblast occupies the southern slopes of the middle-Russian plateau, and its average elevation is from 177 to 225 meters . The surface is hilly, and intersected by ravines...

    , Lipetsk
    Lipetsk Oblast
    Lipetsk Oblast is a federal subject of Russia which was formed on January 6, 1954. Its administrative center is the city of Lipetsk...

    , Oryol
    Oryol Oblast
    Oryol Oblast is a federal subject of Russia . Its administrative center is the city of Oryol. Population: -Geography:It is located in the southwestern part of the Central Federal District, in the Mid-Russian Highlands. Kaluga and Tula Oblasts border it in the north, Bryansk Oblast is located to...

    , Ryazan
    Ryazan Oblast
    Ryazan Oblast is a federal subject of Russia . Its administrative center is the city of Ryazan, which is the oblast's largest city. Population: -Geography:...

    , Smolensk
    Smolensk Oblast
    Smolensk Oblast is a federal subject of Russia . Its area is . Population: -Geography:The administrative center of Smolensk Oblast is the city of Smolensk. Other ancient towns include Vyazma and Dorogobuzh....

     Tambov
    Tambov Oblast
    Tambov Oblast is a federal subject of Russia . Its administrative center is the city of Tambov. Population: down from 1,178,443 recorded by the 2002 Census.Tambov Oblast is situated in forest steppe.-Birth rate:...

    , Tula
    Tula Oblast
    Tula Oblast is a federal subject of Russia with its present borders formed on September 26, 1937. Its administrative center is the city of Tula. The oblast has an area of and a population of 1,553,874...

    , Voronezh
    Voronezh Oblast
    Voronezh Oblast is a federal subject of Russia . It was established on June 13, 1934.-Main rivers:*Don*Voronezh*Bityug*Khopyor-Economy:...

    : and some southern parts of 3 regions: Moscow
    Moscow Oblast
    Moscow Oblast , or Podmoskovye , is a federal subject of Russia . Its area, at , is relatively small compared to other federal subjects, but it is one of the most densely populated regions in the country and, with the 2010 population of 7,092,941, is the second most populous federal subject...

    , Pskov
    Pskov Oblast
    Pskov Oblast is a federal subject of Russia . Pskov Oblast borders the countries of Estonia and Latvia, as well as Belarus. It is the westernmost federal subject of contiguous Russia . Its major cities are the administrative center Pskov and Velikiye Luki . Area: 55,300 km²...

     and Tver
    Tver Oblast
    Tver Oblast is a federal subject of Russia . Its administrative center is the city of Tver. From 1935 to 1990, it was named Kalinin Oblast after Mikhail Kalinin. Population: Tver Oblast is an area of lakes, such as Seliger and Brosno...


  • The territory of the second formation (e.g. where Russians settled after the 16th century) consist of most the land of lower Don
    Don
    - People :* Don , a short form of the masculine given name Donald in English, also a masculine given name in Irish* Don , a Spanish, Portuguese and Italian title, given as a mark of respect* Don, a crime boss...

     and Volga, the Northern Caucasus as well as Southern Ural
    Ural
    Ural may refer to one of the following:*Ural Mountains*Ural *Ural River*Ural Federal District*Ural economic region*Urals oil, a reference oil brand*Ural Automotive Plant*Ural-4320, Ural-375D and Ural-5323, Soviet and Russian military trucks...

    , Siberia
    Siberia
    Siberia is an extensive region constituting almost all of Northern Asia. Comprising the central and eastern portion of the Russian Federation, it was part of the Soviet Union from its beginning, as its predecessor states, the Tsardom of Russia and the Russian Empire, conquered it during the 16th...

    , and Far East
    Russian Far East
    Russian Far East is a term that refers to the Russian part of the Far East, i.e., extreme east parts of Russia, between Lake Baikal in Eastern Siberia and the Pacific Ocean...

    .

Phonology

  • Unstressed /o/ undergoes different degrees of vowel reduction mainly to [a] (strong akanye
    Akanye
    Akanye or akanje is a phonological phenomenon in Slavic languages in which speakers pronounce the sound a instead of o. The most familiar example is probably Russian akanye...

    ), less often to [ɐ], [ə], [ɨ].
  • Unstressed /o/, /e/, /a/ following palatalized
    Palatalization
    In linguistics, palatalization , also palatization, may refer to two different processes by which a sound, usually a consonant, comes to be produced with the tongue in a position in the mouth near the palate....

     consonants and preceding a stressed syllable are not reduced to [ɪ] (like in the Moscow dialect), being instead pronounced [æ] in such positions (e.g. несли is pronounced [nʲasˈlʲi], not [nʲɪsˈlʲi]) – this is called yakanye/яканье.
  • Fricative /ɣ/
    Velar fricative
    Velar fricative can refer to*voiced velar fricative: in the International Phonetic Alphabet*voiceless velar fricative: in the International Phonetic Alphabet...

     instead of the Standard and Northern /ɡ/. Soft /ɣʲ/ is usually [j~ʝ].
  • Semivowel /w~u̯/
    Semivowel
    In phonetics and phonology, a semivowel is a sound, such as English or , that is phonetically similar to a vowel sound but functions as the syllable boundary rather than as the nucleus of a syllable.-Classification:...

     in the place of the Standard and Northern /v/ and final /l/. where the Standard and Northern have /f/.
  • Protetic /w~u̯/ before /ɣ/ and stressed /a/: во́кна, ву́лица, Standard Russian окна, улица "windows, street".
  • Protetic /j/ before /i/ and /e/: етот, ентот, Standard Russian этот "this".
  • In Pskov
    Pskov
    Pskov is an ancient city and the administrative center of Pskov Oblast, Russia, located in the northwest of Russia about east from the Estonian border, on the Velikaya River. Population: -Early history:...

     (southern) and Ryazan
    Ryazan
    Ryazan is a city and the administrative center of Ryazan Oblast, Russia. It is located on the Oka River southeast of Moscow. Population: The strategic bomber base Dyagilevo is just west of the city, and the air base of Alexandrovo is to the southeast as is the Ryazan Turlatovo Airport...

     sub-groups only one voiceless
    Voiceless
    In linguistics, voicelessness is the property of sounds being pronounced without the larynx vibrating. Phonologically, this is a type of phonation, which contrasts with other states of the larynx, but some object that the word "phonation" implies voicing, and that voicelessness is the lack of...

     affricate
    Affricate consonant
    Affricates are consonants that begin as stops but release as a fricative rather than directly into the following vowel.- Samples :...

     exists. Merging of Standard Russian /t͡ʃ/ and /t͡s/ into one consonant whether /t͡s/ or /t͡ɕ/.

Morphology

  • Palatalized final /tʲ/ in 3rd person forms of verbs (this is unpalatalized in the Standard and Northern dialects): он ходить, они ходять "he goes, they go"
  • Occasional dropping of the 3rd person ending /tʲ/ at all: он ходи, они ходя "he goes, they go"
  • Oblique case forms of personal pronouns мяне́, табе́, сабе́ instead of Standard Russian мне, тебе, себе "me, you, -self".

Relation to other dialects

Some of these features such as akanye/yakanye, a debuccalized
Debuccalization
Debuccalization is a sound change in which a consonant loses its original place of articulation and becomes or . The pronunciation of a consonant as is sometimes called aspiration, but in phonetics aspiration is the burst of air accompanying a plosive...

 or lenited
Lenition
In linguistics, lenition is a kind of sound change that alters consonants, making them "weaker" in some way. The word lenition itself means "softening" or "weakening" . Lenition can happen both synchronically and diachronically...

 /ɡ/, a semivowel /w~u̯/
Semivowel
In phonetics and phonology, a semivowel is a sound, such as English or , that is phonetically similar to a vowel sound but functions as the syllable boundary rather than as the nucleus of a syllable.-Classification:...

 and palatalized final /tʲ/ in 3rd person forms of verbs are also present in modern Belarusian
Belarusian language
The Belarusian language , sometimes referred to as White Russian or White Ruthenian, is the language of the Belarusian people...

 and some dialects of Ukrainian
Ukrainian language
Ukrainian is a language of the East Slavic subgroup of the Slavic languages. It is the official state language of Ukraine. Written Ukrainian uses a variant of the Cyrillic alphabet....

 (Eastern Polesian
Polesia
Polesia is one of the largest European swampy areas, located in the south-western part of the Eastern-European Lowland, mainly within Belarus and Ukraine but also partly within Poland and Russia...

), indicating a linguistic continuum.
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