 | This article includes a list of general references, but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations. (October 2021) |
| Silesian | |
|---|---|
| Lower Silesian, Silesian German | |
| Schläsche Sproache | |
| Native to | Germany, Poland, Czech Republic |
| Region | Silesia; also spoken in Czech Republic and German Silesia (area that was part of Prussian Province of Silesia, more or less around Hoyerswerda, now in Saxony) |
| Ethnicity | Silesians |
Native speakers | (undated figure of 12,000 in Poland)[1] 11,000 in the Czech Republic (2001 census) |
Early forms | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | sli |
| Glottolog | lowe1388 |
| ELP | Lower Silesian |
Silesian (Silesian: Schläsisch, Schläs’sch, Schlä’sch, Schläsch, German: Schlesisch), Silesian German or Lower Silesian is a nearly extinct German dialect spoken in Silesia. It is part of the East Central German language area with some West Slavic and Lechitic influences. Silesian German emerged as the result of Late Medieval German migration to Silesia,[2] which had been inhabited by Lechitic or West Slavic peoples in the Early Middle Ages.
Until 1945, variations of the dialect were spoken by about seven million people in Silesia and neighboring regions of Bohemia and Moravia.[3] After World War II, when the province of Silesia was incorporated into Poland, with small portions remaining in northeastern Czech Republic and in former central Germany, which henceforth became eastern Germany, the local communist authorities expelled the German-speaking population and forbade the use of the language.
Silesian German continued to be spoken only by individual families, only few of them remaining in their home region, but most of them expelled to the remaining territory of Germany. Most descendants of the Silesian Germans expelled to West and East Germany no longer learned the dialect, and the cultural gatherings were less and less frequented.
A remaining German minority in Opole Voivodeship continues use of German in Upper Silesia, but only the older generation speaks the Upper Silesian dialect of Silesian German in today's Poland.
- ^ Silesian at Ethnologue (16th ed., 2009)
- ^ Weinhold, Karl (1887). Die Verbreitung und die Herkunft der Deutschen in Schlesien [The Spread and the Origin of Germans in Silesia] (in German). Stuttgart: J. Engelhorn.
- ^ Klaus Ullmann: Schlesien-Lexikon, 2. Band der Reihe Deutsche Landschaften im Lexikon, 3. Auflage 1982, Adam Kraft Verlag GmbH & Co. KG Mannheim, pp. 260–262.
